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Ju 87’s going into the dive for a bombing attack.The signal to attack was given by the formation leader starting his dive.

Finally, he switched on the wind-driven ‘Screamer’ (if required) and opened the dive brakes the hydraulic operation of the brakes automatically lowered an elevator tab, to counter the severe nose-up trim-change which would otherwise result. Prior to entering his dive the Ju 87 pilot switched on his reflector sight, trimmed the aircraft for the dive, set the pull-out altitude on the contact altimeter, closed the radiator flaps, throttled back the engine and opened the ventilation air supply to the windscreen (to prevent possible misting as the aircraft entered the moist air lower down). 914 meters) to be in position to protect the bombers from enemy fighters as they pulled out of their dives. If there were fighters flying close escort, these would follow a weaving path behind and slightly above the dive-bombers as the force neared the target the escort would split, one-third remaining at height while the remainder descended to about 3,000ft (ca. 274 meters) between aircraft, up to a usual maximum of about 30 machines (Gruppe strength). Larger formations would be made up of several of these Vics in line astern, with a spacing of about 300yd (ca. When approaching their target the Ju 87s would, typically, fly in three-aircraft Vics (Ketten) at about 15,000ft (ca. In each case the nature of the target dictated the bomb load carried by the Ju 87 against a concreted fortification, for example, a single SD-500 would be used against field artillery positions, a typical load would be one SC-250 under the fuselage and four SC-50s under the wings (the designation of a German high explosive bomb indicated the type of casing and the weight of the weapon in kilos). 73 m), with moderately heavy gun defenses, a Staffel (squadron) of Ju87s stood a good chance of scoring four or five hits with large bombs. Thus, although the dive bombing attack was not accurate enough to be worth-while against small, hard targets such as individual tanks, it was very effective against soft targets, such as motor vehicles, which were vulnerable to near misses.Īgainst (say) a circular fortification with a radius of 80yd (ca. Furthermore, against operational targets, which were usually defended by anti-aircraft guns, the errors for all types of bombing were two or even three times as great as those indicated on the training ranges. On the completion of their course at the specialist Dive Bomber school, crews were expected to be able to get 50% of their bombs within 25 m (27yd) of the center of the target the comparable distance for high-flying horizontal bombers was two to three times larger.

The steep-dive attack was one of the most accurate ways of bombing. Back to Part I: German Ju 87 Junkers dive-bomber