Word: gunners
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...Gunners sitting inside plexiglass blisters sight the target through a small square of glass, track it to get speed, range and angle. A computer of complex and secret design sets electronic and mechanical elements in motion. The computer also makes corrections for such errors as might be caused by wind, the pull of gravity, parallax (i.e., the distance between the gunner's sighting position and the turret he is operating), and the speed of both target and firing planes. All-electric, from sight to firing pin, the guns respond to the most delicate adjustment. All a gunner...
...hanging thumbnail. It's damned annoying." Leatherneck's Career. Like many an other famed Marine (e.g., Generals "Lem" Shepherd and "Red Mike" Edson, Colonel "Chesty" Puller), Kentucky-born Jim Crowe started in the ranks. He was an enlisted man up to 1934, when he became a Marine gunner (warrant officer). After Pearl Harbor, he was commissioned a captain ("I was never a lousy second looey...
...turret gunner in a bomber must consider a complex of factors - the speed and altitude of his own plane, the angle and speed of his target, range, bullet speed...
...these computations must be made in two to seven seconds. Even with the help of tracer bullets, a trained free-hand gunner gets a very low percentage of hits...
Deadly Defense. With K8, a gunner needs relatively little training. He sets three dials, recording the altitude and speed of his own ship and the wing span of the target plane (after he recognizes the type), then looks through the sight itself -a circle of orange light with a dot in the center. Using a foot pedal to regulate the circle's size, he frames the target, from wing tip to wing tip, in the circle (see cut). The machine then instantaneously makes all the necessary computations; all the gunner has to do is press the trigger...