homepage Forums Air Combat & Civil Aviation Wings: Over Flanders Fields Altitude 4200meter?

Hallo All, Hallo OBD,

I have a question:
I have flown a mission "Patrol behind friendly front lines" with jasta 10, 02.02.17.
And according to the briefing we should reach the altitude 4200meter = 13800feet.

Is it not too high at this early time? With my humble knowledge the pilots ran into problems above approximately 4000 meters (13000 feet) because they were getting too little oxygen > hypoxia.
And he first simple measures were taken late in the war.


I have changed manually the altitude to 3200m.

Thanks for answer and Greetings

I usually set my preset ALT to 10,000 in Workshop unless I'm flying in 1918. I love the low to mid level dogfights the best amongst the clouds.

In "Open Cockpit" and "No Parachute," Arthur Gould Lee says his flights in the Sopwith Pup got up to 18,000+ feet in 1917, so its definitely not too high

Modern civilian regulations require oxygen for pilots at that altitude, but I don't think most pilots experience much impairment below 15,000. Above that, it starts to become more obvious. Generally, severe impairment starts above 18,000 depending on the person.

The insidious thing about it is one of the effects is a sense of euphoria, so you feel great and have a difficult time recognizing your degraded performance. It's fairly common in altitude chambers for a severely hypoxic person to adamantly refuse oxygen, insisting they are fine, even though fine motor coordination is gone and they can't form a coherent sentence.

In 1917 there was some awareness of all of this, but it's likely that many pilots were not recognizing how impaired their performance was on these higher altitude flights.

Hallo and Thanks for your detailed answers!

Only one demand:
@AceMedic88: "In "Open Cockpit" and "No Parachute," Arthur Gould Lee says his flights in the Sopwith Pup got up to 18,000+ feet in 1917, so its definitely not too high".
In such altitudes there is not only the oxygen important, but also the temperature. It is very very cold. So you need clothes for the cold, also in summer. And this effect is even stronger in winter. And additionally, the winter 1916/17 was strong.

So my question: What specific impact did the winter cold have on flight altitude during the individual years from 1914 to 1918? Are there any data for this?


Thanks and Greetings
P.S.: Only an idea: Maybe it is possible for OBD, to show the pilot with winter clothes for winter time and / or very high altitudes.

In a few lines, he talks about when he was that high he had to:
1. practically yawn to feel like he was breathing
2. slap his legs to warm up his hands and legs

Without directly saying it, they felt the effects of high altitude

Regarding cold, I think it was McCudden who said he was so "frozen" on a flight in a DH2 that he couldn't feel his feet and didn't care if he was shot down.

Lapse Rate is the decrease of temperature with altitude. It depends greatly on moisture content but on average it's 3.5 degrees F (2 degrees C) per 1000 feet. I.e., every 1000 feet you ascend, it's 3.5 degrees (2 degrees C) colder. Thus, if it's 70 degrees F (21 degrees C) on the ground at takeoff, at 18,000 feet it'd be 7 degrees F ( -15 degrees C). With dry air, the lapse rate is 5.4 degrees F, so that'd be -27 degrees F ( -33 degrees C) at 18,000 feet. These figures are general and, as I said, vary with moisture content.

Yes, decrease of temperature for Km: humid air ca. 6°C/Km, dry air ca. 10°C/Km,

So, the example with 4000m (ca. 13100feet) and same temperature 21°C:
humid air: ca. -3°C.
dry air: ca. -19°C

4000m (ca. 13100feet) and temperature 0°C:
humid air: ca. -24°C
dry air: ca. -40°C

Hard to imagine, everything that freezes at such temperatures, first of all in dry air. And then you have additionally the headwind because of the own speed in the air.

So I will decrease manually the altitude in winter at 3000m - max. 3500m (9800feet - 11500feet) until we will have more concrete data.


P.S.: Next idea: frozen ice-points on the "Player Goggles Glass" in WS for winter time and / or very high altitudes (maybe with pilot winter clothes?)

Greetings