ONLY WEEKS OFF THE JAPS

Dominion, Volume 37, Issue 96, 19 January 1944, Page 4

ONLY WEEKS OFF THE JAPS

Fighter Pilots In Training

THEIR JOB AND WHY THEY CHOSE IT

Not many minutes’ flying time from Wellington on an air station as big and modern as the latest suburb another bunch of young New Zealanders are so far on with their training that they are only a matter of weeks off having a erack at the Japs. Tills week they will have their passing out. Today they are one of the flights of an advanced training fighter squadron. The next step is posting to an operational unit to take their places in the operational type of aircraft in which they will fight on a personal stake with the smashing of ' the enemy the bigger issue.

They look keen; they are keen. The whole atmosphere of the place .is charged with action. Trainer aircraft roar skyward the day long; sometimes as many as 25 to 30 take the air almost simultaneously. Executive officers work close to the landing field, amidst the din; one eye on their administrative problems and the other on the skyriders. In fact, there is something about fighter training work in the advanced stages that is keyed to a pitch far above routine. It’s like watching men who are making every post a winner and the prize is the chance to fight in the most individual of all modern war combat. A representative of “The Dominion” saw these youngsters at work. When they had a moment, he talked with them about what brought them there and their immediate ambitions.

Judged by pre-war civil standards all the lads in this A.T.'S. are veteran flyers. The flight to pass out this week has had 230 or more hours each in the air. Allow for average speed and it is equivalent to a flight'to England. The advanced course gives them 75 hours’ flying in eight weeks; their elementary and intermediate supplied about 150 hours. Good weather is important to them; if not they may have to fly at weekends to make up for time lost during the week. The “boss” is a squadron leader who fought two years with the R.A.F. in England. From the trainees’ viewpoint he knows all the answers. Some instructors are also ex-fighter pilots and, if the circumstances permitted, the ideal would be to have all of them from this class. But the man who has known the peak thrills of fighting aloft cannot easily settle down to the routine of instructional duties. These trainees go about their job like men who love it. It would be hard to find their parallel for sheer enthusiasm. It’s infectious, too.' There were.signs of it among the men who keep them aloft; the painstaking ground staff technicians who must exercise the minutest care below that the fighters may take chances aloft. It takes about 10 of them to keep a plane in the air, What are the attributes of these fighter pilot trainees? Absolute fitness, the highest degree of mental and physical co-ordination, and, above all, that intestinal fortitude which it takes to say, dive down from the ceiling at thousands of feet a second straight at an enemy, let him have it, and straighten her out again. Grim Objective.

Flying here is not for fun. It has the grim objective of training these young men to use fighter aircraft —the flying gun platforms of war—to the most deadly advantage. How is their skill tested? For example, there is the combination of the towed drogue and the painted-tip bullets. The drogue is an envelope-like affair towed aloft—and at a safe distance —by bombers that are now as out-of-date as neek-to-knee bathing costumes. The trainees, with 100 rounds apiece, get to work on it. The painted tips of five bullets —each pilot on a particular exercise has a different colour—tell their own story of the results. Then there is the camera gun; a cine-camera that works simultaneously with the firing of the guns. The trainees use it in mock combat with each other. Next day the film strips show the results.. A fact which some experienced fighter pilots consider not so widely known is that the guns of a modern fighter are not mobile. They are fixtures in the plane. It is the aircraft which has to be aimed at the enemy.

Training is a safe enough business for these lads. They all have their wings. The experience lias been that accidents occur only through failure to obey instructions or from doing something that is not part of the job. However exciting the life, it still has highlights. The first solo flight back in the elementary stages six months ago, the gaining of wings on the intermediate course, and, not s , tar ahead, the greatest of all —the first real combat. They canjH)t express their experience of the lastnamed. but au “old hand” filled the gap. He said that the predominant impression of the first combat was the uncertainty: what'you were going to do yourself and what the other fellow was going to do. That ordeal skilfully overcome, a man went on to tne next with confidence which increased with time and victories. But the main thing was to see your opponent first; it was hard to shoot down a pilot who got this advantage on you.

When the lads in this advanced training squadron pass out they will be sergeant pilots; some will be. commissioned. At present they are leading aircraftmen. Their ages range from 19 to 22; on some courses they are, older. A few were asked to tell the public why they took on fighter pilot training. Here is what they said. D. D, Ellison, aged 20, Masterton, former electrician: “I like flying; it’s good fun. I want to have ago overseas, where I have three brothers in the Army.” B. D. Dornbusch, aged 22, of Wanganui, enjoys a special distinction. He is the only married man in his flight. Before tlie war he worked for his father, an agricultural contractor. He enlisted in the Army and was in the Fourth Reinforcements but was withdrawn.because he. was then under age. “It’s good here,” he said, “but I want to have a crack at th? Japs.” Edric Rowe is aged 20 and was educated at Napier Boys’ High School. “I don’t know what made me take up flying. I can’t say I wanted to before, but when rou hear what everyone else is doing. . . .

Besides, I had a good pal who went in before me. Then I made up my mind that the Air Force, was tlie service for me. and now I am in, I’m sure of it.”. These three are in’ the flight who will pass out this 'week. Those now mentioned have three weeks to go. “It wms just inclination. I wanted to do a job I could do myself. I enjoy it, specially the aerobatics." This was Ivan Tyerman. Gisborne. He is aged 21. Murray. Thomson, Miramar, is 19J. Like the others, he has been flying approximately six months. Before the war he was in a P.W.D. designing engineering office. He said that some of the ground subjects instruction was going to bo useful to him after the war. As for taking up flying, “it just appeals to me. lie explained.