December the 14th 1940

Bit of a tricky one tonight - I very much enjoyed the set up they had going (especially with the Human ground controller) but it didn't seem to connect for us tonight.

Firstly Hinkel and I were paired with two chaps from AKA Squadron and ordered to patrol the Thames Estuary - Hinkel and I lifted first from Hornchurch as AKA were still forming up, and headed off east, only to be vectored by ground control to intercept an incoming raid at Angels 25, which turned out to actually be a low altitude raid, so we presumably flew past it high up then had to turn back around and descend - meanwhile the AKA chaps engaged with multiple contacts, but couldn't give us a good fix on their position (sometimes it was just off Eastchurch, sometimes it was just off Southend) so we flew around looking for them but didn't find them, then they eventually got shot down.

We carried on flying around the Estuary for a while before getting revectored on a low altitude raid in the middle of the Estuary, we headed for that but couldn't find anything apart from a few contacts heading east, we gave chase but got bounced by 109s, resulting in Hinkel and I ending up going for a drink (though we survived the crashes at least )

Second sortie we went back to operating as a seperate unit again and were scrambled from Hornchurch to help 310 Squadron, who were engaged defensive with some 109s near Ramsgate - presumably that fight ended one way or another, however - as we were revectored to Dover before we reached them, after that we were sent to the Calais area and ordered to patrol around the coast, being vectored on to a raid forming over the coast at Angels 7, which slipped past us and ended up as a group of 109s at 20k + just south of Folkestone, we engaged that group together with some other Spitfires and I downed a 109 (whilst Hinkel covered my six most professionaly of course ) then the fight broke up so we RTBed back to Hornchurch.

Personally I had fun, but I'm a nerd anyway so I just liked the whole Ground Controller thing - it would have been nice if we'd run into some Bombers, as all we saw were 109s and possibly 110s, and would have been nice if Hinkel could have a go at some as well.

Communication is the key thing when working with a Ground Controller and other Squadrons, usually if we saw some enemies it'd be 'enemies at 10 o'clock' then we'd be in a fight, where as with a proper chain of command we need to spot the enemy, then report back to control and give their location/heading etc, then wait for them to tell us what to do, which would have possibly resulted in a better first sortie if the other Pilots had given us a fix before engaging, leaving us not really knowing what was going on (as well as Ground Control)

All in all I think it's a very good system they've got going, better than the ATAG campaign we flew anyway, where there wasn't really any direction other than a pre-sortie conversation, but we were just a bit unlucky with the vectors.

allthough i did not fire a shot, i had fun

Sounds interesting. Shame I missed it, by the time I got back home it was 9ish so I figured it would be too late to join the fray.

Glad you enjoyed it Hink, that's the main thing at the end of the day (though killing ze Germans is always good as well )

Bad luck Speedy, hopefully you'll make it next time.

Here's my cockpit video of the main dogfight from the second sortie, annoyingly Bandicam didn't record the TeamSpeak comms on this sortie, so there aren't any.



Obviously there's no video of the first sortie as the film got wet - apparently I got picked up by Enemy Air Sea Rescue, which is interesting considering I ditched just outside the Thames Estuary

Naturally I escaped between then and the next sortie.