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Warbird Obsession
It's an addiction. Admitting you have it is the first step.
By Rebecca Maksel
airspacemag.com, December 03, 2008
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The French writer-aviator Antoine De Saint-Exupéry considered the P-38 “a flying torpedo that has nothing whatever to do with flying and, with all its dials and buttons, makes its pilot a sort of chief accountant.” The sturdy Lightning, however, is considered the most successful twin-engine fighter ever flown—by any nation. The first P-38s reached the Pacific Theater on April 4, 1942, joining the 8th Photographic Squadron (based in Australia), and flying combat missions over New Guinea and New Britain later that month. Meanwhile, back in the United States, the Army Air Forces was trying to dispel reports that Lightnings were death traps. “[There’s a] common rumor out there that the whole West Coast was filled with headless bodies of men who jumped out of P-38s and had their heads cut off by the propellers,” Col. Arthur Ennis, chief of public relations, told a fellow officer. (Read more about the P-38's history.) More than 10,000 P-38s were built before production ended in 1945. The P-38J pictured here, Joltin’ Jose, is from the Planes of Fame Museum based in Chino, California.
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Comments
Nice photo and info about the P38. My Mother's youngest brother was a photographer in the US Army, stationed in Australia during WWII. He was killed along with the other crew while on a recon mission over New Guinea in a P38 in late 1942. The wreckage was not found until 1961 and the remains, identified by dog-tags, are buried in Arlington National Cemetery.
Posted by R. C. Rogers on December 22,2008 | 11:44AM
Saw a Spitfire fly in Owls Head ,Maine in the late 1970s. I heard the owners last name was Rockefeller,and it was WONDERFUL to HEAR that engine going at "full chat" at about 500 ft with a pilot who was driving it like he stole it! I still have the photos of that great plane from that great day on my desk, 30 years after... The magic of that day has allowed the smells,sounds, and SIGHTs to remain with me. It was a very good day!
Posted by Brian Beauregard on August 31,2009 | 06:21PM