Aircraft History
Nose Number 147, painted in white.

Assigned to Lt. Robert Petit during March and April 1943 while flying from Figher 2 (Kukum) on Guadalcanal.

Two victory Japanese flags were painted on the nose, for a pair of A6M2-N Rufes claimed by Petit on February 27, 1943.

On March 29, 1943 on a mission over the Shortlands Petit claimed a destroyer sunk, and painted a ship siloette on the nose. Infact, this was a subchaser badly damaged, but not sunk.

On April 18, 1943 took off from Figher 2 (Kukum) piloted by Rex Barber on the "Yamamoto Mission", shooting down G4M1 Betty 2656 Tail T1-323 with Admiral Yamamoto aboard.

Afterwards, he joined two others P-38G #100 piloted by Holmes and P-38G piloted by Hine attacking the second bomber G4M1 Betty T1-326.

Holmes dove at the bomber, firing at it and causing the left engine to smoke. Hine next fired at it. Finally, Barber fired into the fuselage and claimed to cause it to explode. Barber's P-38 was damaged by debris from this bomber that left a hole in the left wing, damaged the left intercooler and othe superficial damage. The bomber ditched into the sea off Moila Point off southern Bougainville.

The three attacking P-38s were attcked by Zeros, but Holmes and Hine intercepted, allowing Barber to escape and successfully returned to base.

After the mission, this P-38 had over 100 holes from damaged suffered on the mission, and an inter cooler damaged by escorting Zeros.

References
13th Fighter Command in World War II pages 80 (photo), 120 (photo) 137 - 162, 312 (profile)

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Last Updated
October 16, 2009