Just laying more ground work for what's to come...
28 September 1943
HQ, 78th FG, 66th FW, VIII Fighter Command, 8th AF
Station 367 (Duxford, England)
It took eleven days for Captain James Heidinger to get from Tunisia to England. He was joined on the trip by Captain Weldon Pruit of the 37th Fighter Squadron, 14th Fighter Group, Major Ronald Gaffney from the 94th Fighter Squadron, 1st Fighter Group, and Captain Donald Hilgert coming from the 27th Fighter Squadron, 1st Fighter Group. Hilgert had come up with Heidinger through flight training and they had both flown as members of the 84th Fighter Squadron when they first came to Europe with the 78th Fighter Group the previous November. It was nice to catch up with him on the trip and hear all the stories of what he had been doing with the 1st.
When they arrived at Duxford on the 15th, Weldon—being from the 37th FS which was originally a component of the 55th Fighter Group—had continued on to join the newly arrived 55th Fighter Group in Nuthampstead where he would provide P-38 combat training for the group. Heidinger, Hilgert, and Gaffney were all assigned to HQ of the 78th Fighter Group and would provide the same for that group as they were transitioned back to P-38’s. They were aided in their efforts by the few remaining P-38 qualified pilots in the 78th, eight in total, spread between the three squadrons.
Commanding the Group was the former 83rd FS C/O, Lt.Col. James Stone. Under him, as head of the P-38 transition program and in direct command of the HQ Squadron of the 78th was Lt.Col. Eugene Roberts. Lt.Col. Roberts had been C/O of the 84th since July of ’42 so was P-38 qualified and both Heidinger and Hilgert had served under him. Roberts, Gaffney, Hilgert, and Heidinger together formed this HQ Squadron and were informally known as the Transition Flight.
When they first arrived, the group was on a temporary stand-down as they started the transition from P-47s to P-38s. Limited short range escort missions would resume in a week using the P-47’s still with the Group but all other patrols were cancelled and after the 24th all missions would be suspended with escort handled by other groups and the British.
The first P-38’s, brand new H-models requisitioned from the 55th, started arriving on the 18th. In the meantime, the P-38 qualified pilots already in the group were re-familiarized in F-5B’s on loan from the 7th Photo Reconnaissance Group while P-38 instructors and a Lockheed pilot named Laveer, or some-such, started to go through ground school instruction on the Lightning for the P-47 pilots. Since the 20th FG were still without airplanes of their own, their P-38 ground crews were re-assigned to the 78th, starting with the 84th Squadron which would be the first to fully transition to the P-38 allowing the 82nd and 83rd Squadrons to continue flying limited sorties in their P-47s until they too were ready to move to P-38’s.
All of the shuffling around was a bit of a headache for VIII Fighter Command but the hope was that by concentrating the P-38’s with pilots that were already experienced in flying against the Germans they would be able to get a fully operational group of Long-Range Escorts earlier than they would if each of the new groups were allowed to build up to readiness under the regular program.
The Group had started sending pilots over to RAF Castle Camps, just a few miles east of Duxford, on the 18th where they would receive Twin-Engine training on the few Avro Ansons kept there. The training plan called for the pilots to each take a short flight or two in an Anson with one of the Transition Flight pilots to learn the basics of twin-engine flying and engine management. Once they got a few hours of that under their belts they would go through systems and cockpit checks in the P-38 followed by their first short flights in the Lightning. Once enough pilots got some P-38 hours they would start going up in flights led by the Transition Flight pilots to start going through in-flight procedures and handling. In all, the plan was to have at least two squadrons, if not all three, ready for combat operations in the P-38 by the second week of October.
Now, after nearly two weeks with the 78th, Heidinger was finally being assigned his own airplane, a new P-38H-10-LO A/C# 42-67033. It looked the same from the outside as his old P-38G-20-LO but once he sat in the cockpit he was amazed by just how different this airplane was.
“So, the top row of breakers,” the Lockheed representative—who Heidinger had learned was named LeVier, not Leveer—explained the changes to the cockpit in the new airplane, “control lighting, fuel system, and armament. Here at the front is the Oxygen and Landing Gear warning lights circuit followed by the Landing Light circuit. Working our way back you’ll see the Cockpit Lights, Position Lights, and Recognition Lights. After that we get into the fuel systems, starting with the Fuel Gauges circuit and this one for the Cross Suction pumps and Oil Dilution system followed by the breakers for the Right and Left Hand Fuel Booster Pumps. Now, this is an H-10 which has the new electric fuel management system so these next two circuits are for the Right and Left Hand Fuel Bypass System solenoids and Warning Lamps. Continuing back, these last three breakers are for the Bombs and Tanks Release and the two for the Armament Firing Solenoids and Relays: this one for the two outboard fifty cals and this one for the twenty mil and the two inboard fifties.”
LaVier sat on the right wing next to the cockpit pointing to each breaker as he explained its function to Heidinger in the cockpit. The circuit breakers were each labeled appropriately but it was helpful to have them explained, nevertheless.
LaVier continued, “Here, on the side panel in front of the flap control, are the radio circuits—your six-ninety-five radio, your range receiver, your command set, and lastly your radio dynamotor. Below your Inverter Switch are the temperature control circuits: Temperature Instruments, Right and Left Coolant Flaps, Right and Left Oil Cooler Flaps, and the Right and Left Intercooler Shutters. Your propeller circuits are forward of the control levers to your left, as always.”
After familiarizing him with the circuit breaks, Tony LeVier continued explaining to Heidinger the changes to the main switch box. Heidinger was happy to learn that engine start was simplified and that automatic electrical engine primers had been installed and incorporated with the starter switches and that now each engine had its own dual-purpose Energize/Engage switch. The re-organization of the switches, he felt, would also make it quicker to find a particular switch as those with related purposes were now grouped together.
He was also intrigued by the automatic temperature controls, it will be nice not to have to worry so much about constantly monitoring coolant, oil, and carburetor temperatures and have to manually adjust the shutters and flaps of their respective radiators.
Following that, LeVier walked him through the new cockpit environmental controls for heating and ventilation and pointed out the change in the trim controls which were now grouped together between Heidinger’s knees.
Finally, he explained the new electrical fuel management system and how it worked. The knob turned with very little resistance and the different selections were organized clockwise in the order it was recommended to use the tanks in flight. LeVier explained how tank selection and cross-suction worked, pointing out that cross-suction was still unavailable for the outer-wing tanks.
“Not for lack of trying,” LeVier explained, “we actually had it set up to cross-suction from those tanks on a test plane but in the end the engineers and the Army agreed it added too much complexity to the installation and wasn’t needed.”
The functions seemed pretty simple and Heidinger suspected it would make switching off of Drop Tanks in action considerably quicker as all the pilot would need to do was turn the single selector dial one click clockwise and flip off the override for the cross-suctioning engine. He tested the procedure a couple times and found that the change could be made in little over one second, after which the pilot would need only to jettison the tanks. He had recommended to Lt.Col. Roberts that established S.O.P. for the Group include arming the tank release as soon as they were in enemy territory so the entire process of dropping the tanks in these new planes could take place in two seconds or less. If only they had had this with their planes in the 82nd on the second, several more of his friends may have come home.
The engine controls were still the same, which was a bit of a disappointment to Heidinger. He brought this up to LeVier, “Any plans on unifying the engine controls?”
“I know that the development group at Lockheed is still working on a number of upgrades but I don’t know if that’s one of them.” The Lockheed mouthpiece looked at Heidinger and must have seen something there to prompt him to ask, “How bad it is?”
Even though LeVier had limited clearance for operational details regarding the P-38, Heidinger did not feel right going into too much detail, so he kept his answer as simple as possible while still getting the need across, “We have lost pilots from messing around with engine controls to get up to combat settings.”
LeVier frowned, “what do you mean? They set the engines wrong?”
“Maybe a few but the real problem is that it takes too long to move everything forward. Look,” Heidinger demonstrated, “suppose we are flying along at twenty-thousand feet with max cruise settings: we have our mixture on Lean,” he moved the two levers to the AUTO LEAN location, “engines at twenty-three-hundred R.P.M.’s,” he set the engine speed levers to their approximate positions, “and throttles at around thirty-five inches,” he pushed the throttle a little forward. “Now, we are bounced out of the sun, the Jerries are already coming down at us and we need to get into fighting condition. What do we do?”
“Move to AUTO RICH, set engines at three-thousand, and advance throttles.”
“Yes. Do you have a second hand on that watch?”
LeVier nodded, he knew where Capt. Heidinger was going with this.
“OK, tell me when to start and time it, I’ll say ‘set’ when I’m done.”
Heidinger put both hands on the yoke to simulate his normal flying position. He waited for LeVier’s mark, trying not to anticipate it and jump faster than he would in a real situation.
“Go!”
Heidinger quickly reached forward, pushed first one then the other mixture levers up, jammed the engine RPM levers forward, and forced the throttles to their Military Rating stops, “Set!”
“About five seconds.” Tony LaVier sounded impressed that Heidinger made the change so quickly.
“Five seconds? Unless Jerry’s trying to catch me dead-astern, he’s damn near a thousand yards closer. Then you have to consider how long five seconds is if you’re under fire. Hell, he could get off two, two-second bursts in that time! Any idea how much lead that could put in my plane? Now add on a couple seconds to switch fuel and drop tanks…I’m probably not coming home for dinner.”
Heidinger saw understanding reflect in LeVier’s eyes.
“We need it down to one motion. One set of levers. I saw the P-47’s here at the field, they have the Throttle lever mechanically linked with a spring-pin to the boost and speed controls. We need something like that in the P-38 which links the throttles to the speed and mixture controls.”
“I see. I’ll send this back to Lockheed to see what we can do. Any chance you can get more pilots to say the same? Or the C/O?”
“LaVier, if you can make this happen I’ll get every damn P-38 combat pilot in Europe to send your mother flowers.”
2 October 1943
Trucks raced down the runway and into the field beyond. An expanding plume of black smoke marked the crash site and from the air Capt. Heidinger could see there was little hope Lt. Virgil Marcone survived.
They had all seen it before, whether in P-38’s or P-47’s. P-47’s are notoriously torquey and are known to flip if the pilot is not diligent in handling it while P-38’s can surprise inexperienced pilots if an engine fails and do the same. In this case, Lt. Marcone had just left the ground when his right engine tanked. Heidinger saw it all happen from the air, the right wing dropped its wingtip to the bitumen of the runway and dragged for a moment before the plane rolled into it. The wing collapsed and the P-38 yawed to the side causing it to cartwheel off the end of the runway and through the fence into the recently baled barley field beyond.
Accidents like these were all part of operations and the every pilot in the Group, combat veterans all, knew that the planned flight would continue regardless of what happened on the ground.
* * *
Forty minutes later while over Wales and followed by ten pilots from the 84th Squadron, Heidinger talked them through one-engine flying.
“Bayland group, Bayland Lead, set engines to Max Continuous. Mixture, AUTO RICH. Engines, twenty-six-hundred, that’s two-six-zero-zero. Throttles to four-four inches.”
Each squadron in the 78th was split into two groups, similar to how the 82nd FG had used a High and Low Sections for their squadrons. In the 78th, however, each group, A and B, had its own radio call sign. The 84th Squadron A Group was “Bayland” while the B Group was “Clinton.” This was repeated in the 82nd and 83rd Squadrons as well with their A Groups being “Steadman” and “Churchtime,” and the B Groups as “Lockyear” and “Cleveland,” respectively. Today, Heidinger was taking about half of the 84th with him, and they were the only ones up so they were designated A Group, “Bayland.”
“Bayland, maintain heading and altitude. Loosen it up a little, Lead is sliding out.”
He wanted to be sure there was plenty of space between the planes just in case one of the pilots mis-judged his airplane after the engine was off. He pushed his plane down and around to a lower vantage from where he could watch the entire formation.
“We are going to simulate loss of the right engine. Slowly pull right throttle all the way back. You will feel the plane want to yaw and roll into the slow engine so take your time and be sure to keep control.”
Heidinger watched the P-38s start to wag and wobble as the pilots followed his instructions, thankful that he had the foresight to loosen them.
“Move the right Mixture to IDLE CUTOFF. Trim the rudder to keep it straight.” It took a minute but soon all of the planes were fairly stable and flying true.
“Bayland, feather the Right Propeller using the Feathering Switch on the front of the Main Switch box.” He saw the propellers, one-by-one, start to feather on the P-38’s in the formation.
“Bayland Lead, Bayland Green Two, my prop won’t feather.”
Heidinger was actually pleased to hear that one of them was having trouble, this gave him the opportunity to talk the pilot through the alternate method and let the squadron hear how to handle it. “Bayland Green Two, Bayland Lead, use the propeller selector switch behind the mixture control. Hold the forward switch to DECREASE RPM to manually feather the prop.”
“Green Two, roger, use selector switch.”
Heidinger kept his eye on Green Two and confirmed that the right propeller slowed to a full feather.
“Well, done, Bayland. Now, switch off the right-hand fuel pumps and turn the right-hand ignition OFF.” Giving them a few seconds to complete the tasks he then continued, “Move the right-hand coolant, oil, and intercooler switches to CLOSE.”
He drifted across the bottom the formation and visually confirmed all of the radiator flaps and intercooler shutters were closed on the right side of each airplane. With this done, he continued about the flight, talking the squadron through basic single-engine maneuvers and letting the pilots familiarize themselves with how their planes handled with just the one engine running. Heidinger made sure to remind them not to turn hard into the dead engine unless their plane was first fully trimmed and stable.
They flew on one engine for thirty minutes, getting a feel for the plane and with Heidinger talking them through airspeed limits and fuel management with some practice in running the left-engine off the right-side fuel tanks while the right engine was dead which served to familiarize them with fuel cross-suction functions. After he felt they had enough time, he talked them through un-feathering the propeller and restarting the dead engine. He let them fly with both engines for another ten minutes then called out, “Bayland group, Bayland Lead, all planes kill right engine.”
This time, instead of talking them through the procedures, Heidinger let them do it on their own, testing their memory and trusting their ability to handle their Lightnings. He gave them five minutes after confirming all the right engines were properly feathered and streamlined before ordering them to restart the engines.
Another five minutes later and he repeated the order but this time he changed it up and told them to kill the left engine. Heidinger remembered learning these steps, which were little different on the early P-38’s, during training and they would never kill the left engine because it housed the only generator. Ever since the second generator was added, however, he always thought it would be good to let pilots practice engine-out of either side so they do not automatically compensate for the right-torque on a failure. These pilots were good and experienced and would not be so easily thrown off and Heidinger was pleased to see all ten successfully stop their left propeller and maintain their loose formation throughout.
After letting everyone get their left engine re-started he turned them back east to Duxford.
He had one last procedure for them, he was going to make them simulate single-engine landing. It was something that nearly every P-38 pilot Heidinger knew had done at some point—loose an engine on a mission and limp home with only one engine. He had seen several, even experienced pilots, loose it on landing with one engine so he and the Transition Flight had agreed they would drill single-engine landings with the 78th pilots as well as single engine flight.
“Bayland group, Bayland Lead, close right-hand throttle and set right-hand propeller to DECREASE RPM. Do not, repeat, DO NOT kill the engine.” The pilots had been briefed prior to the flight that they would be making this engine-out simulation. By decreasing the engine to its minimum speed without killing it, they could approximate the drag and torque characteristics of a dead engine while still having the ability to increase power if they need to abort and go-around. He re-organized the group into a circle at 2000 feet and four miles out from the runway allowing them plenty of room for a controlled approach and slow decent. He would talk each pilot through the landing one-at-a-time and each about one minute apart.
“Bayland Red Two, Bayland Lead, you have priority.” He directed his wingman to the airfield. “Reduce airspeed. At one-six-zero, lower gear.” He paralleled the path of the other P-38 and monitored his progress. “At one-four-zero, Lower flaps to MANEUVER.” A moment later, Heidinger saw the flaps extend out a few degrees. “Smoothly reduce power as you approach but keep airspeed above one-two-zero until you are ready for your final decent.” Red Two was a couple hundred feet up and a few hundred yards our when Heidinger called out to him, “Red Two, Lead, full flaps, reduce throttle, and set her down.”
The P-38 slowed rapidly once the flaps were fully extended but it was close enough to the runway and the pilot experienced enough for it settle nicely on the bitumen and slow smoothly to the taxi-way. “Well done, Red Two. Bayland Red Three Bayland Lead, you’re up.”
He repeated the process for each pilot making certain that every one of his flight was down safe before he followed.
* * *
After the debriefing and a short discussion about Lt. Marcone’s crash, Heidinger sat down with Lt.Col. Stone, Lt.Col. Roberts, Maj. Gaffney, Capt. Hilgert, and Tony LeVier to talk about the crash and discuss what steps could be taken to avoid other pilots suffering the same fate under similar circumstances.
“I’ve gone through the Pilot’s Manual and there are no procedures defined for handing engine failure on take-off.” Stone addressed Tony LeVier directly. “Does Lockheed have anything?”
“Not that I know of. Let me wire them to see if our other test pilots have anything. If not, give me a plane and I will see what I can figure out.”
Hilgert added his own insight, “I think the problem is the sudden change in torque. Trust me, I know how it feels to flip that plane with an engine out!”
“Yes, but, how do we avoid it? If the plane is already past V-one but not yet at the minimum single-engine control speed what else is there to do?” Roberts was right. Even if they drill the pilots to maintain control there would be no avoiding a crash if the plane is already past the “point of no return.”
The Group C/O adjourned the meeting with at least some semblance of a plan, “Let’s let LeVier and Lockheed figure out what is best. Captain Hilgert, since it sounds like you’ve had the closest call out of this group, I’m putting you in charge of this effort. Mister LaVier, you can work directly with Captain Hilgert to get a procedure defined for us. I have word from the Wing that they want us to start flying limited operations with the P-38 in one week and I’d like something to add to Group S.O.P by then.” After receiving confirmations and salutes, he dismissed the men.
On top of the good writing.