Devil at My Heels - Louis Zamperini [32]
Ship
Cause
Dead
1
4 motors stopped; forced landing
Navigator, bombardier
2
went down crossing Frisco to Oahu
10
3
motor afire, forced down Kahuku 424th
4
4
hit mountain in soup, take off wheeler 372nd
9
5
Blew up midair, 371st. Steel escaped
7
6
Mokoleia, in ditch, fell apart
0
7
Camera ship over Wake Island, hit by AA fire in wing and bomb bay tanks. Ran out gas 2hr short of Midway, went down
10
8
In drink on takeoff—Kerosene; Coxwell, Hoyt, Mozonett, Carringer, Seymore
11
9
nose wheel out
2
Later the full report came in. Unable to contact the tower, Major Coxwell had taken off downwind, only to crash two or three hundred yards after completing his turn. Several crew members got free of the plane, but while trying to swim to safety sharks and barracudas caught and literally ripped them to pieces. Two other ships, also unable to contact the tower, made it back by the skin of their teeth. We found a waterlogged paycheck for 400 dollars, belonging to Mozonett, on shore.
I KNEW THAT one day my crew might also end up in the ocean. Our squadron had already lost so many planes that not considering the possibility was just plain foolish. I had more than once nearly been among the dead.
When the bombardiers scheduled for two missions were unavailable, I volunteered. It wasn’t exactly bravery; after every three missions we’d get a day off, and I always wanted more free time. In each case the bombardier returned at the last minute and I stayed home, sorely disappointed until both planes met with disaster. The first, full of bombs, flew into Oahu’s central mountain ridge and exploded. The second crashed at sea.
I’d see planes crack up on landing and takeoff. Men would be at mess one day and not the next, and we’d never find their remains. Sometimes, when mixed crews—men from different crews put together into a new one after casualties—went on search missions, their unfamiliarity working with one another led to disaster.
Thirty minutes into one mission on Superman, Phil yelled, “Hey, Zamp, come up here! A motor quit. We can’t restart it and Douglass can’t find the problem. The gremlins are at it again. What do you think we should do?”
Gremlins were the imaginary elflike beings that supposedly trouble the crews of warplanes. They were usually associated with mechanical trouble, or failure, much like computer “bugs” are today.
Phil had asked for my help because I always seemed to have a fix. Primarily he was thinking of Lund, the operations officer, who took special delight in raking pilots over the coals for what he considered an improper decision. To put Phil at ease I said, “Go back to Kahuku.” We knew other guys who’d had a motor quit, but they were already at the point of no return so they finished their mission. We’d just started.
Phil said, “Lund will eat our asses out.” Lund was a mean son of a gun, but I could deal with him. “Go back,” I said. “I’ll handle Lund.”
Sure enough, Lund saw us from his office as we landed. He climbed into his jeep and raced out onto the tarmac. “What the hell are you guys doing back here?” he yelled.
I said, “We had a motor quit.”
“Other guys finish missions on one motor,” he insisted.
“Okay, Lund,” I said. “We’ll take off on three motors and finish the mission on three motors—if you’ll go with us.”
That brought him up short. “Well, let’s see now,” he said. “There’s, uh…uh…Okay, you can take ship number nine.”
I’d been bold because, hey, what could he do? It was war. They needed us. Would they lock me up? Send me home? Great—send me home! Bombers blew up, crews got lost at sea. War’s not glamorous. Send me home.
WHEN WE WEREN’T in the air I attended briefings and studied. I recall one lecture on emergency first aid for gunshot wounds, and bleeding control in general. Another covered offensive and defensive attacks against Zeroes. I took a class in meteorology and worked to perfect