Military Tech in Action

[Lionclaw]

Originally Posted by Oberon

Awesome pic Steve...and TLAM...that first Russkie pic has me confused...but then again, so does a lot of stuff the Russkies did Particularly it confuses me how they managed to connect the hose in mid air...

Perhaps one of the planes flew really fast and pulled the airbrake making the hose snap forward and attach to the other plane?

[TLAM Strike]

Originally Posted by Sledgehammer427

question is, did it work?

Indeed they did:

After the Nazi invasion of the USSR on 22 June 1941, the Z-SPBs actually saw significant combat use, being sent to the Black Sea region for operations. The first Z-SPB raid was conducted on an oil depot in Constanta, Rumania on 26 July 1941. Two I-16SPBs were released on the raid, which was highly successful, the Rumanian defenders having no warning. In fact, the I-16SPBs conducted a casual circle over the town before diving in, with no one on the ground paying them real attention until the bombs went off. Further Z-SPB attacks were conducted, with a particular focus on bridges, which the I-16SPBs proved effective in bringing down; the average ratio of bomb hits to misses in Z-SPB missions easily exceeded 50%. Vakhmistrov provided engineering assistance to further Z-SPB operations, developing an external fuel tank to help stretch the range of the I-16SPB and beefing up the armor and defensive weapons of the vulnerable TB-3s.
Records of what the Rumanians and Germans thought of the Z-SPB attacks are sketchy, but it appears they were baffled as to where the little Polikarpov fighters were coming from. German advances in the south finally forced the withdrawal of the Z-SPBs, the last combat operation taking place on 22 October 1941. They did not see action again, since both the I-16 and the TB-3 were effectively obsolete. A total of 29 sorties of the Z-SPB took place, expending a total of 116 bombs, with losses of three I-16SPBs but no TB-3s.

from: http://www.vectorsite.net/avparsit.html

Originally Posted by Oberon

Awesome pic Steve...and TLAM...that first Russkie pic has me confused...but then again, so does a lot of stuff the Russkies did Particularly it confuses me how they managed to connect the hose in mid air...

Not that complicated really the plane in front trails a hose much like in the Probe and Drogue system. The bomber behind it catches the hose with a special hookup on its wingtip.