World War II Database

1.  Bill says:
7 Sep 2015 04:08:30 PM

TARGET PEARL HARBOR:

By 0530 the pilots and aircrew had breakfast and were briefed given final instructions last minute pep talks. 0550 the carriers headed into the wind for launch of attack force. Did you know there are no known photos of the first attack wave, because of darkness.
However, the second attack wave was filmed and photographed first aircraft off the deck of Akagi was A6M2 Zero flown by Lt. Saburo Shindo survived WWII and later became a General Officer in Japan's post was JASDF...

GROUP PHOTO:

Zuikaku fighter pilots at center, second row from front Lt.Masao Sato group leader. right Lt. Masatoshi Makino, Sato's second in command. Left of Makino Lt. Yuzo Tsukamoto commanding Zuikaku's combat air patrol over the fleet during the attack on Pearl Harbor.
Far right with goatee is PO1c Teteuzo Iwamoto who would become Japan's second-ranking ace with 80 kills. Iwamoto was a China Combat Veteran with 14 kills, all the pilots returned to Zuikaku. Aircraft flown, were Mitsubishi A6M2, Model 21 Zero

2.  Bill says:
1 Nov 2015 06:35:13 PM

PILOT'S MAN YOUR PLANES:

Carrier pilots and aircrew had breakfast and were given last minute instructions. At 0550 the carriers turned into the wind, to launch aircraft. Did you know that there are no known photos of the first wave attack being launched because of darkness. However, the second attack wave was filmed launching its aircraft.

LOSSES:

In 1941 the Japanese Naval Academy trained
90 new pilots a year, after others had washed out of flight training, not counting the thousands that applied, but not accepted.
The loss of 29 pilots and aircrew was about 1/3 of the academies output per year. Nine aircraft were lost in the first wave, and twenty in the second wave.
One hundred and eleven aircraft were damaged, of which twenty six were written off many of the aircraft returned with battle damage or were damaged during recovery aboard the carriers. The carrier decks were pitching and heaving due to rough sea.

THIRD STRIKE: NEVER AN OPTION

No third strike was ever carried out due to many factors, the Japanese lost surprise, and US forces were ready for another possible attack. The air group still had sixty (60) torpedoes, all the 800kg bombs were used in the two attacks, only smaller 250kg bombs were left, not enough to do real damage.
Fuel for the fleet was short Nagumo had to conserve fuel for the carrier aircraft and the Americans had carriers and were by now searching for them Nagumo retired.
The fleet took a north-west route back to Japan, en-route the carriers Hiryu and Soryu diverted to take part in the Wake Is. invasion the rest of the fleet arrived back in Japan December 23, 1941...