Friendly fire WWII

on a note that i read in a book, sometime ago,in north afrika,,42 43.some USA or english troops were in a aera were some germans troop transports, was about? then,a small sqn, of liberater bombers were to bomb, there depo .but as they were in the wrong aera they started dropping there bombs, on allied troops,....
then a sqn, of RAF mosquito bombers were ordered to shoot the liberaters down, whitch they did,,can anyone confirm this story,or is it ,true.
gary,,,

[George Hopp]

Since Mosquito bombers weren't armed, they would have had a bit of a problem in shooting anyone down.

[PUFF OF SMOKE]

Brian, I Have Been Doing Research On RCAF 414 Over The Last Few Years. My Father Was S/L In 43 And 44. I Had The Orb For 41-45 At One Point. I Recall Reading About A Friendly Fire Dogfight The Resulted In Two Pilots ( RAF And RCAF) Being Killed And The Other Two Wingman Being Witnesses At The Subsequent Inquiry. In Reviewing The Copies Of The ORB Pages That I Retained I Can't Seem To Find It. Has Anyone Told You About This Incident ?
Ron

[Brian]

Hi Ron

Thanks for the info - I don't seem to have record of this, so if you can find out any more I would be grateful. I will have a look at 414's ORB when I get the opportunity.

Cheers
Brian

Are we suggesting Sqn Ldr Smokey Stover DFC?

[B.F.M. Droog]

Hello Brian,

As promised some info on Allied bombings on Dutch cities:

Nijmegen (near the border with Germany)

In an air attack on 22/02/1944 (ca. 13.30 hrs local time) by the 8th Air Force - supposed to hit a German town - at least 771 Dutch civilians lost their lives. A bilangual victims list (Dutch/English can be found on the site www.noviomagus.nl

Enschede (near the border with Germany)

In heavy allied air attacks on 10/10/1943, 22/02/1944 and 22/03/1945 the inner city of Enschede was heavily damaged. More than 250 civilians lost their lives. (source: Overijssel Province - history of Enschede)

Enschede was an important industrial town and industrial buildings were throughout the war attacked on purpose - but at least two of these bombardments (the last two) were a mistake; the bombs were supposed to hit a target in Germany.

Further Dutch cities attacked on the 22/02/1944 were Arnhem and Deventer.

The book 'De fatale aanval' (the fatal attack) by Alfons E. Brinkuis can be read on the site of Nijmegen City. It's in Dutch, but with a wee bit of effort even Englishmen should be able to distill the American units responsible for these attacks out of it.

I'll report later on an air attack on The Hague.

Regards,

Bart

Dear Brian,

While brousing through the Aviation Saftey Network, I found this:
FW200 D-ARHW 29 November 1944, friendly fire accident

Norman Malayney

[Brian]

Thanks Tony and Norman

I do have these incidents records, but thanks all the same.

Tony: Deere wasn't guilty of the 1/8/41 downing of the 242 Squadron Hurricane.

Cheers
Brian

[park20]

Brian
My father survived a friendly fire incident while on patrol at night in the Pacific.
He was one of Black Mac's killers in VMF(N)-533 ca.1945
I cannot give exact details about everything but the story is fascinating. I have a few pics of the Hellcat he brought home

would be willing to re-tell the story as best i can in an email

clay.parkhill@yahoo.com

[Brian]

Hi Clay

Yes please, I would be delighted to receive an account. Please contact me briancullauthor@fsmail.net

Many thanks
Brian

[jhor99]

Originally Posted by Brian

Hi guys

I have just joined your honourable guild of aviation experts. I am conducting research into friendly fire incidents for my new book. I am interested in all such incidents concerning misidentification in the air during WWII, and seek your help. My two-volume study covers all air forces, in all theatres of the war. Quite an undertaking, no doubt you will agree. My draft already contains hundreds of recorded incidents but I am sure there are more to be uncovered. Please help!

I notice that all previous comments have to do with ground fire downing friendly aircraft.
There were incidents where aircraft bombers shot diwn friendly planes. We knew that if a plane pointed his nose at you to open fire immediately,There were times when P-38s had an engine shot out, in order to join a formation of bombers the plane had to slide in and not try to go nose in.