Must have happened when I went to the toilet, which was an unavoidable event in a film that was giving me the shits.
There were so many other things wrong with the closing sequences. For example, the German holding a torch on the tank crewman who had escaped from the belly hatch had a small torch with a brilliant white light, when every torch of that era and for decades afterwards had a yellow beam.
It’s not clear whether the belly hatch cover was between the German with the torch and the tank crewman or otherwise out of shot, but it seems that the hatch cover had been opened for escape and then locked again from below, and then later unlocked from below to allow re-entry. TG, is this plausible?
Many moons ago, when I had some vague hope that some politician and other prominent public figure would surprise me by being anything other than a lying, self-serving, self-seeking, corrupt arsehole of the first order, I used to keep a few of the items below by my chair. Very satisfying to fling at the TV and stick it on the offending image, but without damaging anything.
To my knowledge, all escape hatches can be operated only from the inside, Normally, to replace the escape hatch, it has to be pulled up from the inside to relatch it. I watched that scene on You Tube, and he drops it, then just scrambles out toward the hole left by the mine that broke their track. Doubtless he as a new guy would be panicked to a degree, and not think of using the nice flat hatch as cover, and concealment. He just wanted to get away from the blast of the two potato mashers. I saw that bright white light too, they must have given him something modern for the sake of showing up well on film. I doubt that Norman would have replaced the escape hatch after returning to the Tank, just because he probably didn’t know how to do it. I don’t think the film shows it.
Common sense says that the escape hatch and mount would be reinforced to ensure that it wouldn’t be a weak spot if an anti-tank mine went off under the belly. Is that correct?
Yes, they open (read “drop” ) outward, and are set in a reinforced hatchway much like a Submarine hatch. They are supposed to equal the surrounding area of the Hull in strength against impacts, and explosions. I found an image of a Sherman Prototype showing how crew could escape using that hatch. Looks like they drop it, and crawl out over it. In the M-60 the hatch was much heavier, about 75 Kg. and locked into the hull much like a Safe door works . We had to strap the release handle down to prevent them from popping open, and falling out. We never trained in the procedure for evacuating the tank through the escape hatch, and unless the turret was in the proper position, only the driver could make use of it.
Good idea to grab the grease gun before exiting as shown in the photo, which allows a small arms battle just like Fury. Or, more realistically, gives the crewman a slightly better chance of survival if forced to flee the probably burning tank (which is likely if the hatch had to be used) and the opposing armour and or ground forces aren’t going to do the usual clean up of fleeing tank crew.
Maybe it was deficient training or perhaps some idiotic idea, of the sort with which military history is littered, that it would be bad for morale to suggest that you weren’t invincible.
Or maybe the higher powers just figured that on a WWIII battlefield in Europe you’d all be irradiated anyway, so why bother?
If any of the above is correct, your tanks could have been made cheaper without the escape hatch. :rolleyes:
In many tanks is the reverse also true? That is, if the turret isn’t in the correct position the driver (and I think is some cases and or other crew members) can’t escape?
If so, seems fair enough to give the driver an equal chance of escape. Given the training invested in producing a competent tank driver, it makes sense to try to preserve as many as possible for future use.
The Driver is nearly the most important crewman, a good one was a real gift from above. With some Tanks the turret position could keep the driver trapped, on ours if the Gun was straight over the Driver’s Hatch in a down position, it would be tough to get out of it. The Turret Crew, Commander, Gunner, Loader, had 2 hatchways to use, and it wasn’t that tough to get out except for the gunner, he was stuck down in the right front of the Turret, and had to wait for the commander to get out of the way in order to egress. The escape hatch was mostly for the Driver, and was directly under his seat. One tug of the red lever, and the seat folded up out of the way, and flip of one lever, and the hatch drops out. Were the tank to end up on it’s roof, then the driver’s hatch, and the escape hatch are the only ways out. as long as the turret machinery isn’t in the way, the others can wiggle out of the turret space into the driver’s compartment. Good reason to be on the thin side.
I was just mechanized infantry in an armoured unit, which was cavalry rather than tanks. The nearest I got to a driver was being flung around on top of and inside an M113 on tank courses, which was actually quite fun until it went on too long and seasickness afflicted some of the passengers inside, so I’m not qualified by experience to comment on driver importance.
Nonetheless, I understood from those exalted beings who crewed our armoured vehicles (that we foot soldier grunts existed to recon well ahead of and clear roadblocks etc whenever and wherever there was any risk of a threat to these exalted beings and their armoured vehicles) that the greatest virtues of a driver were the ability to be kind to the vehicle and crew and, which was part of that kindness but a separate and more important skill, the ability to ‘read ground’. This meant being able to see well ahead where best to go at all speeds, forward and reverse, so that the best route was chosen for tactical reasons and being kind to the vehicle and crew. It wasn’t a skill possessed by all drivers, nor was it a skill which could be taught to all drivers.
Very true, a good Driver could read terrain, avoid soft spots, they knew which plants usually covered soft ground, which is near to witchcraft. They also read terrain features for best mobility, and cover. The really good ones could pick a line of travel, and stick to it, where other were always going this way, or that not holding a formation well. Although it does happen, getting mired, or otherwise stuck in a terrain feature can be avoided by good Drivers. The Commander is supposed to keep watch for such troubles but has to do Commander things too, so can’t always be watching the way ahead. Then, the loader can observe from the loftier perch, and help the Driver to go around problem areas. We were always happy to have some infantry along, and they were always happy to have some tanks nearby .Even though we always teased each other, they were invaluable in many situations, especially in close terrain, or towns. They would be kept in the carriers well behind us were we to use formations to attack in the open, which in the cold War days was what we trained for Broad sweeping attacks against the soviets in the Fulda Gap area, this after ambushing their lead units from afar. I also spent time in the M-113 APC, I attended the APC School right after Tank School, and we had an adventurous 2 weeks of learning all about them We even got to swim them , which is a pain, they do not handle at all well in water. At first all we managed to do was go in circles in a small lake, and wander around like a Bumble Bee trying to steer them, after a few days we got useful at it. They are great fun to drive, but being inside one is as you said, likely to give one seasickness when off road. The Tactical Driving test was tough too, having to negotiate all manner of obstacles, and conditions properly in order to pass.
Our structure was that what I called above ‘mechanized infantry’ (technical term ‘assault troop’) were part of our armoured corps and, we thought, somewhat superior to mere infantry. Surprisingly, the mere infantry who perhaps for weeks at a time had to lug huge weights of personal supplies, ammunition, munitions, and sundry goods (which we carried on vehicles and generally didn’t have to carry much more than basic webbing and ammunition as our forays were generally fairly short, as in a few hours at most, verge sweeps beside or ahead of an armoured column or advances of rarely more than a few hundred metres ahead of a column or vehicle to check and clear potential threats such as mines, bridges set with explosives, road blocks for ambushes, etc) thought we had it easy. And the poor bloody infantry were quite correct!
Our sole purpose was to work with and under command of armour as part of armoured operations for the advancement and protection of armour, whereas our armoured operations with infantry were generally combined arms operations in support of infantry operations.
Australia’s high command and defence planners decided in the early 1950s that, unlike our WWII North Africa operations, Australia wasn’t likely to be engaged in large scale open country warfare but was more likely to be engaged in close country and jungle warfare in South East Asia. This judgment proved to be correct.
It was also recognised that Australia could not field anything remotely like the huge land and air forces required to resist a Soviet attack against Western Europe, nor could we make any useful contribution from our distance to what threatened to be a fairly short nuclear war.
So we concentrated on what we could manage in our likely area of operations against potential enemies with significantly fewer resources than the Soviets, which turned out to be Vietnam, where our tanks were unlikely to be and in fact were not engaged in tank to tank battles (despite NVN tanks figuring heavily in film of the final downfall of SVN).
Our Centurions played a very useful infantry support role in various operations in Vietnam, notably in bunker busting NVA / VC positions which would have chewed up much greater casualties on our side if attempted solely by infantry.
Yeah, your Terrain would be very different to fight on, And varied a lot, from Jungles to the outback. Leg infantry would be needed in most of your Country, the Mechanized is a requirement for Armored Units that are always on the move. Get them where you want them, then turn them loose like a swarm of Jack Jumpers on the invaders. Follow that with an assault by the First Funnel Web division, and you’re victorious. (Assuming General Crock Dundee left any for you) Your Military would have it’s hands full if invaded in force, so many different types of fighting skills needed. Uncle Sugar would be there to help quick as could be managed, but I think your Guys could handle things pretty well. Australians are Respected by the American People.
Vietnam wasn’t an optimal environment for Armor with some exceptions, but we still had a lot of them around. The 113 Tracks were used more extensively in the Jungle being lighter, and able to a degree to protect the infantry inside though more often than not the grunts sat on top of the Tracks, and Tank crew usually stood in their Hatches so they would not get mashed up against the Hull, or Turret if a Mine, or B-40 (early RPG) was encountered. I knew to Tank Commanders that survived hits by B-40’s, both were blown out of the Turret by the explosion, landing nearby on their backs. neither badly hurt, Murf, the bolder of the two, and a genuinely scary person, landed next to the driver, and was asked, hey Murf, you dead? he answered, I don’t know, are you dead? Murf continued being a very scary guy up till a Bounty was placed on him, and the Command folks sent him back to civilization. Murf was a slightly more evolved version of a Rock Ape. The other guy was slightly injured but remained on the job after which he was sent back, and assigned to the Unit I was in.
:rolleyes: