He said he was so busy thinking, he never had time to get scared. He describes the next 35 minutes as a never-ending battle of strategy and constant maneuvering to avoid being hit from behind, while taking the occasional shot whenever it presented itself. Suddenly, Williams found himself facing the incomprehensibly long odds of surviving a “7v1" encounter, meaning seven planes against one. Williams’ wingman broke away and safely returned to the fleet, but Williams was trapped. He and his wingman were instructed to head back toward the fleet and set up an aerial barricade to protect the ships, but Williams and his fellow pilot soon found themselves “bracketed” at 26,000 feet by the MiGs, and four of them began firing at the two Navy planes. As the unidentified planes flew overhead, Williams recognized them as Soviet MiG-15s.
patrol experienced an engine problem, so he and his wingman returned to the ship, leaving Williams and his wingman behind. Meanwhile, the captain of the four-plane U.S. While climbing through snow clouds below 12,000 feet, Williams said he and his patrol group learned that seven unknown aircraft were approaching at a high elevation. At the time, the Soviets weren’t involved in the war and were not seen as a threat, but they had been sending more planes into the skies to protect their airspace. On Nov, 18, 1952, Williams said he and three other Panther pilots were assigned to do combat air patrol along the Yalu River, which separated the North Korean and Soviet territories. After training to fly the F9F-5 Panther jet, Williams shipped overseas and was eventually assigned to provide air support for a fleet of carriers off the North Korean coastal city of Chongjin, about 100 miles south of the Russian city of Vladivostok. Williams was still in flight training when World War II ended, but he stayed in the Navy and while finishing up a college degree in Minnesota, the Korean conflict began. They got their wish after enlisting for war duty in the wake of the Pearl Harbor attack in 1941. (Charlie Neuman/For The San Diego Union-Tribune)įrom their early childhood in South Dakota, Williams said he and his brother dreamed of growing up to fly airplanes. Congress members Darrell Issa, Scott Peters, Sara Jacobs, Juan Vargas and Mike Levin are preparing an amendment to the 2023 National Defense Authorization Act to include the Medal of Honor for Williams. Congressional delegation joined forces to not only bring Williams’ heroism to the public’s attention, but also to right what they see as a historic wrong. servicemen for extraordinary valor in the Korean War, Williams didn’t make the list.īut this past week, all five members of the San Diego U.S. As a result, when the nation awarded 146 Medals of Honor to U.S. Navy and National Security Agency scrubbed the dogfight from its records and Williams was sworn to secrecy for more than 50 years. Rather than acknowledge an air battle that might have had the effect of drawing the Soviets into the Korean War, the U.S. But no trace of Williams’ daring flight on Nov. Williams’ aerial heroics have been a legend for decades among pilots coming up through the Navy’s Top Gun school, and the incident was recorded in Soviet Union military history. For 35 minutes, he engaged solo in an aerial dogfight with seven Soviet MiG-15 pilots, downing at least four jets before escaping to land his heavily damaged F9F-5 Panther jet on a U.S. Navy fighter pilot Royce Williams pulled off what many experts say is one of the greatest feats in aviation history. Seventy years ago this fall in the skies over North Korea, U.S.
0 kommentar(er)
