nose. The controller in the makeshift tower radioed
for Alon to check his temperatures. They were okay,
Alon replied. It was his last transmission. Seconds
later, Alon’s fighter nosed down and crashed in
flames beside the runway.
That evening the pilots huddled at their make-
shift bar and talked about what happened. Alon had
become a near-mythical hero in Israel, the char-
ismatic young David who had taken on the Arab
Goliath. “Everybody in the squadron was crying,”
remembered Augarten in No Margin for Error. “In
all the wars I’ve been in, I had never seen anything
like that.”
No clear cause for Alon’s crash was determined.
There was no time to grieve. The war was reaching
a climax. Despite the ongoing embargo, more war-
planes were joining the Israeli air force, including
three Boeing B-17 bombers smuggled from the
United States, four Bristol Beaufighter strike aircraft
from Britain, and a pair of disassembled U.S. P-51s
in crates marked “farm equipment.” Best of all for
the 101 Squadron pilots, Czechoslovakia was pro-
viding Israel with World War II-surplus Spitfires.
With its augmented air force, Israel took command
of the sky. By the last day of air combat, January 7,
1949, the Spitfires had shot down 15 hostile aircraft.
The P-51s destroyed four. And the S-199s, despite
their calamitous history, accounted for seven air-
to-air kills.
For all its treacherous attributes, the Avia S-199
had played a critical role in Israel’s formation. The
mere sight of the fighter in the early days of the war
had terrified the invaders and roused the spirits of
theoutnumbereddefenders.“Itwasallwehad,”said
GideonLichtman.“Soweflewit.Andwestopped
theenemy.”
WithouttheS-199,the 1948 Arab-IsraeliWar
mighthavehada differentending.lead a four-ship raid on the Egyptian air base at El
Arish. The mission got off to a rough start when
his number two pilot, Californian Stan Andrews,
swerved on takeoff, flipped upside down, then
blocked the runway for 15 minutes. Down to three
fighters and short on fuel, Lenart opted to strike a
closer target, the Egyptian-held seaport at Gaza.
Only two S-199s made it back. The third, flown
by another young Californian, Bob Vickman, had
vanished. Searchers and radio monitors tried all night
but failed to learn the fate of Vickman.
The next day, it happened again. A pair of S-199s
jumped two Syrian dive bombers near the sea of
Galilee. The lead pilot, Battle of Britain veteran
Maury Mann, made short work of the first bomber,
shooting it down in a matter of seconds. Mann’s
wingman, South African Lionel Bloch, swung in
behind the second, chasing him northward toward
Syria. That was Mann’s last glimpse of Bloch. A
second S-199 had vanished.
The following morning, a South African ex-med-
ical student named Syd Cohen jumped in an S-199
and went looking for his lost countryman. Acting on
a hunch, he gave the trigger for his nose-mounted
machine guns a short squeeze. He felt the rattle of
the two guns—and then something else, a different
vibration.Back on the ground, Cohen’s suspicion was con-
firmed. All three propeller blades had bullet holes
in them. The synchronizer enabling the guns to
fire between the blades was flawed. Vickman and
Bloch had probably shot off their own propellers.
In October, Israel launched Operation Yoav, an
offensive in the Negev desert. Every flyable S-199
was put to use. Alon had returned from a bombing
and strafing mission on the coast. In the landing
pattern at Herzliya, Alon reported by radio that he
had a landing gear problem. That was another S-199
quirk, one or both main gear failing to extend. The
remedywastoyankthefighter’snoseupanddown
tocoaxthegearoutofitswellinthewing.
WhileAlonwassortingouthisproblem,observers
onthegroundspottedsomethingmoretroubling.A
trailofgraysmokewasstreamingfromthefighter’sTHE CONTROLLER IN THE MAKESHIFT
TOWER RADIOED FOR ALON TO CHECK HIS
TEMPERATURES. THEY WERE OKAY, ALON
REPLIED. IT WAS HIS LAST TRANSMISSION.Modi Alon, fl anked
by Israeli prime
minister David
Ben-Gurion (far
right), became a
hero when he scored
the Israeli air force’s
fi rst aerial victories
by shooting down
Egyptian bombers
over Tel Aviv on
June 3.September 2019 AIR&SPACE 61PUBLIC DOMAIN