17. The Soviet Women Pilots Left Their Mark, Despite Flying Obsolete Airplanes
Although the airplane flown by the Night Witches, the Polikarpov Po-2, was slow and obsolete, that very obsolescence came with silver linings. For one, it was highly maneuverable. In the hands of a capable pilot, a Po-2 could perform jinks and dips and turns within a small radius, that the faster and more modern German airplanes sent to shoot them down – assuming they could find them in the first place at night – could not match.
The Po-2’s slow speed also had its advantages: its maximum speed was less than the stall speed of the Messerschmitt Me Bf 109 and Focke-Wulf FW 190 fighters. So if one of those enemy fighters tried to slow down enough to match the Po-2’s speed, it would stall and crash. Between that, the dark cloak of night, and the aforementioned maneuverability, German fighters found it extremely difficult to shoot down the women of the 588th.
