The Mosquitos of Malta and the MTO...

P

Pen32Win

Charter Member
I've been having a lot of fun flying a campaign around the MTO and one of the stops was at Malta. In the missions you fly a Beaufighter and it got me to thinking about Mosquito Operations in the MTO. I like the Beau but love the Mossie. I ended up finding quite a bit more than I thought I would. Did you know that the SAAF flew PR Mossies in North Africa? Or that No.# 23 Sqn flew NF II Intruder's out of Malta to Tunisia and all around the MTO for a year starting in Dec. of '42, then moved to Sardinia until May of 44? No.# 256 Sqn also flew Mossies out of Malta..... Who knew?

I had no idea..... And my old buddy even did several skins to fit. Philippe's NF II has a couple of "YP" skins and "YP" belongs to No.# 23 Sqn.....

Has anyone ever done any missions concerning Mossies in the MTO? Seems like ripe ground for something new and different.... Just thinking out loud.
 
Reply...

Pen32Win,

That's been something that's been on my "to do list" for a while now. But unfortunately, I already have my Summer campaign research project. Last year, it was Operation Frantic. This year is something totally different...Italians on the Eastern Front, 1941-1943.

So if you want to do something in the Med with Bruno's Mossie and Malta scenery, have at it and I'll support you 100% with whatever you need, good buddy!

P.S. - I'm glad you like "Beaus in the Sand." I gotta finish up those last two missions so I can release her!
 
I have some good reading about Recon Flights in the Med:
SEEING THE ENEMY: ARMY AIR FORCE AERIAL RECONNAISSANCE SUPPORT TO U.S. ARMY OPERATIONS IN THE MEDITERRANEAN IN WORD WAR II, by Major David W. Dengler, 230 pages
Very interesting.

I read specifically about recon flight previous to Scicily invasion. German and Italians had their hands full of airplanes flying over their airbases daily. And it occurred to me about doing a mission taking off to fly a CAP and intercept a recon flight (one F6(P51) or PR Spitfire) over the Messina strait to protect/cover the convoys in and out of the continent, land and refuel (by going to the point in the airfields where your aircrafts refills automatically to 100% fuel, triggering at the same moment a fuel truck go and park near the fueling zone) and scramble again to protect from a bombing raid done by medium bombers on the convoys or on the airfield. Pure fantasy.

Cheers, Discus
 
Thanks Rami and Discus;

Rami while I've been flying it I've also been doing my usual tinkering. I've done my "Real Gun" fixes to all of the RM Warships and some DP fixes to some of the Merch. Fleet too.

I've also been working on getting the Player Formation AI Beaus to drop thier bombs on moving targets, though this may require as with many fast, heavy twin engine A/C, a separate AI aircraft. I've got it to the point where the AI's will do their thing and it does well as a player A/C until you get a lot on the screen, then you get the "Yaw Shakes". As soon as you look away from the busy area everything is fine......

I give you a full report and update of everything when I finish. BTW, Now all of the Landing Craft Stop at the water's edge too......

On the Malta Mossies, I've got to see if I can find the Operational Records for No.#23 Sqn for that time period. That would make a great basis for a Campaign.
 
Records

Hi Pen32Win

May be you have already seen this but in case you haven´t here is a link where you can find nº 23rd Squadron Operational Records for 1940-1943:
http://www.oldrafrecords.com/db_search.php
I hope it´s useful for you. It is for me!

The images are not very clear, but you have day by day activitie with type of aircraft, number, crew, duty, take off and landing time and detail of sortie. They have omited route, time over target, weather, and what they had for breakfast! I remember viewing web page with historiacl weather records.

110 operational records for 1943!

View attachment 36953

Discus:salute:
 
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