S3 Series

Interesting frame to be sure. Darryl asked us to lead separate flights of his DRs in order maximize our experience with his numbers. System was complicated but a pre frame briefing went smoothly and off we went. Flight over was long (as expected) and we had to make numerous corrections due to enemy activity in our travel lanes. I felt communications went well with all strike squads involved and with our fighter squads, AEs and 352nd. Things got particularly dicey as we traveled through our CV area. Zekes were above us and I was forced to make numerous corrections to our slow but steady formation. We agreed to press on once the 352nd had refueled so we headed in to the enemy area previously scouted out for us by the AEs.

It's always the case with these convoy attacks that the picture I was assuming I would see was not in front of us when we arrived. The DDs were scattered more than I expected but out pre-planning kicked in and all flight leaders headed to their targets based on their positions around the 2 CVs. Zeros were dropped in on us from time to time but they were either quickly shot down by our escort or our rear gunners lit them up. As expected the DDs were tough to hit but we manged two destroyed and the DRs did a terrific job sinking both CVs.

We took some casualties at the convoy but the 352nd held in there and allowed many of our TBDs to RTB back to our CVs with less than 10 minutes of fuel. Congrats to both houndg and coolon for the 2 DDs they sank. Also special mention goes out to b-frog for his action of bringing home his crippled TBD after losing his elevator over the enemy convoy. Any landing with no elevator is a terrific landing but a CV landing is special.....WELL DONE!!

Enjoyed flying with the DRs...my assigned two wings did a great job all night.

Good frame Darryl!

Again tks to both the AEs and the 352nd...without whom we would have been fish food.

Salute!

Good write up, Dew.

The coordination was better than anything I have seen for many moons.

Due to pilot error ( crappy gain settings on my stick on a different computer), I flew as a ghost with Gundoc and Gofly. Doc discoes multiple times, Pd has the "black screen bug" so was with Gofly for the attack as a gunner. The escorts came to the rescue as we approached the convoy, and one or two Tubs shot down a Zeke. One of the suckers passed us so close I thot it would be a mid-air.

Unlike hitting a factory complex or large field, a convoy attack required a lot of timely decisions and tgt assignments at the last minute. We had great intell from AE, and it paid off.

Hats off to both the Blu Noses and AE. Outstanding coordination.

An interesting and exciting frame.

Gums sends...

#1: Strike Forming just past rondezvous.



#2: Just passing through..... We flew through our ships to allow the escort to refuel


#3: Return Home during attack. No flaps and only one aileron, but the tail hook is still connected!

great pics!!

It was fun flying with you fellas. Hope to do it again, sometime. I appreciated the assistance in the planning process.

Thanks, again!
Darryl <S>