| NARRITIVE
ACCOUNT:
.....Lt.
Yeager returned at 0900 with oxygen trouble. Lt. Turner
and Lt. Hobbs also returned early at approximately
1000 because of Turner's engine not working in high
blower. They observed two barges NE of Kundurum Point.
Vella Lavella and also some action around Vila Airfield,
apparently a bombing mission dropping and drawing
some A.A. They observed some good hits on the area
of the strip.
.....Major
Volcansek returned with Lt. Reid at 1045 and because
of a reversed course while Lt. Reid was in the traffic
circle and also because they ware both nearly out
of gas they nearly collided landing in opposite directions
on the runway. Lt. Reid took a wave off and ran out
of gas while in a steep bank attempting to circle
field. He made a water landing and was not injured.
They both report seeing bombs hitting the Kahili strip
area and seeing A.A. fired at the bombers. They report
seeing Zeros, both Zekes and Haps at one time and
also report their second section of Lt. Williams and
Lt. Craig, peeling off and heading for home as Lt.
Craig's engine was smoking. It was just after this
that Major Volcansek saw a single Zero and headed
for it. He got a short burst in it, and saw a small
flash but no smoke. Lt. Reid coming in behind reports
the Zero rolled over and went into a spilt "S"
and he followed shooting a good burst which had it
smoking and headed down. They had to return full speed
because of six Zeros on their tail.
.....Major
Sapp's division reports that no contact with the enemy
and could observe little results of the bombing except
some patterns of bombs landing in the water off the
end of the runway. They also report six ships, four
apparently cargo carrying and a light cruiser and
destroyer, four just north of the runway and two in
Tonolei Harbor. Major Sapp saw some stunting or a
dogfight behind and on investigation saw only a round
splash in the water, this just north of Vella Lavella.
.....Major
Gordon's division went through without their leader
as he was delayed on the takeoff and could not find
his division after takeoff. He joined up with some
F4Us, which were acting as high cover for some bombers.
He saw the A.A. from the field seeming to burst below
the bombers but was too high to observe hits, if any,
on the target area.
.....Lt.
Morris went into the water just off the Munda strip
upon returning, because of the hydraulic system to
the flaps failing, as he made his start to approach
he gave 30° flaps which worked correctly, then
just before his final turn he gave 50° flaps and
only one responded, the other flap just seemed to
break loose out of control. This caused him to go
into a violent left turn from which he could not recover
before hitting the water. The pilot received only
minor injury to his shoulder.
.....Major
Carnagy's division was the last to leave the target
area some five minutes after the bombs had dropped,
but at 26,000 feet could observe few hits and they
saw no fires. They made no contact with Zeros but
saw four or five at a great distance.
.....Lt.
Williams and Lt. Craig were not reported in on any
field long after their gas was depleted and so were
given up for lost and a search was sent out for them
at 1315 and landed at 1540, with negative results.
1st.
Lt. W. O. Reid;
.....“Upon
arriving at Kahili, we circled North of the airstrip
out of range of the Ack-ack. After the bombers came
over the airfield, the Jap fighters were getting up
to our altitude, which was 30,000 ft. I saw at least
8 Zekes and Hap fighters coming up. Four Zekes were
directly under us but the division leader didn't see
them. I lost sight of the other section as we went
into a slow circle above the four Zekes. Then I heard
Lt. Williams, who was leading the second section,
say he was accompanying Craig, his wingman, home.
I looked up and saw Craig trailing white smoke and
Williams was with him.
.....We
made another circle and saw a Zeke alone 800 feet
below us. The division leader, Major Volcansek, started
to make a run on his rear, I throttled back behind
Volcansek as he started on his run. Volcansek closed
fast on the Zeke and fired. The Zeke did a half-snap
roll onto his back and Volcansek went by him, just
as he started to pull thorough off his back into a
split "S" I started firing at him, and fired
at him as he was pulling through. He started smoking
badly and I pulled up. I looked down and the last
time I saw him he was going straight down with smoke
pouring from the plane. I started looking around for
more enemy fighters and lost trace of the smoking
Zeke.
.....I
joined up on Volcansek then, and while doing so I
looked back and saw 6 Zeros closing in on our tail
about 400 ft. above and directly behind I informed
Volcansek of the Zeros. We pushed our nose over and
opened up the F4U wide open. We pulled away from them
immediately and lost them in the distance. Upon reaching
the field I was low on gas. I was in the landing circle
and they changed the course. I was practically out
of gas so tried to come on in. Another ship was coming
in the opposite way and we were head on so I pulled
out to thus let him land. As I pulled up and passed
the end of the runway and started to circle for another
approach I ran out of gas. I pulled my wheels up and
already had 40º flaps. I made a landing like
I would on an ordinary field. The plane skipped along
the water like a surfboard for several yards, then
came to a stop as the nose went under the water and
the tail want up a little then settled back down.
The stop wasn't very sudden and it didn't jar me very
much at all. Had plenty of time to get out before
it sank."
Return
to September 9, 1943 War Diary
|
