86 FLYPAST May 2015SPOT FACT The engines were unusually quiet due to
the exhausts being muf ed by the turbo-superchargersSolid hits
Back to Charles Pinson: “Every
enemy aircraft had a P-38 chasing
it and all of them were forced to
defend themselves with evasive
action. As we attacked from the
right side, I set my sights on the
right engine of the trailing ’410,
which was in the third flight of their
box formation.
“Firing at 300 yards out and
closing fast, my rounds impacted
on his engine nacelle, wing root and
fuselage, causing the rear gunner
to collapse out of sight. A split
second later, his engine failed and a
huge puff of grey smoke shot out,
followed by flames. The stricken
German fighter did a 90-degreewith eight breaking to the left and
the remainder going to the right
as they were making an obvious
attempt to form two defensive
circles. They didn’t have time as we
were on their tails for zero-degree
deflection shots.”
The Bf 109s joined in the fight
after the first shots were fired and
they proved to be very aggressive. But
the momentum was with the P-38s
and they were soon all over the new
challengers. A pilot from the 96th
reported that he saw one of the ’109s
right on the tail of a P-38 at tree-top
level. The Lightning was bobbing and
weaving as best he could to keep the
Luftwaffe pilot from getting a clean
shot. Suddenly the pursuer hit the
top of a tree causing him to wobble
out of control. He immediately
splashed into a river, becoming the
first of three Bf 109s to go down in a
couple of minutes.“He was about 3,000 yards ahead
of me and I followed him into
a valley where he levelled off
and crash-landed in a freshly
cultivated field. I turned around
to get back in the action”
with eight breaking to the left and
the remainder going to the right the remainder going to the right
as they were making an obviousAbove
Captain Ralph
Powers of the 95th
FS in the spring of- RALPH POWERS
Right
A British-based
55th Fighter Group
P-38 in 1943. ARTHUR
ROWLEYBelow
Captain Harley
Bernhart’s 95th
Fighter Squadron,
82nd Fighter Group,
P-38 at Foggia, Italy.
HARLEY BERNHART84-89_Spot Combat_fpSBB.indd 86 13/03/2015 11:14