If there really was love at first sight in the world, then Alexei Solomartin could be sure that he had been shot by Cupid's arrow, the god of love, - when he saw Lilia for the first time yesterday, he felt as if something had struck his heart, and then at last night's war readiness meeting, his glasses had been unconsciously aimed at the girl. Pen & Fun & Pavilion www.biquge.info

Lilia's every expression seemed to touch her heart, but yesterday except for introducing each other, Lilia didn't look at herself directly, it was really a bit weird, and she fell asleep very late when she returned to the barracks. This will meet in the hangar repair booth, and the two planes will be close together, and they will find an excuse to go up and say a few words.

"Congratulations, Comrade Lilia."

Lilia turned her head and saw that it was Captain Solomartin, "Hello, Comrade Captain. "Lilia recognized the person, the leader of the second squadron of the first brigade.

"Just call me Alexei. What's wrong with the plane? ”

"There seems to be some problems with the oil circuit, and the engine is turned off halfway." Seeing the captain's head wrapped in half, "Injured?" ”

"Two holes in the ear, it's okay....." Solomartin finally found a chance to show his eloquence, and five minutes later he even had to thank the German pilot who had been cursed by him just now, with a slight injury and his witty habitual language, the girl in front of him obviously had a good impression of him.

The two pilots chatted on the sidelines, talking from ear to ear to today's battle, and finally simply gestured with their hands, discussing with each other the tactical movements and gains and losses of today's air battle.

Although Solomartin only has 3 more personal crashes than Lilia, he has much more combat experience than the girl, and Lilia can learn more from the captain. And at this time Sergei also walked in and saw two young men exchanging combat experience.

The two stood up and saluted: "Hello, Comrade Division Commander." ”

Sergei waved his hand casually and didn't talk to the pilot much, "Vatya, have you found out what's wrong?" ”

"We're going to change the cannon, it seems that there is a problem with the firing pin and spring, it's hard to say." The mechanic simply changed the cannon, and if he waited until the cannon was repaired and then installed, he didn't know how long it would take, and the division commander couldn't wait that long.

Lilia's plane over there is more troublesome, first to check the total oil circuit, if you can't find the fault point, you have to make a big move, there are several possibilities to cause the mid-air stall, you need to check one by one, the workload is large.

Air battles broke out sporadically throughout the afternoon and continued until it became dark. By the time the last fighter landed at the airfield, it was already completely dark. Today the airfield lost 7 lagers and about 17 German planes of all types were shot down, but the battle with the German fighters was a draw.

In addition to Lilia, the female pilots also shot down a 109 with the long plane, and Kaja-Pudanova took down a Junkers along with two other lagers. There were no losses in the fighter pilots piloted, but there were a few more bullet holes in the fuselage of two of them, and the first battle was successful.

In terms of losses, it seems that female pilots do a better job than male pilots, but there is a reason for this: the long planes are experienced, and the girls do not get much opportunity to engage in air combat in actual combat, and several of them still do not fire a shot. Regardless, they experienced the first real combat attack in their lives, understood what combat was really like, and would become more mature in the future.

The 12 pilots were gathered in the cafeteria, all of them old pilots, including the one-eared Solomartin. It's not dinner yet, but most of the pilots at the airport have gathered here automatically, because it's a night flight preparation meeting, and you can learn something by listening to it.

The Lag 5 is a day fighter, and a good pilot can fly at night with the help of instruments and the moonlight in the air, but it is very difficult to make an aerial volley!

However, they have the guidance of a forward radar station, and a good pilot can rely on the ground to guide him close to the target airspace, and then it depends on his personal skill and luck - if you want to find a target in the air, it is the double eagle eye that is not as important as luck, except for the owl, of course.

There are not many pilots with the ability to attack at night, and they are not suitable for large formations, so it is best to be a lone ranger in a single aircraft. All 12 of them have experience in night flights, and Solomartin doesn't have to worry about running out of planes, because the airport has already vacated the planes of young pilots.

Tonight, the Luftwaffe will definitely carry out the airdrop, and there is only one brigade of new night Pi-2 twin-engine interceptors at airfield No. 6 on the front line, and the number is obviously insufficient, and the first division has to make some efforts.

Sergei personally deployed the battle plan, indicated the patrol airspace, and he himself would take to the air in the planes of other pilots.

"It's all a two-plane formation, and we are too far from the front line to wait for the radar to report before setting off. Half an hour later, the first group took off, everyone opened my eyes wide, don't look at the wrong eye, and when I can't tell the direction in the sky, I will find a watermelon and kill it! Understood, no! ”

The pilots laughed, where will they find watermelons?

The female pilots were also listening to the preparatory meeting in the cafeteria, but they couldn't laugh, and they didn't understand the reaction of the male comrades - why are they still like this when a comrade died today?

The girls will understand in the future that there are often pilots who die here, and if someone dies for a long time, everyone mourns for a long time, and the airport will become a lifeless cemetery! Live happily, let every day be happy, maybe your best friend will be gone tomorrow, maybe it's yourself, it's important for pilots to spend every day happily!

In the sky, the grief of the sacrifice of comrades-in-arms will naturally be transformed into the motivation for revenge, and the pilots have learned to adjust.

At Airport No. 6, Kobets was inspecting the night interceptor squadron on the tarmac, and the twin-engine Pi-2 had been modified with additional fuel tanks in the bomb bay, and its endurance had been greatly improved. There is a 37-mm cannon under the nose near the lower part of the cockpit, two 23-mm guns on both sides of the nose, a 23-mm gun on each side of the wing roots, and two 23-mm guns on the back, and the 12.7-mm large-caliber machine gun arranged backwards in the crew compartment is retained. The whole plane can be said to be armed to the teeth!

The firepower in the front hemisphere can be described as ferocious, and a single point shot can knock a bomber like the Junkers 88 to pieces! The "oblique shooting song" was researched and added to the back of the plane according to the proposal of the deputy commander, and it pointed at the sky at 60 degrees, which can disembowel the opponent at one time!

Since there is no suitable airborne radar, the aircraft factory has equipped it with an infrared detector that can locate the infrared signal emitted by the aircraft's engine within three kilometers. Powerful flashlights are also installed on the wingtips, which have a minimum of night volleying capabilities.

Because the dive speed brake was canceled, this aircraft did not have a dive bombing function, and the maximum range in the test was close to 2400 kilometers after increasing the fuel load, and the cruising flight time was 6 hours! The maximum speed reached 650 km/h!

It is also a three-person crew, the pilot is responsible for piloting and firing, and the navigator is responsible for liaising with the ground guidance station and observing infrared detectors, and is also responsible for using powerful flashing lights when necessary to point out the direction of the pilot. The third member of the team and the pilot have the authority to control the "oblique fire", but he is the main member, including the large-caliber self-defense machine gun in the back.

Professional night fighter, but Kobets was not very satisfied with it - the armament department told him that in five months at the latest, night interceptors equipped with reliable airborne radars would be supplied to the troops, and now these were only emergency products.

In the dark night sky, one after another, the Pe-2 took off, and four of them took off in the first wave, and as soon as they took off, they separated according to their respective courses and climbed to an altitude of 4,000 meters.

The night flight group was led by Senior Lieutenant Georgy Mikhailovich Parshin, who had six years of experience flying twin-engine aircraft, and at the beginning of the war served as deputy captain of the dive bomber unit, completing 27 combat sorties. Having just completed training in the refitting of new aircraft, he served as the leader of the night interceptor group, and this was their first night interceptor combat mission.

Warrant Officer Shaverin, the navigator, Corporal Kharchenko, machine gunner, and the crew were all drawn from the original dive bomber unit for a period of intensive training. Because tactics were a completely new subject, many of the attack tactics were experimental, and the pilots were familiar with how to make the transition from bomber pilots to combat interceptor pilots.

It seemed more appropriate for a single-engine fighter pilot to switch to a night interceptor, but it was not the case - bomber pilots were more familiar with their own aircraft, and they generally had night flight experience, which was very important and did not have the experience of most single-engine fighter pilots.

A true night sky loner, as soon as he climbed to cruising altitude, Captain Parshin controlled the aircraft at cruising speed and cruising in a northwesterly direction.

"Saverin, is our new equipment in order?"

"I'll try."

Turn on the infrared detector and there is no target display - it is not very sensitive in the first place, in which case everything is normal. Press the wingtip powerful flash trigger button, and the night sky instantly lights up, "Everything is normal." After saying that, he turned off the infrared detector: if it was always on, it wouldn't be long before it went wrong, and it was a piece of equipment that would be used again when flying near the target area.

It would be five hours before they would return home, and Captain Parshin had a hunch that he would definitely catch something today, and that his excellent night interceptor would not return empty-handed. (To be continued.) )