RIP William Snipes. He was a terror to the Eindeckers in his DH2 and Nieuport 11. Alas, on his first day transferred to RNAS-1 on 9 Sept 1916, his engine failed on takeoff and plowed directly into a tree past the end of the runway. Nearly 200 hours flying time - no labels but I did use time compression.

200 hours is an amazing achievement. We'll done on that. Sorry to see Snips go out to a dud engine.

97 confirmed victories in four months of combat!?! Snipes really was the terror of the skies over the Western Front! Very sorry to hear about his loss Hellshade.

Wow 200h, in my case flying a scout, 10 missions max before, being shot down.

Those Pup's are real death traps!

William "the sniper" Snipes will be missed. I raise a toast in his honour.

Wow, almost one kill every 2 hours of flight, early in the war! That guy in 1918 must have made Fonck look like a boy scout!

Bummer Hellshade!

Wow, 200 WOFF hrs.!

He WILL be missed!

Hellshade, that is an achievement few make in WOFF. Good on you mate.

Thanks everyone. I couldn't believe it when he died. I sat there stunned that after all the combats he had been through, engine failure at takeoff and bad luck at tree placement ended his career. /sigh. So, I started again with a new pilot in his same RNAS squadron just a few months prior to his death, flying a Nieuport 10C. Well...his second mission was insane.

Flying at roughly 7,000 feet my squadron leader sees Eindeckers well below us while behind enemy lines. I dive but too steeply and I guess somewhere between 5,000 and 6,000 feet, there is a terrible cracking sound and I lose BOTH of my lower wings. Just GONE. My N10C starts spinning counter clockwise like mad. I know I am a dead man but I figure I will fight it until I hit the earth, so I apply rudder, elevators, mess with the throttle. Some things made me spin faster, others seemed to slow it for a moment but certainly never stopped the flat spin downward. At one point, my crate even flipped on it's back. Somehow - surely more luck than skill - I managed to get her righted in the air again and just as the ground was rushing up on me I was able to pull a little bit of a glide out of it instead of a straight drop down. Maybe the last 10 or 15 seconds. It's hard to say how long really, because the flat spin descent feels like forever when it's happening. Still rotating counter clockwise but slower, nose not level but not straight down either. I'm guessing 20 degree down angle. I slam into the ground with a crunch and blood splatter covers my view. But...I DIDN'T DIE! I figured it was going to be instant death, but it wasn't. I thought, "Well, when I end the mission and switch to the mission wrap up screen, it will tell me that I died there or that I had been captured." NOPE! Though badly wounded behind enemy lines after crashing from at least 5,000+ feet altitude, I managed to pull myself from the wreckage and escape back to my side for 21 days in the hospital. Workshop setting was on Normal outcomes, not Easy. A brand new pilot somehow survived that!

But my poor veteran pilot William died 20 feet off the ground hitting a tree on take off. War is hell. LOL

Just curious - can any of the true history buffs tell me if pilots ever walked (or crawled) away from crashes at that height after losing both lower wings?

Maybe if they exited the craft and luckily landed in something soft and deep like mud or hay but I doubt it. Chalk it up to the vagaries of war. I remember a yank song "on a wing and a prayer" that some how seems appropriate in your case.

Hellshade, I was wondering, are you using Normal or Easy claim setting? You seem to get a a very nice confirmation ratio for your claims. I have lately refused to make a lot of claims (even after seeing my enemy crash ) because I get so many claims rejected due to lack of visual corroboration.

I am using Easy on Confirmation of kills, Normal on Outcomes (Landed behind Enemy Lines, Crashed, etc). I probably should switch Confirmation to Normal also but I admit I just don't feel like doing the typing. LOL

On Easy you have to do the typing but you get most of the claims confirmed. It is on "Easiest" that you don´t even have to type

[Edit] - I think I am using the "middle" choice. It doesn't automatically approve victories, which is the easiest. It brings me to the claims form but all I have to do is select my witness, select the type of aircraft I shot down. There is room for text to type but I often just leave that blank. Most claims are approved but not all.

Hellshade!! My condolences on the loss of William!! 200hrs and a true terror and warrior! May he rest peacefully near the airfield where he departed and watch his brethren take to the skies to engage the enemy!

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Death by tree, a tough way to go, in particular for a pilot with that many hours of combat flying. My condolences Hellshade.

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Boelcke died in a collision with one of his wingmen, did he not? Someone else was rumored to have shot off their own prop when their sync gear failed. I guess a collision with a tree after engine faliure on take off is not any more unlikely. Even "war heroes" are subject to physics. LOL

Shades of JTBMcC VC
Cheers,
shredward