ABOVE:
Tokyo Express,
Always Dangerous
and Silver Plane taxi
to the ramp at St
John’s to swing their
compasses.34 http://www.aeroplanemonthly.com AEROPLANE JULY 2018HANOVER STREET B-25s
radio, Wright turned and rejoined the
main formation. Incidentally, Wright
had a B-25 of his own but financial
constraints had prevented him from
making it available.
Lorentzen was lead pilot with
Haddican in the right-hand seat
of Laden Maiden, another veteran
of Catch-22. The four Mitchells
maintained a loose formation, making
sure that visual contact was kept
because only the lead aircraft had a
fully functioning radio.
The bombers were cruising at
220mph at around 12,000ft. The
temperature inside the fuselage was
-15°C; they had no heaters. This had
been anticipated and the crews wore
adequate clothing. Two more hours on,
and the forecasters’ ‘acceptable’ became
decidedly ‘unacceptable’. The Mitchells
were forced lower and lower until
they were at between 50 and 100ft,
almost wave-hopping. They kept this
up for three-and-a-half hours, always
managing to keep visual contact with
at least one other aircraft. Laden
Maiden was out in front and Hawke’s
Doolittle Raiders brought up the rear.
Then one of the pilots reported a hole
in the cloud where he could see some
blue sky. Hawke ordered them to close
up and climb through the hole for a
few thousand feet. As they did so, the
cloud intermittently closed in on them.
Nevertheless, each aeroplane kept in
sight of at least one other during the
tedious ascent.
Doolittle Raiders was using up fuel
too quickly. It had been the original
intention of Hawke to rely on the
tailwind to make up for the smaller
fuel capacity of his aircraft. With thedelay in St John’s and the changing
weather, he had taken the opportunity
to install three 50-gallon fuel drums
into the bomb bay mounted on 2 x 6in
timbers. Some domestic plumbing,
rubber hosepipes and an old hand-
pump completed the fitment. After six
hours of flight a 150-gallon petrol tank
in the wing refused to transfer. The
old hand-pump was brought into play.
Now the starboard engine was showing
a lack of oil pressure and the generator
appeared to have failed. Parish was at
the controls and Hawke told him to
push the nose down and pick up speed
to reduce the carburettor temperature.
This was getting too warm because of
the rich mixture they were having to
use on that engine.Flores, the first of the islands which
make up the Azores archipelago, came
into view. The crews could now relax.
For the next 90 minutes or so they
would be island-hopping, never too
far from a landing ground and fuel.
Their destination was Santa Maria,
the last of the islands and the closest
to mainland Europe. Doolittle Raiders
remained reliant upon the drums in the
bomb bay and, although theoretically
they had enough fuel for the preferred
destination, there would be no reserve.
Hawke elected to put down at Lajes
on the island of Terceira and take on
petrol. The other three Mitchells, each
of which had additional fuel tanks,
carried on. After refuelling, Hawke
gave Bill Parish the opportunity to try
his hand at the take-off. It was a good
one, student and instructor sharing in a
sense of satisfaction.Less than an hour later they were
requesting a low pass over the ramp
at Santa Maria, in order that they
could be given an assurance that the
bomb bay doors were fully closed.
They were, and so they landed to join
the six other pilots, turning in for a
well-deserved rest. They had flown
for eight-and-a-half hours, covering a
distance of nearly 1,600 miles.
Looking back at the flight from St
John’s to the Azores, Tony Howarth
says, “After a hilarious in-line take-off
from St John’s, Newfoundland we
pointed, somewhat vaguely it seemed,
at the Azores and climbed to about
10,000ft. Encountering heavy cloud,
we dropped down below it and found
a strong crosswind. After several
hours at sea level — well, 50ft above
the spume being torn from the top
of the waves — we climbed through
cloud to 13,000ft.
“Seven hours out of St John’s
everyone was a little nervous and
uncertain. We heard that this [aircraft]
which could talk to that [aircraft]
which could talk to two others wanted
a 25° course change. Another [aircraft]
wanted 10° in the opposite direction.
But John Hawke, our portly fairy
godmother and leader of Hanover
Flight, pointed a webbed finger straight
ahead and said, ‘Five minutes’. Five
minutes later the first of the Azores, a
classic volcano-shaped island, elegantly
pierced the cloud straight ahead of us.
Not 25 miles to the left or right, as had
been suggested at the pilots’ briefing.
No. Straight ahead. As Hawke said,
‘There it is, exactly where it should be’.
‘That is genius’, I thought, adding to
myself, ‘Thanks be...’”RIGHT:
Vern Ohmert
brought his wife
Becky along for
the adventure.
She is seen in the
nose of Tokyo
Express having her
picture taken by Bill
Baldwin.28-35_AM_Hanover_July18_cc C.indd 34 04/06/2018 12:25