016 - The Mighty Hawks

The Men of Wheeler Field

.

The “United States Air Force” didn’t come into being until the end of World War II. Before then, they were known as the U.S. Army Air Corps. The Air Corps stationed at Pearl was part of the 15th Pursuit Group, an aviation wing responsible for the defense of the Pacific’s Air, Naval, and Army fleets. The Air corps, however, was mostly equipped with older planes, like the P-36 Hawk and P-40 Warhawk.

.

Even before the Kido Butai attacked Battleship Row, their first objective was to attack Wheeler Air Field, in central Oahu. Japanese “Zeke” fighters strafed Wheeler Field with machine gun fire and dropped 132-pound incendiary bombs on airplanes while the "Vals" dropped their massive 551-pound bombs on the airstrips. These "Type 98" bombs were designed to make take-off and landing on the airstrip nearly impossible.  

.

Being close to the harbor, Hickam and Ewa Fields received most of the damage. In the thirty minutes between the First and Second Waves, the American Army Forces managed to launch a small counter-attack of 12 planes. Of these, most were the older Curtiss P-38 Hawk. It was a stout steel fighter plane with two guns: a fixed-mount .50 caliber machine gun and the smaller swivel-mount .30 Browning machine gun.

.

In the short thirty minute span between the first and second attack waves one of the pilots at Wheeler Field, Lieutenant Phil Rasmussen, who was still in his pajamas, managed to taxi an available P-36 Hawk to a covered area (called a revetment), refuel, and reload his aircraft with a full load of ammunition. Soon, he was airborne.

.

Like Rasmussen, 11 other pilots (most in the newer P-38 Warhawks) managed to get airborne and headed to Kaneohe Bay, in the northeastern Oahu. Although Rasmussen and his men were outnumbered and outgunned, they held their own, shooting down 11 Zeros while only losing one of their own.

.

However, Rasmussen was one of the luckiest men that day. After he shot down a Japanese Zero, he narrowly avoided being rammed by an ammo-less Japanese plane. His P-36 also went into a nosedive, but Rasmussen managed to regain control around 5,000 feet and pilot his plane back to Wheeler Field - without the aid of a rudder, brakes or a tail wheel. Afterwards, over 300 separate bullet holes told the full story of the Curtiss P-36 Hawk's true strength. For his bravery on that day, Rasmussen was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross, and later, the Silver Leaf Cluster Honor..

.