A glide bomb or stand-off bomb is an aerial bomb with aerodynamic surfaces to give it a flatter, gliding, flight path than that of a conventional bomb without such surfaces. This allows the bomb to be released at a distance from the target rather than right over it, allowing a successful attack without the aircraft needing to survive intact until reaching the target. World War II era glide bombs like the German Fritz X and Henschel Hs 293 pioneered the use of remote control systems, allowing the controlling aircraft to direct the bomb to a pinpoint target as a pioneering form of precision-guided munition.
Note that glide bombing, confusingly, does not refer to the use of glide bombs, but a style of shallow-angle dive bombing.
Read more about Glide Bomb: Post-war Developments
Famous quotes containing the words glide and/or bomb:
“All things change, nothing is extinguished.... There is nothing in the whole world which is permanent. Everything flows onward; all things are brought into being with a changing nature; the ages themselves glide by in constant movement.”
—Ovid (Publius Ovidius Naso)
“One of the laudable by-products of the Freudian quackery is the discovery that lying, in most cases, is involuntary and inevitable—that the liar can no more avoid it than he can avoid blinking his eyes when a light flashes or jumping when a bomb goes off behind him.”
—H.L. (Henry Lewis)