I flew a lot of things with stripes on them last weekend as an opportunity to reflect on the significance of the day. I used Prepar3d, and flew over the modern day Normandy coast, using current weather, which was a bit thunderstormy most of the weekend.
First trip was actually the evening of June 5, just an innocent preliminary look at the beaches wearing my new stripes which mean nothing at all.
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Bright and early June 6 was my first fighter sweep. It has been a few years since I have flown a D-Day mission and I forgot how far from England the beaches were. They were barely within the operational radius of a Spitfire which was a key criterion for the eligible landing zone.
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Speaking of Spitfires, I chose one for my late morning sweep. This is my own skin, and is based on a well-known photo of this machine being passed by an armored column as it sits abandoned after a forced landing on June 10.
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I landed at Caen, which of course was not possible on June 6, but the airfield was a key target of the first days of the invasion, and anyway I had to make dinner and was too tired to return to base.
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And of course, finally, I had to fly a C-47. I hadn't gotten up at midnight to recreate the main drop, but I flew the route of the American C-47s - rather indirect, to avoid flak over the beaches - for the afternoon reinforcement and supply drop.
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