Back to Rescues page...
This is the actual account of 2LT David Gunn, one of the rescued B-25 pilots...
  The
mission was originally scheduled for Dec. 27, 1944, I believe, but was rescheduled because
of weather until finally Dec. 30. It was, as I recall, the longest B-25 mission during my
term of service with the 38th Bomb Group. Some of our planes had been equipped with
more fuel tanks
than most of the others so twelve of the longer range planes from all four squadrons were
scheduled for this mission. Twelve crews from two squadrons were assigned to fly
these planes. My crew and five others were from the 405th squadron and we flew in
second position over the target which was more than 700 miles west of Morotai. I was
flying a plane from another squadron.
In addition to a five-man crew, my plane had the squadron Gunnery Officer as an observer
and a Lieutenant from a photo unit who was to make motion pictures of the strike for
eventual use in news reel films for state side release. I was flying number 3 in the
first flight in our squadron.
As we approached Tarakan, we closed up into tight formation and turned left to a
190-degree course over the target. I had a feeling that our flight leader had turned
a bit soon which put us closer than desired to the squadron ahead of us and I shouted to
my copilot, "too close" as we
pushed our throttles to the firewall and dropped about 800 feet to tree top level.
I had already begun firing the twelve .50 cal. guns in the nose when I suddenly flew
through the bomb blast from a bomb dropped by the number 3 plane in the flight ahead of
us. Mud covered my windshield. From then on, I saw nothing of the target but
tried to stay low (for best protection) by twisting my head from side to side to see trees
on each side of us. My copilot dropped the bombs by observing passing targets
through his side window. I did not know it at the time, but the number 2 man in our
flight was blown out of the air over the target, possibly
because he encountered a bomb blast as the force was going up while the blast I flew
through had already expended its energy and was falling as I went through it.
After we reach the southwest coast of Tarakan and turned north to go around the island, I
pushed my hand outside my window and rubbed a little mud off a small part of the
windshield in order to have some forward vision. We flew to the north side of
Tarakan Island and turned east to return to Morotai.
At this point, my tail gunner reported that a plane had ditched a little way behind us.
Other planes also observed this and our squadron leader circled to observe the
plane and check for survivors. By this time we had climbed to 800 or 900 feet. We
noted that the five men had gotten out of the plane but did not seem to have a life raft.
I had an emergency kit in the forward compartment and dropped down to fly low over
the survivors, and my flight engineer dropped the kit out through the forward escape
hatch. A couple of men from the ditched crew swam toward the kit.
As we rejoined the flight overhead, we noted that one of the survivors had floated away
from the rest. By the time the men got the raft in the kit inflated, the floating
man was some distance away and moving toward the beach. It was the tide carrying him
and he made no motions whatever.
Our planes could not stay in the area very long so the squadron leader assigned me and one
other plane to cover the survivors until the Catalina could come in to pick them up.
We were then to fly to Dipolog on Mindanao to get gas and then return home.
Shortly after they left for
home, we learned that the Catalina was already part way back to Morotai (having been
called to another rescue as I now understand) and could not get out to pick up our crew.
Soon after that I discovered that I could not transfer my reserves of fuel into my wing
tanks which made it unusable. We tried the emergency hand pumps to no avail. I
informed the other plane that I didn't have fuel enough to reach any emergency base and
had elected to stay at this location in the air as long as possible and then ditch here.
We knew that the Cat would come back the next day, weather permitting. The
other crew turned for Dipolog.
As we circled the men in the water, I was disturbed because they were not heading for the
shore of a nearby island. I realized they thought the Cat was coming. Soon the
man floating toward shore reach the edge of the water, but just lay over his floatation
cushion without moving. We did not know if he was alive but we knew that he must be
at least seriously injured. I flew low over the men in the channel on a raft and
tried to signal them to go for the shore. They did not understand.
About three hours after the first craft ditched, my fuel gages were bouncing off empty.
I circled this little island a few miles north of Tarakan one more time to be sure
there were no Japanese air, land, or water borne personnel coming in that direction.
I lined up parallel to the shore of the island near the beached man and made as
near a perfect ditching as there could be. We were in about four feet of water and
stopped about a hundred yards from the man on the cushion. Our first effort was to
reach the man on the cushion - he was still alive. We quickly gathered all survival
equipment and headed for the beach. In two or three trips back and forth we managed
to secure two rafts as well as other emergency gear.
We carried our gear about another hundred yards to the edge of jungle ferns behind a stand
of trees growing on a tidewater mud flat. We carried the injured man to our
temporary camp a few feet into the ferns I assigned two men to take one raft part
way out through the trees to
watch for unfriendlies. We pulled our
other raft close to the ferns. We could not see the other crew on the
water from our position. The tide kept coming in.
About an hour later, the men on watch come sloshing through the water warning that a
Japanese landing craft was approaching our downed plane. They had abandoned their
raft for fear its bright orange color would be observed moving through the trees to where
we were. It wasn't long before we found ourselves standing in water. There was
no high ground near us. I feared that the raft we had was too visible and tried to
deflate it, ultimately stabbing a hole in it to hasten the process. I knew there was
a patching kit under the seat.
The Japs pounded around on our plane for about a half hour. It was getting dark.
They finally motored way without making any search for us, retrieving the raft in
the trees before they left.
As twilight began to settle in, I suddenly saw a motion through the ferns near us.
And the next hole through the ferns, I saw a familiar face - one of them men from the
other crew, shortly followed by the three other men. We were now together.
When they saw me ditch, they knew the jig was up and headed for us but the current of the
incoming tide had carried them beyond the point we were on and about a mile further west
the made shore. As they moved toward us, they encountered some natives and a hut.
They had some exchange with them and then noticed the Japanese landing craft coming near
on its way to our plane and hid in the jungle a short distance from the natives.
After the Japanese left the area, they again headed for us until we met.
The tide was still coming in. I have learned since, that six to eight-foot tides are
usual in this area. The island, Tibi Island, is located in the mouth of a big river
from the interior of Borneo. It was actually very little more than a swamp at high tide.
Four of the uninjured moved away from the main group looking for higher ground, but
the quickly enshrouding darkness left them separated from us and essentially lost.
I did not like our location because we had such a limited viewing angle. Before darkness
totally enveloped us, I noticed a tip of the island about 400 yards from us that was
covered by ferns, elevated a bit, with an unobstructed view of the water for a great
distance. I decided that when the tide receded, we would move across the mud flats
to that point. About midnight, we packed up. The mending kit glue was hardened and I
had to insert a wooden plug in the hole I had made, Some of the men chewed gum from
the rations and I was able to put that around the plug and complete the sealing of the
hole. We pumped it up and put the man we had rescued into it. He had two
compound fractures in his right arm. One of the men who had joined us also had a broken
arm so we put him in the raft.
We started out towing the raft over the mud, five of us pulling. Another of the men
who had ditched first was the tail gunner and when they made their unexpected ditching, he
suffered a compression fracture of his back and was hurting so bad he could not pull, even
having to ride on the end of the raft at times. We finally made the base of a
ten-foot mudbank that led up to our objective.
We managed to get the injured men up the bank, and then the raft. We moved about 10
or 15 feet into the ferns and made camp. During the night it drizzled and we
covered the injured with an emergency tarp, the rest of us sitting on the edge of the raft
with our feet outside. We
managed to keep jungle rats at bay. The tide came up again about dawn but the water
wasn't as deep around us as at our first camp.
In midmorning, we observed a large canoe with several men in it and a machine gun in the
prow moving along a hundred yards offshore. Their gaze toward us left no doubt they
were looking for us. After the tide moved out in the early afternoon, we smelled
cigarette smoke and our
lookout near the edge of the ferns spotted two Jap solders moving along the base of the
bank approaching us. We sat for some time in complete silence.
When we felt they had left us, I went to our lookout point and noticed that our tracks
over the mudflat were still quite plain. They had obviously noticed them and had
chatted about them which explained the sounds of their voices we had heard for two or
three minutes. Later in the afternoon, a water-borne patrol passed by again.
The weather was not good that day so I didn't expect to see the Cat. Night settled in and
we settled down. After we had arrived at this camp the first night, we heard sounds
like something pushing through the ferns some small distance away. We could also
hear voices but could not
determine if they were the four men who had separated from us. I determined not to
give our location away.
On the second morning, January 1, 1945, we observed the water patrol again. Some
time after that, we heard the drone of aircraft engines. We made ready to signal or
to hide under the tarp with ferns pulled around us. The sound moved from the north
of us to the west of us, low and
obscured by the trees on the island. Soon, a big black B-24 came into view to the
south and we began to flash our mirrors and wave the tarp. In just a few seconds, the Cat
came into view close behind. It turned east and then began a curving flight path
toward us and I knew we had
been spotted when he flew over us and started lowering his wingtip floats. The tide
was still up, nearly to the top of the bank. We started inflating the raft and
moving it to the water. The injured men got aboard. The others got in the
water around the raft and used first aid splints (about 4x16 inches) carried on our
forearms as paddles as the plane, now landed, was taxiing toward us. The pilot did
not know the water depth but I did and kept signaling him on in toward us.
We were nearing the plane when one of the Cat crew jumped into the forward turret and
swinging it toward shore. I looked back and saw that the other four men had come to
the shore and one of them jumped into the water to swim toward us. I yelled to the
Cat, "Don't Fire, friendlies." The pilot now realized he would have to shut the
engines down until all the rescues could be made. We soon got to the Cat and
were assisted aboard. Two of the Cat crew dropped down into our raft with paddles
and went off to pick up the four men. During this time, the Cat pilot (your uncle)
started the process of getting the engines started. He had not
wanted to shut them down because there had been some trouble getting one of them started
that morning.
As the final group of men came on board, one engine started right up. Then they wound up
the inertial starter on the second engine. It coughed and spit without starting.
It was on about the fourth try that it finally came to life to everybody's relief.
Following takeoff, and after reaching a few hundred feet, we could see a Jap
counterpart to our P.T. boats racing through the water across the channel that separated
Tibi Island from Tarakan Island. But we were safely away and headed for Morotai.
Shortly, the crew broke out parts of a roast turkey and we had our first meal in
about 50 hours. Your uncle invited me up to the flight deck and I sat in the
copilot's seat for about an hour during the return flight.
Upon arriving at Morotai, all of us wound up in the hospital. Those of us not
injured, had numerous scratches and bruises, mostly from our jungle experience and
uncounted mosquito bites (in spite of the liberally applied repellant). Those not
seriously injured returned to our squadron's area about a week later. There were
actually four men who sustained injuries that resulted in being returned home.
2Lt David J. Gunn, B-25 pilot
Back to Rescues page...
|
