Panther Course - A birdie on the 263rd hole.

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For those who desire their baked beans branded Harrods as a consequence of levity and levitation, I offer the profound deepness of topic that is U.S v Soviet dog-fighting on the Russian border in...... 1953. The Doomsday scenario.....  Passing over ramifications such as censorship, thermo-nuclear warfare and its tripwire and some very cool balls of steel from a highly trained reserve unit; as the story winds its wending way into popular lore - behold the 'story'.



High Ball - Forgotten hero link 


Illumination. Now, the horse's mouth - 'Coming in to this Task Force they opened up on me'.
 link

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HR: Back in the day I had heard rumors of that engagement, but since then I had not realized it was declassified.

There were a couple of other such confrontations with the Chicoms in the Formosa Straits too, and I seem to remember, going way back in the way back machine, that a couple of Corsairs (F4U prop jobs) cleaned the clock of a MIG or two.

It was fairly well known now that during the Korean War that there were a bunch of Russian pilots flying Chinese marked MIG's over MIG Alley. Of course that was classified at the time.

Don't suppose you know where that art work of the two Panthers came from do you. I collect naval prints and display them in what She Who Must Be Obeyed calls my personal navy yard (actually the room in my house devoted to building and displaying my model ships).

I suppose Christmas is almost gone there in Jolly Olde, so I will wish you a Happy Boxing Day, along with a Merry Queen's Birthday, Guy Falkes Day, Saint George's Day, Saint Crispin's Day, and who could forget that Glorious 4th of July when the Mother Country finally got rid of the colonial riff raff.

[herosrest]

I believe it to be the work of Ed Markham. link 

It is an attractive image and preferable to the photography which Google threw up. I have long admired the aircraft's lines and its history in being powered by Rolls Royce.


On 18 November 1952, Lt. Royce Williams, flying off USS Oriskany destroyed four MiGs in a single, 35-minute combat. This unique feat has remained little-known, due to the involvement of National Security Agency (NSA) – the existence of which was then top secret – in planning the mission. Following intelligence provided by the NSA, the MiGs had been intercepted during a series of air strikes against the North Korean port of Hoeryong. After losing contact with his wingman, Williams found himself alone in a dogfight with six MiG-15s; when he was able to land on Oriskany, his Panther was found to have sustained 263 hits by cannon shells or fragments, and to be beyond repair. Williams' victories were even more notable in that all four MiGs were flown by Soviet Naval Aviation pilots: Russian sources confirmed Williams' claims, 40 years later, stating that the pilots lost were Captains Belyakov and Vandalov, and Lieutenants Pakhomkin and Tarshinov.

The Aviation History Online Museum

Bearcat was a li'l beauty.

In regard to the early July matter - We never really left Barnegat

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The Panther was indeed a nice looking aircraft.

Unfortunately for the Bearcat, her service life was short, intended to be a replacement for the Hellcat, and to work in tandem on carriers with the Corsair. Bearcat was to be the interceptor, and had a very short operational range, while the Corsair was the fighter bomber. Problem was the Panther came along, shortly after the Bearcat appeared and the Corsair was just as good an interceptor as it was a fighter bomber. All the Bearcats were gone by 1949 from the Carrier Air Groups, although they could be found in the Naval Reserve, and we transfered a bunch of them to the French for use in Indo China.

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F8F - It was the end of an innovative line of naval aircraft. It's a funny old world since I was sat an idle hour doing the equivalent of watching paint dry, following reasons why Mustangs were much faster than the Bf-109G. The later Bf-109K turned that around. I had idle time and......

HNY Be well.

[herosrest]

Golden lining - www.youtube.com/watch?v=ie3SrjLlcUY

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HR: That air base in Colorado is right outside my back door. It was at the time called Colorado Springs Army Air Field, and then a fellow named Petersen crashed an F-5 (converted P38) on take off and they named the base after him.

The base was actually taken over by the Army Air Force at the start of World War II from the City of Colorado Springs. The old pre-war terminal, the airport manager's house and one forlorn looking hanger are still there and designated as a national landmark. All three together look like the airport in the movie Casablanca, and you expect to see Bogart and Bergman every time you pass by. That place now serves as the base museum and there are a goodly collection of aircraft on display. Today that base is the headquarters of North American Air Defense Command (A joint effort between the US and Canada), Northern Command (charged with the land defense of the United States) and Space Command. Busy place.

[herosrest]

1942 was..... chaotic. Slow boats to..... everywhere.

An unusual one for you. I'm linking a Russian famous planes video article and just kill the sound. There is rare footage which probably God alone knows where it came from. I've linked at 23 minutes 11 seconds of the film with a 'kill' being chalked onto an Airacobra fuselage. I know, you know, from expression that this was the pilot marking up his own bird. It's only a few seconds of some very obscure history.  I bumped into the item 5th June 2015 and watched it for I don't know why other than an interest in the theater of ops and period of WWII.

Famous Aircraft - P-39

I link to Pacific Wrecks Capt. Paul G. Brown 36th Fighter Squadron.

I further link a Mystery which I examined beginning 15th February 2005. A lost hero. 

At around 29:30 in, is something truly unusual. If not unique.

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HR: The P39 and its product improvement the P63 were great disappointments to us in many ways. The export version, the P400, flown by USAAF pilots at Guadalcanal, were better than nothing, but they still could not mix it up with the A6M at altitude. They could sure play hell with the Tokyo Express though, with their nose mounted cannon. Good tank buster, but a dismal failure in what it was designed for, an air defense interceptor. Never figured out how they could get those doors open while in flight, so that the pilot might eject from a damaged aircraft.

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Nanette by Edwards Park is a very good and easy read. His ability with the written word is brilliantly beyond words.



P-39 "Nanette" - Pacific wrecks.

Angels Twenty. Edwards Park, WWII fighter pilot and one of the founders of Smithsonian magazine recounts his experiences as a young American flier in a backwater of the war--the jungles of New Guinea. Beaver Squadron's P-39s were badly outmatched by the Japanese Zeroes, but they held the line. Park's account, often humorous, often moving, is faithful to the spirit of his old comrades and the planes they loved.

A review - I found Park's book in a Perth remainder store many years ago. His is a riveting story of combat flying under dangerous conditions, but for me especially interesting, as I had traveled extensively in Papua New Guinea and Australia and knew many of the places he described. Subsequently, I wrote to Parks in San Diego, USA. He kindly replied, writing that "you made my day, finally I found someone who knows of Tsili Tsili (an abandoned secret forward airbase in PNG)"! Highly recommended for students of flying and WW2 history.

Interesting guy was old Mr Park.

Be well. Out.

Fighters: the world's great aces and their planes by Edwards Park.