In my group, after a plane had an engine change, it had to be flown a few hours “slow time”. Several times I had the duty. Once, before doing a slow time, a ground officer asked me if he could go along for the ride. I readily agreed to take him. This was when I was based near Tunis, N.Africa. On a previous flight, I discovered a British base about 40 miles away, This base was made to order for a buzz job, a straight road, no obstructions and lots of traffic on a straight road at least 2 miles long.
I took off with my passenger in the nose, once aloft I asked the F/E to check the ball turett, to be sure that the guns were in a horizontal position. When I got to the area, everything was in order, lots of traffic and no aircraft to be seen. I dove down from several thousand feet, in low pitch. My first recollection was of an Arab driving a wagon of hay packed quite high, drawn by a mule. As I drew near the mule turned into a bucking bronco, and was off the road. The high point of the operation was a British lorry, going in my direction, the driver couldn’t see or hear me, there were soldiers in the open back. I was really too low because I had to pull up a little , as I got close to the lorry I saw the soldiers jumping out of the truck while it was moving. I quickly left the area because I knew that there would be repercussions. About a week later while a B17 was in the general area, a Spitfire came alongside and escorted him awy from the area. The Brit General complained to the American General and there was hell to pay, I never owned up to the escapade.

Thank you sir for sharing your wartime experiences with us!

Dennis

Are the Stuka and Spitfire at Chicago still hung from the ceiling like that? It doesn’t seem to be a very practical way to display them.

And the Stuka (IIRC) was dropped from the ceiling a number of years ago which obviously caused some damage!

Here’s a few pics (taken Nov 2002) of Evergreen’s Bf-109G-10. The engine overhaul cost Evergreen $400,000 (if I remember right from a 1997 interview) but I don’t think it was ever run after being mounted on the aircraft.

Dennis

Chad,

N3800L

My understanding from Connie, and it is a long time ago, was that the aircraft just rolled into the ground on take off or approach, I am not sure which.

The most likely situation here, in my view, is that Connie Edwards donated the wrecked P-38 some 15 years later to the EAA and has been rebuilt to static display for their museum.

Mark

The Edwards P-38 was donated to EAA in 1981 by the Edwards family and was flown from Big Spring, Texas to Oshkosh by Connie. I have pictures somewhere of its arrival at Oshkosh. It was later dismantled and restored by EAA staff, funded by Gary Levitz. The Edwards family acquired it in Sept 1973. This aircraft was never in an accident as far as I know. Kevin Grantham’s excellent book “P-Screamers” doesn’t mention an accident either.
Attached is part of an article from the November 1989 issue of “Sport Aviation” magazine (EAA’s membership magazine).

The other two P-38s at Airwar 74 are also still around today: N3JB with the Museum of Flight Seattle in their new Personal Courage wing as “Lizzie V” and N9005R with Lone Star Flight Museum as “Putt Putt Maru”. Sadly, two of the three will never fly again and I understand that Putt Putt has been grounded by Lone Star.

Cheers, Dennis

consider, that since this was shot, all 3 P-38’s have crashed….Lyons suffered a gear up landing in AZ on a return trip to California from this show, the CAF’s suffered a fuel starvation crash landing at Breckenridge the next year….and we all know what happened to Lefty’s just a few years ago.

Mark

The ex General Lyons P-38 [44-26981, N5596V] was repaired by the Santa Monica Museum of Flying and is flyable today….though tied up in legal difficulties.

Thanks for sharing the picture, Mark. It’s great to see three of them in the air together.

Dennis

Hi Septic,

Unfortunate all of Jack stuff doesn’t fly any more. It all has something to do with P-38 Crash that killed Jeff Ethell.

RER

This statement is not correct! From what I’ve heard, the TBM, P-38, P-47, B-25, PBY and C-47/DC-3 have all flown within the past five years. (and maybe the P-51).

Dennis

Here’s a very recent picture of the Dora sitting in the Great Gallery at the Museum of Flight. Yes, it’s on loan from Doug Champlin.

Dennis