A Pilot named Shimada

The story of a japanese KI-51 "Sonia" reconnaissance Pilot, Captain Shimada, flying his Type 99 Assault Plane. this is the tale of his last flight over the pacific before being shot down by famous american writer and author Charles Lindbergh, who told of this story




Two Mitsubishi 51 Sonias, armed, two-place reconnaissance-attack craft, returned from searching for a comrade missing after escorting a convoy of the 35th Division to Sorong. Part of the 73rd Independent Flying Chutai, the Sonias were piloted by the 73rd's C.O. Captain Saburo, Shimada and Sergeant Saneyoshi Yokogi, doubtless happy to be nearing home at Amahai. It was then that the P-38s of "Captive" Squadron, the 9th Squadron of the 49th Group, dropped down on the Japanese duo. It was that squadron that now squared off against the two Japanese over Amahai.


The enemy pilots were clearly veteran;. While Sonias shared basic characteristics of other Japanese craft- low wing loading and a high power to weight ratio- they were still two-place airplanes with fixed landing gear. And yet beset by the 9th's Lightnings they flew like demons stymieing "Captive's" best efforts.



MacDonald's flights traced the 9th's growing rage and frustration as the frantically twisting Japanese continued to evade their P-38s' gunfire. They listened anxiously to their radios, following the course of events as best they could:

"Damn ! I'm out of ammunition."
"The son of a xxxxx is making monkeys out of us. "
"I'm out of ammunition, too. "


MacDonald keyed his mike asking for the location of the fight, but the 9th grimly ignored the call; enemy craft were scarce enough without competition from Satan's Angel's. A 49er, Lieutenant Wade D. Lewis's cannon shells caught a Sonia in the left wing triggering a fire. As the enemy straightened out to run, Lieutenant J.C. Haslip finally slipped behind the green and brown mottled ship, fired a long burst drawing smoke, the stricken craft diving down into the sea. So died Sergeant Yokogi.


For thirty minutes Captain Shimada fought off Captive Squadron while MacDonald's flights frantically searched for the fight. Banking around a huge thunderhead, black flak drew the 475th to the long running battle three miles off Amahai drome. At 1045 drop tanks fluttered away as MacDonald led the flights into a turning dive from 3,000 feet, triggering a short burst that spangled the Mitsubishi with hits. It began to smoke. Trapped, Shimada decided to fight. Banking furiously, his wingtips streamed condensation as he wracked his craft around in a wicked left-hand turn. MacDonald's wingman and Group Operations Officer, Captain Danforth "Danny" Miller, tried pulling lead on the hostile fighter. Danforth caught it briefly in his sight's reticle and then lost the Sonia's track, his tracers falling off eighty feet behind. By then Shimada had completed his turn and dove on the next attacking Lightning lining up on the second element leader, Charles Lindbergh.


Now the two flew at each other head-on at 500 mph. Lindbergh instinctively sighted on the Mitsubishi is radial engine and held down the buttons, Firing 6 seconds worth of bullets into the propeller of the Sonia,



the stricken Mitsubishi poured smoke, it half rolled and took its last dive.



Shimada’s gallant fight ended in a spray of foam that briefly marked his passing. Years later MacDonald expressed admiration for that pilot who single-handedly outflown a squadron of P-38s.

 

I wonder what history would have said if Shimada had bested Lindy rather than the other way around. That's a heck of a fight and a heck of a story.

 

And here I was thinking Biak was in the Aleutians. :"> Man oh man how wrong I was! You learn something new every day.

 

You are going to have to change your name, remember - "no man is an Island"!