Into the Wind

By Phil Nussbaum

Many of our lives are shaped by circumstances, whose importance cannot even be conceived at that moment they occur. The heroine in this book embraces those seemingly obscure moments and ends up with a position of real importance to the Allies and her own countrymen. She becomes very grateful for the things that ultimately brought her to the zenith of her career and to the love of her life. It is my hope that as you fly with her you will become grateful as well, for having met her, and for the opportunity to learn from her. Close the canopy and fire up the engines, your own adventure awaits.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: May 29, 2014
• ISBN: 9781304599896

Book preview

Into the Wind

Into The Wind

By Phil Nussbaum

Copyright © 2014 by Phil Nussbaum

All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any written, electronic, recording, or photocopying without written permission of the publisher or author. The exception would be in the case of brief quotations embodied in the critical articles or reviews and pages where permission is specifically granted by the publisher or author.

ISBN: 978-1-304-59989-6

Acknowledgements

As the author, I am only the tip of the spear. Were it not for the tireless efforts of others, books like these would never be available. Proofing, formatting, technical auditing, releases are but a few of the tasks that stand between the creation of a book and the reality of publishing.

Ms. Rebecca Reeb and Ms. Vicki Powszok, did all the yeoman work on this book and are chiefly responsible for finishing this complicated process. I wish to recognize their efforts and their sacrifices made on my behalf. A thank you, even a heartfelt thank you for going above and beyond is such a small tribute.

To say I am lucky would be a gross understatement. Thank you again, ladies. This process is not possible without you.

Chapter 1     Dawn Patrol

It is late summer 1942, 5:15AM.  The sun is not yet over the horizon, and the local weather is the usual mix of low clouds and high grass with very little room in between.  An olive, drab, war-weary early model P-38 is on final approach ten miles from the end of the runway.  The factory-built recon P-38 called the F 5, is two years away.  The local mechanics, however, have already modified this airplane for its special mission.

Upon touchdown, it will be the end of a five-hour roundtrip mission.  The pilot has been constantly monitoring the left-hand, rough-running 1350 horsepower power plant.  She has diagnosed the problem as an insulation breakdown in the spark plug wiring, causing some of the magnetos’ electrical flow to the engine’s spark plugs to be short-circuited.  The moist, bitterly cold air always invited gremlins into the ignition harness.  The rough-running left engine has been both aggravating and nerve racking, for the last 100 miles.

Ms. Allison Booth, tired and sweaty despite the cold temperature, is listening for commands from the radar controller.  She is executing a precision radar approach that is similar in nature to the landing approaches used later in the Berlin airlift.  Decision height comes and goes, but Allison keeps descending.  Gear down, flaps down, cooler doors to trail, fuel mixture controls as needed.  Over one hundred hours of operational time in this airplane has given her the finesse she needs to accomplish things with little wasted motion.

You are over the end of the runway and over the centerline.  Ease back on the power.  No sooner had Allison complied with those instructions heard over her headset when the main wheels gave their customary chirp.  Allison could now see the centerline but not much else.  A Jeep with a glowing Follow Me electric sign meets her at the end of the runway and leads her through the ground fog and into her revetment.  There are three or four mechanics and handlers standing by to meet the airplane.  Allison shuts the fuel off to both engines via the fuel mixture controls and gang bars all the electrical switches.

Allison lowered the side windows then pushed the top section of her canopy up against its restraint made of parachute cord to keep it up and out of the way.  The mechanics bring a specially built ladder so that Allison can climb down easily instead of using the factory retractable ladder at the rear of the wing.  The factory-built rear ladder was a bit cumbersome to use, and her dedicated crew decided she deserved better. Allison climbs down and fluffs her hair. Someone hands her an umbrella.

Thanks boys, you are the best.

No, Ms. Booth.  You are the best. Everyman in that revetment knows what Ms. Booth has just gone through, and her P-38 had a few bullet holes as deadly proof of where she had been. An ME 109 decided to pot shot her, but she left him in her dust.  The 109 got a lucky shot but no real damage other than a little extra work for the tin knockers—the sheet metal mechanics. 

Her crew will dry out the ignition harness and then paint all the threaded connections with women’s nail polish to improve the barrier seal against further moisture buildup inside the harness.  A high-voltage harness tester will confirm that the repair work done to the harness is OK.  Sometimes the individual spark plug wires had to be replaced because the rubber insulation material on these wires had broken down and could no longer remain in service. In some cases, entire harness assemblies were replaced.  Either way, the mechanics put in very long hours.

She handed in her report, grabbed coffee and some scrambled eggs, and went to her quarters to finish her meal and hit the pillows.  Another mission chalked up, and she felt good that the bombing squadron would now have real-time weather data.  Back then that was the only way to get real time weather data to the bombing groups.  The Army called it direct observation.  Allison was the best there was at her job, but it wasn’t always that way.  As she started to reflect back, sleep came easily and she was gone.

One year prior she was a newcomer but not exactly unknown.  She and her touchy Supermarine Spitfire Mark 5 were in the middle of her landing roll out, and suddenly a brake started to lock up.  She killed the engine and applied the opposite brake, but the inertia was too much.  She ended up off the runway, and one landing gear collapsed under the side force.  She and her recon Spitfire ended up in a rather undignified heap despite her best efforts.

The first person at the scene was Tim Matthews.  Sergeant Tim, as he liked to be called, drove up in a Jeep and immediately saw to Ms. Booth’s condition.  She had a pretty large cut on her forehead.  He began to administer first aid, and Ms. Booth was impressed both with the man and his attention.  As others showed up, he directed their efforts at recovery, never taking his eyes off Allison’s cut.  As embarrassed as she felt about what had just happened, she also felt protected.  Being in Sgt. Matthews’ presence would have almost seemed cozy if they had not been sitting next to a wrecked, smoldering heap.  Anyone who dared to be curious got something to do.

Enlisted men and junior officers alike did not want to run afoul of Sgt. Matthews.  His size was totally intimidating and transcended rank most of the time.  He was so big and powerful that he almost did not get into the army on size alone, because they were able—just able—to find uniforms big enough.  Nobody got into the Sgt.’s way, but he never needed to bully anyone.  He was beyond that. People did for him and he did for them.  It was that simple.  Today’s event was just another opportunity to be who he was.

What do you do here at the base, Sergeant?

Well Ms. Booth, my MOS is aircraft maintenance, but I mainly keep the peace between a lot of these head cases.

Well I am very glad to meet you even under these circumstances, Tim.

Thank you ma’am.

Please call me Allison.  I am a civilian here.

Well Ms. Booth, I usually insist that folks call me Sergeant, at least to my face.  They both laughed a little.  How are you feeling?  I have got your future character-building scar butterflied and the bleeding has stopped.

Still throbs a bit.

It is dangerous to give you an aspirin but I will have one of the men run for a small bag of ice.

Ice, Tim? This is England, and there isn’t any ice.  Period.

Not so, my brave pilot.  I have ice.  About that time, a runner brought some of this contraband ice, and Sgt. Matthews made two packs: one for Allison’s forehead and one for the back of her neck. The two sat there while the ice did its thing.

Some thirty minutes later, the ice had worked its magic, and the real medics finally took her to the hospital, although there was nothing left to do except monitor her overnight.

See you around Tim.

See you around Ms. Booth.

Allison.

I will work on that Ms. Booth.

The command office had a replacement airplane flown down a few days later.  Another persnickety Spitfire, but Allison flew whatever they gave her.  Another weather recon mission was posted and flown like only she could fly.  Her Spitfire was armed just in case she had to defend herself.  Although she had no formal gunnery training, everyone’s guess was that if you pissed off this particular redhead, she would instantly gun down whoever the transgressor was, training or no training.

She gathered temperatures, developed relative humidity, wind speed, and direction, and took note of the cloud cover type and location.  As she flew over the intended target alone, the clouds opened up, and today’s bombing mission, starting in two hours, was bound to be a good one.  By the time Allison was back across the north end of the English Channel, the bombers were outbound.  As she passed by them in the opposite direction, the gunners appeared to have received permission to test fire their guns.  She found herself the unwitting recipient of tracer fire from her own people.  She got on the horn, and the firing ceased instantly.  Allison made a mental note to be sure to avoid the bomber stream if she found herself returning, as they were clearing ten thousand feet, which was the typical altitude at which bomber crews tested their guns.

No radar approach was needed today since the weather was as good as it gets in April.  She treated the boys to a roller, and then pulled into her revetment.  There was the usual flurry of attention given by the ground crew.  You sure make nice landings Ms. Booth.

I wish they were all that good, Corporal Riley, but I do get a roller every once in a while.  It was extremely evident that her ground crew was very proud of her work.  For her part, she never failed to compliment them on their efforts.  Thanks, men. I have to go turn in my reports.  Corporal Riley, you will look after that oil leak for us, please.

Right away, Ms. Booth. She made it very clear that anything done for her was actually done for the group, or us.  The men always appreciated that.

Chapter 2     Stand Down Time

There were to be no bombing missions for the next few days, owing to generally bad weather and snow over the entire European theatre.  Allison decided to go home for a couple of days.  She and her mother