4.13.3 - The No. 2 Bomber (AI) in Player's Element...
 

...STILL does not close his bomb bay doors after dropping his payload, while the rest of AI planes in the formation do close theirs.

This is an old, old bug now, spanning several patches.

I love the new material with each new patch, but considering that the recent patches tended to concentrate largely on the ground attack and level bombing aspect of the game, (adding not only new bombers but also greatly detailing the level bombing procedure itself), it is somewhat surprising (and disappointing) that this bug has been allowed to persist throughout.

If the formation has to high-tail it out of there after releasing their payload, the guy who leaves his doors hanging (and he does this every single mission, btw...) falls back because of the extra drag. Not to mention that it just looks stupid.

Orders such as "Rejoin" and others do nothing. His doors stay open. In fact, they don't close until he's in the landing pattern back at base.

Again, the content in the patches is fantastic, but this bug renders all the lavish attention paid to bombing somewhat irrelevant.

Is this something that just cannot be fixed, or what?

After bombing run, try to use 'Drop bombs at will' command. No. 2 should close his bomb bay doors.

Well, that did it.

Never tried 'Drop bombs at will' because it seemed counter-intuitive, and it might have further encouraged the AI to keep the doors open so they could "bomb at will". But hey, it worked.

Thanks.