First of a series of
experiences by
P. J. Dahl.
The year was l943 on a beautiful November day and
WWII was in full swing. As a Second Lt. with only a few
combat missions under my belt I was assigned as tail
end Charley for a mission to Lae, New Guinea led by our
then commander of the 432nd.Fighter Squadron, call sign
Clover.
Upon reaching the target area you could see the
build up of cumulus clouds that seemed to inevitably
form over the land areas. Somebody in the flight of 18
aircraft sighted bogies and called them out to Clover
red leader and he began an immediate climb trading
airspeed for altitude, truly a bad decision when you
are amongst Japanese Zeros. If you get caught in a P-38
by a Zero when you are below 200 knots or so he will
have you for lunch. No way can you turn with them
and your only salvation is to dive and hope you can
generate enough airspeed to separate yourself from him
then come back at him from an angle of your choosing.
As tail end Charley I was down to just about
stalling speed when bandits were sighted and lead
called "drop tanks". Due to my inexperience I
failed to select internal tanks before hitting the
jettison tank button and as the tanks separated from
the aircraft both engines quit. It took but a
micro second to realize my error, switch to internal
tanks and get all engines going again but I had to dive
sharply to prevent stalling and I became separated from
the flight.
I called Clover red Leader, said I had experienced
troubles was ok now but had lost sight of the
formation. He advised me to head for home as they were
engaging enemy fighters. As I took up a compass
heading for home I spotted a flight of Japanese Betty
bombers about to make a run on the runway at Lae.
I started towards them and was so concentrated on
watching them I failed to see a zero diving down at my
3 o’clock until I caught the flashing of his guns in my
peripheral vision. I mean this guy was all but in the
cockpit with me. The only action I could take was to
roll the aircraft and through up my wing to place the
right engine between us and dive for the deck.
He poured a lot of rounds into that right engine,
but better it than me. Many coolant lines were severed
and as I looked up in the rear view mirror all I could
see was what appeared to be white smoke trailing behind
the aircraft. Actually it was the hot coolant leaking
out. I was able to out run the Zero with both engines
still running. I then shut down the right engine as it
started to overheat from lack of coolant. So here I was
flying serenely homeward with one engine shot out, but
the aircraft was certainly sound enough otherwise,
unless I got jumped again but there really was little
chance of that.
There were no Japanese bases along the journey home
and another P-38 had pulled up on my right wing as
escort. Finally I called Buna tower for a DF
steer, gave them a long count, got a new heading and
after a while had the field in sight. I made a
long approach, threw down the gear when I was sure I
had the landing made and greased this wounded machine
on to the PSP runway; thus living to fight another day.
It was important to make a single engine landing on
the first try. To attempt a go around on one engine for
another approach was definitely not recommended.
The clean aircraft flew straight and level on one
engine real good and could even climb some, but with
the gear extended and the airspeed down to final
approach and landing speed trying to go around for
another approach in case you over shot the runway was a
great way to buy the proverbial farm. We already
had a burned spot on the side of a hill just off the
runway where somebody had already tried that little
maneuver. I wasn’t about to make that mistake
This experience was another tribute to the twin
engine P-38. If I had been flying a single engine bird
all of those slugs would have gone into the cockpit
rather that the engine. It was a nice feeling to know
you have those two mills and that one could always
bring you home if needed.
2008, 475th Fighter Group Museum
[P. J. Dahl #2]
