Thread by @BoneyAbroad

Today is an important and misunderstood #OTD for the Hawker Typhoon.

The 7th August 1944 saw the launch of von Kluge's Operation Lüttich to try and cut off the Cobra advance. The 7th of August became immortalised as The Day of the Typhoon. Why? #Thread #WW2 #Normandy #History /1

If you want to get into the weeds of Operation Lüttich, I cannot recommend @WW2TV's two-part examination of the battle highly enough. It is vital viewing to understand an important battle in the breakout. /2

Part 1:
Part 2:

A cursory glance, even reading John Golley's semi-autobiographical novel, will give you the impression that the Typhoon single-handedly saved the 30th "Old Hickory" Infantry Division from being overrun.

Well, no. But they played a vital part in an artillery dominated battle. /3

This thread will concentrate on what 2TAF got up to on the 7th Aug 44. I say 2TAF, but really it was just the Typhoon squadrons based at B-3, B-5 and B-6.

Thomas and Shores 2TAF Vol 2 and 4 have incredible detail which I will be drawing from. /4

About mid-morning, IX TAF USAF advised 2TAF HQ that the situation at Mortain was getting properly dodgy.

At 121 Wing at B-5, W/C Charles Green took 174 Squadron for a look-see. /5

Green dropped down to treetop level and reported back that there was "line upon line of artillery" on the roads. Popping up, he and 174 Sqn found the Americans on Hill 314 and then attacked the Germans on the roads and raced back to B-5 to put the entire wing on readiness. /6

As Green and 174 were on their way home, 175's Typhoons were already in the air and would attack 8 minutes after the previous strike had departed.

This sets the tone for the day. 2TAF's armourers and Erks would be working flat out to keep their aircraft in the air. /7

2TAF's Typhoon strike packages would be arriving every 15 mins or so. 245 Sqn would get into the act around 1300 and these attacks are immortalised in Golley's book.

This is 245 Sqn with S/L Jack Collins 3rd from left in the front. Jack would be killed 4 days later. /8

The reports coming back were of carnage on the roads. The Typhoons would be dropping their ordnance into a battlespace where there were insane amounts of artillery was also falling.

The Tiffy drivers were claiming tanks and MET in armfuls, but we will return to that. /9

While the Typhoons were causing damage, their main contribution was in denying the Panzers mobility. At 1520 for example, 1 SS Panzer 'Leibstandarte' reported they had been stopped 2km short of Juvigny by air attack.

They were sitting ducks. /10

The Americans countered with devastating firepower from both their lead units and the hundreds of artillery pieces now trained on the narrow battleground around Mortain.

All the while, fighter-bombers prowled. /11

Thomas and Shores give us a remarkable breakdown of the air umbrella over Mortain at 15:00 7/8/44 from just from B-5 alone which deserves repeating.

At 15:00 there are:
7 175 Sqn Typhoons over Mortain
8 174 Sqn Typhoons on the way back
6 245 Sqn Typhoon en route to Mortain /12

4 refuelled and rearmed 174 Sqn Typhoons are leaving dispersal to return to Mortain
8 184 Sqn Typhoons on the downwind leg coming into land
14 245 and 175 Sqn Typhoons rearming and refuelling while the pilots brief, eat and nap. /13

The Tiffy Boys are not having all their own way.

Bob Lee of 245 Sqn is shot down in MN459 around 13:00. Wounded, he force-lands his aircraft which flips over and Bob is knocked out... /14

Trapped and concussed, Bob watches fuel pool around the cockpit.

Over the next FIVE DAYS, Bob's Typhoon is used for target practice by the Germans where Bob is wounded again before a US Army clearance team find him clinging to life and get him to a field hospital. /15

Over at 193 Sqn, the luckiest Typhoon pilot ever, Ulsterman 'Killy' Kilpatrick, the first pilot to survive a Tiffy's tail coming off, is shot down in MN535.

He force lands and 193 stick around looking for targets, before returning with their bombs. Killy legs it but... /16

He is quickly caught and popped into the bag.

To cut the "Shiny Buttons" story down, Killy charms his captors, convinces them that the shiny buttons on their Austrian uniform is what Tiffy pilots aim for and returns home with "up to" 30 prisoners (depends on the telling!). /17

By nightfall, Operation Luttich was done bar the shouting, the battle would drag on until the 12th. 2TAF's Typhoons had flown 305 sorties in and around Mortain. A rough estimate is that 121 and 124 Wings dispensed with around 286 tons of fuel and ordnance that day alone. /18

2TAF would claim 90 Tanks destroyed, 59 damaged and 56 MET destroyed and 54 damaged.

The ORS survey after the battle would find 17 vehicles of all types destroyed by RP, 14 by cannon and 2 by bombs.

So, were the Tiffy boys overclaiming? /19

Let's be fair here, claimed what they saw. In a crazy smokey, flak ridden environment, a black plume of exhaust smoke from a Panzer gunning it to get away looks a lot like a hit at the bottom of a 500mph dive.

We won't get into the smoke generators either. /20

But, what Mortain showed was a coordinated use of Close Air Support, Artillery and ground forces was a devastating weapon.

A fighter-bomber is an Area Suppression Weapons system. When you deny movement to forces that rely on movement to survive and fight... /21

You are basically running in and hitting the schoolyard bully in the balls quickly, hard and maybe getting a second shot in too before legging it. /22

Your mates, the artillery, tanks and infantry then pile on and give the proper kicking that finishes the bully off or until the bully legs it.

von Kluge legged it, his forces critically devalued as an effective fighting force. /23

Mortain is possibly the purest application of Tactical Air in North-West Europe.

But it wasn't just 2TAF, outside of the Mortain battlespace IX TAF USAAF's P-47s were prowling too. If you got out of the frying pan, the fire was waiting. /24

2TAF lost 5 Typhoons and 1 pilot on The Day of the Typhoon over Mortain, 8 aircraft that day in total. IX TAF claimed 16 air-to-air kills too.

von Kluge was routed and the boys of the 30th "Old Hickory" Infantry Division held on in an epic defence.

Falaise was coming. /end