56 FlightJournal.com
RIGHT PLACE, RIGHT TIME
Above: Lt. Paul Trunk, back row, center.
Right: From this bird’s-eye view during a bomb run, you can
see the B-26’s twin .50-caliber machine guns in the tail,
another in the waist and the four 1,000-pound bombs in the
bomb bay.
Below: The six-strip, 8,000-foot runway at our
Decimomannu airfield on Sardinia.
heavy guns that defended the coastal city of
Toulon. The flak on the bomb run was HIA,
as briefed (heavy, intense and accurate), and
in addition to the 88mm flak batteries, they
sent up 105mm shells that burst with fiery
red centers. One cluster exploded beneath our
three-ship flight. It rocked our plane violently,
and the lead plane took a direct hit. Instantly,
flames billowed from the right engine, and
the right wingman dived down and under,
sliding beneath both planes to rejoin the mainSearchlights silhouetted
these Marauders ready for
a night formation takeoff on
August 15, 1944. The mis-
sion was in support of the
invasion of southern France.
formation. Lt. Klug, my pilot, didn’t see the
flames and continued to fly tight formation on
a plane that might explode at any moment.
“He’s on fire,” I shouted to Klug, and at
last, he saw the flames and eased us away
from the doomed aircraft, but staying close
enough to watch it. The Marauder was losing
altitude rapidly, but at last, parachutes began
to blossom. We counted five and watched
anxiously for the sixth, but it never appeared.
Lt. Hipple, the pilot, stayed with the plane
until he was sure his crew had made it out,
and by then it was too late for him to bail out.
The next day was a stand-down, and we
were confined to base. Something big was
brewing. Late afternoon, we were told that
August 15 would be an all-out effort to support
the troops in the invasion of southern France.
Everything that could fly would fly, and we
would launch at night. Formation takeoffs at
night sounded a little ominous.
At 0400 hours the next morning, a truck
dropped off our crew at our assigned plane,
“Two Four.” The evening before, the crew
chiefs had run up the engines on their aircraft