F4U Corsair Pilots Who Refused to Die

Estimated reading time: 11 minutes

Two young Marine F4U Corsair pilots entered a savage Pacific dogfight and somehow survived the impossible. One met a Japanese Zero’s propeller. The other fell 2,000 feet without a working parachute.

The Pacific Dogfight That Set the Trap

The summer of 1943 was a busy time in the azure blue skies above the Pacific. Allied pilots battled their Japanese counterparts to the death over control of tiny spits of sandy jungle jutting up out of the ocean. If war had ever truly been chivalrous and gentlemanly, any pretense of that was gone some 18 months after the surprise attack at Pearl Harbor.

7 June 1943 saw brutal aerial combat over the Russell Islands in the Solomons. Marine F4U Corsairs and Army Air Corps P40 Warhawks mixed it up with Japanese Zeroes until the sky was dirty with smoke and death. One particular engagement produced two comparably extraordinary tales.

Why the Japanese Zero Ruled Early Pacific Skies

At the onset of the war in the Pacific, the Japanese Zero and the men who flew it seemed unstoppable. Japanese naval aviators in particular were some of the most well-trained pilots in the world. However, their bench was shallow. While the United States tooled up to produce combat aircraft and pilots at a rate not seen before or since, Japanese aviators killed in combat could not readily be replaced. This attrition was beginning to be felt over the battlefield by mid-1943.

The Zero was considered invincible because of an intentional mechanical compromise. Where American fighters were fat with armor, self-sealing fuel tanks, and .50-caliber heavy machine guns, the A6M5 Zero was a stripped-down, lightweight thoroughbred. The Zero’s lack of armor and amenities made it nimble and fast but vulnerable.

The Zero’s radios were rubbish. Unreliable, heavy, and quirky, Japanese radios of the day often pummeled Zero pilots with mind-numbing static. As a result, a great many Japanese pilots pulled the heavy radio gear out of their machines to improve their performance. This left tactical control up to such primitive stuff as hand signals and wing waggling. American tech would soon play a huge part in our coming overwhelming tactical superiority.

As a result, Japanese combat aircraft often flew in huge mixed formations. On 7 June, some 50 Japanese Zero fighters and single-engine bombers were droning along above the Russell Islands. Army P40’s bounced this huge gaggle of Japanese warplanes. The resulting frenetic dogfight devolved into a swirling maelstrom of aerial violence.

A Long Way Down: Samuel Logan Bails Out

22-year-old Marine aviator LT Samuel S. Logan was flying an F4U Corsair when he came upon a solitary Zero hot on the tail of an Army Warhawk. Logan unleashed his half-dozen .50-caliber machine guns on the Japanese plane only to have another Zero get the jump on him. He felt his heavy gull-winged machine shudder and realized that the control surfaces in his tail were shredded. With the big Marine fighter now beginning to come apart, Logan slid his canopy back, unfastened it, and crawled out of the cockpit.

One of the biggest threats to a successful egress from a crippled WW2-era fighter was being struck by one’s own plane during the jump. As a result, Sam Logan worked his way hand-over-hand down the length of his stricken machine and leapt clear from the damaged empennage. In moments, he was falling free. Once away from his airplane, Logan pulled the ripcord and found himself suspended underneath his parachute.

Cold-Blooded Code: A Zero Circles Back

The Zero pilot who had shot him down was not satisfied simply to have destroyed Logan’s airplane. He torqued his nimble little fighter around in a tight circle and lined up for a firing pass on the helpless Marine aviator. LT Logan knew what was coming.

Killing pilots while under canopy was illegal per the laws of war, but there wasn’t anybody around to enforce those laws. American pilots machine-gunned their helpless opponents on rare occasions, usually in response to barbarity such as this, but the Japanese did it quite a lot. This practice stemmed from the weird Bushido code that drove the Japanese war machine.

Japanese troops were indoctrinated to sacrifice everything for their Emperor. Surrender was a disgrace worse than death. As a result, enemy troops who had willingly saved themselves under such circumstances were not considered worthy of basic human protections.

Fish in a Barrel: A Zero Hunts Logan Under Canopy

It is actually tougher to engage an essentially stationary aerial target from a fast-moving fighter plane than you might think. The Japanese pilot lined up on LT Logan and fired a long burst but missed. Logan lifted his legs as the enemy plane passed mere feet below him. The Zero then circled around for another try.

The second effort ended about the same as the first. Logan again had to lift his feet in an effort to avoid the attacking fighter. Miraculously, the Japanese pilot failed to connect a second time.

By the third pass, Logan was pulling madly at his risers in an effort to make himself a tougher target. Now focused entirely on killing the American flyer, the Japanese pilot loosed another burst at close range. Misjudging the distance, the Zero pilot actually struck the dangling Marine with his propeller. The Zero removed most of Logan’s right foot as well as his left heel. As the Japanese fighter wheeled around for a fourth pass, a nearby American P40 noticed the carnage, engaged the enemy plane, and drove it away.

A Fine Mess: Wounded in the Pacific

LT Logan was now in a bit of a spot. The murderous Japanese pilot was no longer actively trying to kill him, which was great. However, he had just had his legs run through an airplane propeller. It was in this sordid state that he touched down in the warm waters of the Pacific.

Logan somehow got his life raft inflated and pulled himself out of the water. Clawing through his survival gear, he managed to get a tourniquet around his mangled right foot and liberally covered the wound in sulfa powder. He then injected himself with a morphine syrette to dull the pain. Despite his injuries, Logan retrieved his signal mirror and successfully attracted the attention of an American floatplane. The friendly aircraft landed nearby and successfully effected a rescue. Logan was medevac’d to a Naval hospital where his right stump was dressed.

One Wild Ride: J.G. Percy Falls 2,000 Feet

During this same engagement, one of Sam Logan’s fellow Corsair pilots, a Marine aviator named J.G. Percy from San Francisco, downed one Zero and damaged another. In the melee, Percy’s Corsair was also riddled with bullets and cannon shells. At 2,000 feet, the 21-year-old Marine aviator dove out of his dying plane.

The parachutes used by military aviators of that era were last-ditch survival tools. They were designed to be lightweight and portable. There were no reserves. When LT Percy yanked his ripcord, the white nylon chute malfunctioned into a worthless ribbon. He had no other options except simply to fall.

From nearly half a mile up, Percy accelerated to a ridiculous speed. Once he neared the water, he oriented himself feet-first and twisted his head skyward. In this configuration, he hit the water like a rocket.

Why a 2,000-Foot Fall Turns Water Into Concrete

Liquids are incompressible. Gases are not. What that means is that you can compress a volume of air or similar gas into a tank to be used at your convenience. By contrast, no matter how much pressure you put on a liquid like water, that volume will not get appreciably smaller.

What that practically means in this case is that the Pacific Ocean had no give to it. Jumping into the water from a diving board allows the human body to slip into the water such that this potential energy is dissipated gradually and safely. At LT Percy’s speed, however, the water acted almost like concrete.

The fastest a human body can typical strike water without injury is between 35 and 40 mph. That equates out to a jump height of around 40 to 50 feet. Terminal velocity for a human being dropped from 2,000 feet is closer to 120 mph when falling belly-first. Percy was more like a pencil. Something had to give.

Brace for Impact: Percy Hits the Pacific

Percy later said that he “Landed in the water feet-first and felt something break.” That something was his pelvis, but he was, against all odds, still alive. The young Marine got his Mae West life jacket inflated, and that kept his head above water.

Despite his grievous injuries, LT Percy swam for three hours until he reached a jagged reef. Pulling himself over the coral, he made his way with difficulty to the nearby beach. Percy remained on the beach throughout the night, unable to stand or walk. The following day, he attracted the attention of four passing natives who summoned aid and got him to safety. Once stabilized in an American military hospital, Percy recovered.

Two Marine Pilots Who Simply Refused to Die

World War 2 was the most expansive conflict in human history. Between 70 and 85 million people lost their lives. 16 million Americans served. One in every 39 perished. Those are the raw numbers. However, the real drama of WW2 was not found in these cold statistics. It was embedded within the individual stories.

Sam Logan and JG Percy were two young Americans who answered the call to go and fight in defense of democracy. When faced with the prospect of violent, gory death, these two brass-balled jarheads simply said not today. One man ran through an airplane propeller, while the other fell from a burning fighter plane without a parachute. Both Marines survived the war and miraculously lived to build lives and families back home. Our great nation is built upon such amazing stuff as this.

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