life span

[mike_baram]

Among the KIAs, how many of them died because of enemy bullets, and how many died because they lost control of their craft, or the thing just disintegated during evasive maneuvers?
I know, it's a rhetorical question....who,in the heat of combat, actually paid attention as to why his buddy went down?

[Barrett]

In ref. to Mike's query about KIAs from bullets or structural failure/etc, I seriously doubt anybody knows. Most allied losses occurred on the far side of the lines so the info would very seldom be compiled--to the Germans, "das macht nicht."
Rather than time spent at the front before becoming a casualty, a more meaningful figure would be offensive sorties or flight hours. Whether two weeks or four months, the period could easily be lengthened by periods of bad weather, illness, leave, etc., whereas sorties or hours deal specifically with time "on the job."
Ref. TJP, I don't have my copy with me but I remember thinking while compiling the "success ratio" (roughly 48%) that very few seemed to have been killed or seriously injured in accidents. It'd be interesting to see the allied vs. German figures on accident stats--I'd guess the Germans and French figures were relatively low.

According to The First of the Few (Denis Winter, 1982):

"Dead and missing in the air service fronts during the war totalled about 9,000, according to official figures. When this figure is set against the million or so soldiers dead, such a relatively small number might seem a small matter...

"The loss was a severe one nevertheless, because the air force had a structure unlike any other arm of the fighting services, and when the number of deaths is set against the total number of men who formed the fighting end of the air war, the grievous nature of the loss becomes clear, for pilots constituted just 3 percent of the British Expeditionary Force. Put more simply, on Armistice Day there were only 5,182 pilots on the west front, and, set against this tiny strike force, the figure of 9,000 makes better sense."

"...One man a week was killed on average throughout the war in 43 and 56 Squadrons - taken at random - which loss must be set against a squadron strength starting at twelve pilots and ending the war at just twenty-four."

While Winter focuses on RFC/RAF pilots--especially fighter pilots--in his book, the figures such as they are seem to support a high death rate. If his loss of one man per week is actually true, then the entire fighting strength of the squadron would be replaced every three to six months. Frankly, I don't doubt this, given comments in autobiographies I have read. Pilots returning after illness or injury--even leave--found mostly new faces in the mess.

It didn't take long to become a veteran.

Barrett said: "Rather than time spent at the front before becoming a casualty, a more meaningful figure would be offensive sorties or flight hours"


"17 Hours" is the name of a new WWI Flight sim in early development. I don't know who on the Delphi Flight Sim board found out that this was the average COMBAT(non-training) flying time a pilot had before death, wounding or capture.

I'm not sure if this was an average that could be applied only to the RFC or not. Probably.

[Vigilant]

An interesting comparison with the elite 56 Squadron is Jasta 4 - a member of Richthofen's JGI. Founded in mid-1916, they lost only 11 KIA before the armistace.

It underlines the point that losses depended on what you were doing and how you were doing it. The Germans did not have an "attack everything" policy.

Vigilant

[Lufbery]

That 17 hours thing was me, Pen. The thing is, I read it somewhere, thought it would make a great name for a game (and the guys doing it agreed *g*), and then promptly lost my source for the quote! I've been going nuts trying to quickly find the quote. I guess I'm going to have to read my stuff instead of skimming it.

When I find it, I'll post it. The point remains, however, that even if the 17 hours is absolutely accurate as an average, it can't be applicable to all services for the entire war. Statistics like these can be fun, but they're very tough to corrobarate.

-Drew

[Lufbery]

Oh yeah, one of my other suggestions for a name for the new flight sim was:

"It's F*cking Cold Up Here!"

I thought that would give the player a sense of what a WWI pilot experienced.

-Drew

[Barrett]

I recall reading that Guynemer had logged about 600 hours when he was KIA, and that figure tends to represent the upper level of other allied pilots as well, whenever such figures are available. (Coincidentally, I have about 600 hours in open-cockpit biplanes, and that's a bunch when folks are shooting at you.) Anybody know the flight hours of some German high timers? It's possible that some air arms logged flights rather than hours.
As for "It's bleeping cold up here," I seem to recall that topic featured prominently in The Aerodrome Forum Novel...the PG version.

[rammjaeger]

Hi Barrett,

I remember one of the German top bomber pilots in WWI achieved 857 missions - don´t know the number of flight hours.