Protecting Airplanes

[BMAD]

Abraham is tasked with reviewing damaged planes coming back from sorties over Germany in the Second World War. He has to review the damage of the planes to see which areas must be protected even more. 

Abraham finds that the fuselage and fuel system of returned planes are much more likely to be damaged by bullets or flak than the engines. What should he recommend to his superiors?

[Donald Cartmill]

Actually I think this goes back a long way to the old Saturday evening post.   The military had made a study of all of the planes that had made it back from air raids.  Cataloged every bullet hole that had pierced the hull of these airplanes .     There were suggestions that  these areas should be armor plated .  Someone else spoke up making the statement, that in fact these were the planes that made it back meaning these areas were less damaging to the plane ability to fly ,and the armor plating could best be used else where 

[Thalia]

Not sure I understand what you're getting at so this probably isn't what you're going for but I'd be recommending protecting those sections more...

[BMAD]

On 9/9/2017 at 7:32 PM, Thalia said:

Not sure I understand what you're getting at so this probably isn't what you're going for but I'd be recommending protecting those sections more...

Think more logically

[gavinksong]

This is classic.

[gavinksong]

5 hours ago, Donald Cartmill said:

Someone else spoke up making the statement, that in fact these were the planes that made it back meaning these areas were less damaging to the plane ability to fly ,and the armor plating could best be used else where 

It was a man by the name of Abraham Wald. This story happened to be in the preface of a book that my dad bought me that I never read.

Edit: also, he specifically suggested that the engine should be armored since it was statistically the least damaged area for returning planes.

Edited September 14, 2017 by gavinksong

[harey]

On 9/10/2017 at 12:32 AM, Thalia said:

Not sure I understand what you're getting at so this probably isn't what you're going for but I'd be recommending protecting those sections more...

What kind of planes are examined? And what kind of planes are not in the sample?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Wald