ENEMY: Eight to Ten Zeros (Zekes).

RESULTS:

ENEMY LOSSES

NARRITIVE OF ACCOUNT:
.....Captain Newlands, Lt. Witt and Lt. Nugent all pancaked early because of engine trouble. Lt. Pankhurst was not aware that Nugent had left him, although Nugent tried to notify him by radio. Pankhurst observed bombs hitting east end of Kahili runway, and A.A. up at 20,000 feet apparently coming from Ballale. He then noticed he was all alone and turned tail for home.

.....Major Gordon with Lt. McLean observed four Zekes coming toward them and from slightly above. Major Gordon then pushed over and after coming out of a short dive he slid over and joined with the bomber high cover. In the meantime McLean had observed, to his surprise, the bombers were dropping going into the target, instead of circling and dropping on the way home as they had previously. This confused some of the pilots as they had not been briefed to this effect. He saw aerial bombs or something like them bursting with a big white cloud and streamers coming out of the cloud, at 26,000 ft, These were bursting close behind them.

.....Later he saw what he first thought were F6Fs behind him because they were scissoring exactly in the same manner as in our practice. It was not until they began creeping up on Gordon and McLean that McLean saw they were firing occasionally, and were Zekes. Major Gordon did not notice them and it was just at the time he pushed over and McLean peeled off in a tight turn and came around on a Zero that was on Gordon’s tail; he shot 6 or 8 good bursts into this Zero, hitting it in many places, and saw it fall off into a tight spin heading down. He claims this only as a probable because he didn't see it hit the water, but he knows he hit it solid many times. Lt. McLean then found and joined up with Gordon. He landed with four or five bullet holes in his tail, one apparently a 20 mm hole.

.....Lt. Yeager and Lt. Wilson observed the first bombs hitting the water at the east end of the runway end the later ones doing a good job on the runway itself. They never did get joined up with the division leader, Major Gordon, and they erred in turning left as the bombers turned away from them after passing over the target. This brought them back over Ballale from which they drew concentrated A.A. They pancaked with aircraft untouched, however.

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