Every Day a Nightmare: American Pursuit Pilots in the Defense of Java, 1941-1942 (Williams-Ford Texas A&M University Military History Series) by William H. Bartsch

Author:William H. Bartsch [William H. Bartsch]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2011-08-03T06:46:00+00:00

IT WAS 0730 ON FEBRUARY 19 when the RAAF Hudsons carrying Vern Head and the other six crashed Timor pilots reached the RAAF field at Darwin after a four-hour night flight from Koepang, uneventful except for the lead Hudson's being fired on by Darwin's antiaircraft guns as it was coming in. Relieved to be back in peaceful Australia, the Americans washed up, shaved, and headed for the officers' mess for breakfast. After eating, they went outside, watching a B-17 and some P-40s taking off!

The objects of their attention were ten pilots of Maj. Floyd Pell's 33rd Pursuit taking off for the flight to Koepang. Their departure had been planned for dawn but was delayed while the squadron's mechanics tried to fix a coolant leak in Pell's ship, No. 3. Giving up waiting for the repair job as it became later and later in the morning, Pell had switched to Bob Vaught's No. 28 and at 0915 was finally leading the flight off. Vaught would remain behind. Pell's A flight was now down to five ships with the loss of Vaught as second element leader, while Bob Oestreicher was following behind with his five-ship flight.2

Shortly after takeoff, Bob McMahon in Pell's flight discovered that his radio transmitter and receiver were not working. He decided to drop back in the formation and replace John Glover in the rear. Airborne, the two flights joined up in stacked-down configuration with the B-17 mother ship that would be leading them to Koepang. When McMahon's gunsight stuttered on and off following the linkup, he began to wonder if it wasn't his ship's electrical system that was acting up on him.' But more worrisome to McMahon was the buildup of clouds that could be seen lying right across their flight path to Koepang and extending all the way up to some twenty thousand feet. They were typical of the local weather about 1600 or 1700 in the afternoon, but it was just a little past 0900. Without radio contact and a with dubious electrical system, McMahon resolved that if there was no clear way through the bottom of the front when they reached it, he would abort.

While McMahon was checking his fuel consumption gauge, he looked up and was surprised to find Pell crossing over in front of him, signaling for a return to Darwin. Unknown to McMahon, Pell had received a message from Shorty Wheless and Lou Connelly on the field that was relayed to him from the escorting B-17: the weather over Timor was deteriorating, and the ceiling was down to six hundred feet. In their view Pell should return to Darwin, but the decision was his to make. Probably mindful of the loss of the whole flight of eight P-40s of Mahony's 3rd Pursuit in bad weather over Timor ten days earlier, Pell accepted the advice of the two senior AAF officers in charge of Darwin operations. Turning through 180 degrees, he began heading back to the field, his nine inexperienced pursuiters following behind. But the B-17 was not with them.

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