Lexington (CV 16) - Naval Cruise Book

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Nm : .. - l v 11... ,, ,,i'i.,a:,i,1T ' .. f'7 'i' ghgg. q-,annum-arm lv 'lwusf .L.n.xa.aw..., ff'-'fe 4+'eff'M-f .tzS::f:s -..E'.fas'-emeL'z1:efrv.-3'9:. .....-a.-,....-- WW'a -- 4.1,-, . , n .M ..- W.. E' M ' . M' A I l . I I I I I 1 I I I I I I I S' II 1,12 I5 Ii I3 EI It Ie I1 It ,.,m...x .I 5 I I I I I I I . 5 I I I il I I I I xi I. 4. 3 5 I 1 In of japanese carrier-based planes launched strikes against Admiral Mitscher's ships, but each raid ran into the covering Air Groups, with disastrous results for the enemy. As an excerpt from CV-16's War Diary that day reveals: c'It was apparent that TF-58 was being attacked by successive waves of carrier planes. From- 1200K until 1500K Qnoon to 3 p.m. local timej groups of bogies were detached and intercepted with deadly regularity. . . .on most occasions interception was affected 40 to 50 miles from the force. A A Correspondent Noel F. Busch reported from aboard Lexington on what was going on in the air: The japanese had apparently. . .planned to run a shuttle-bombing service between their carriers and Guam, at our expense. Unfortunate- ly for them, however, they had set out to do this by sending in their planes in groups of .... 50 or so, and whereas out ofa huge group of 300 a few would have been almost certain to have reached us, these comparatively little clumps were without exception entirely at the mercy of our more numerous interceptors. Actually, according to The Great Sea War, four enemy raids were launched, the first con- sisted of 69 planes-including 16 Zero fighters, the second 128 IfMorison says 130j, the third 47 and the final 82. The same reporter described the Air Group Sixteen fighter pilots as being especially eager to run up their individual and the squadron scores,'7 and Hin a hurry to get back into the air. Indeed, from their attitude it would have been reasonable to guess that they were engaged not in a battle at all but in some especially fast and exciting game .... In Fast Carrier Operations, 1943 -19452 Com- mander Iames C. Shaw reminds us ofa complete- ly different aspect- the personal emotions present in an Air Group. 'cThere is a subtle difference in attitude between a carrier's wardroom and those of other ships. In a cruiser or destroyer, months may pass without a casualty, in acarrier every strike brings death to someone. Everyone realizes that some of those present are eating their last meal. There are curious, furtive glances from table to table. Then, too, in the flattop there is the certainty that, if the enemy at- 50 tacks, this ship will be the prime, probably the only target. The japanese 4'Mobile Fleet had 9 carriers and 430 carrier aircraft compared to 15 and 891 respectively for Task Force 58. This historic engagement, the first phase of which on june 19 saw 346 japanese aircraft blasted from the air and two of her carriers sunk, was nicknamed, in an expression credited to ,Lexington pilot Gom- mander Paul 'D. Buie, Marianas Turkey Shootf' When the Battle of the Philippine Sea was over it was considered notable for other rea- sons also-it was the greatest carrier battle of the war, and one in which the surface ships of the opposing forces never sighted each other. At 10:20 Con the 19thj shortly after the initial enemy raid was sighted, Admiral Mitscher sent aloft over 450 fighters Call those availablej. When they were airborne, the torpedo planes and bombers were launched- so the decks would re- main clear of the Task Force while the Hellcat fighters landed, refueled, rearmed and flew off on their next launch. Actually the bombers did a great deal more than 'ckeep out of the wayf' Their strikes caused great damage to the air- strips of Guam, where Lex pilots dropped sixteen 1,000 pound bombs. i In all, the score of Air Group Sixteen for a single day's work was 45 sure and 4 probable kills in the air, and 3 destroyed and 10 damaged on the ground. A On the way to amassing this impressivetotal the squadrons had some individual heroes emerge. The newestmember of a Lex fighter squadron had landed his plane on another car- rier the day before, and was ferrying his plane The British invented radan but the Americans were the first to put it into extensive use aboard shzp. The superi- origz of American radar was an impor- tant factor in both the ofjvnsive and de- fensive roles played by the fleet Patrol planes, such as thoseshown above Lex's radar antennae array, were launched several times each day to further extend the eyes ofthe fleet. - .

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back to his ship when his radio crackled with a report of japanese planes coming in. Having fuel and ammunition, he decided to do a little hunting before landing. When he set down on CV-16 there were three kills to his credit-not bad for a 3,000 yard ferry flight! One of the Navy's foremost Aces, Lt. Vraciu, shot down six ,bombers with 360 rounds of am- munition on a single flight during the HTurkey Shoot. Describing the attack on the enemy bomber squadron later, the former wingman of Butch O'Hare Chero of CV-2's Air Group in 1942, who had since been killed in actionjlwho led a dozen planes against thirty, related: HAfter we had been on them a few minutes they began to separate like a bunch of disorderly cattle. Every time one of the laps would try to lead a string out of formation the Hellcat pilots turned into ccowboys' and herded them back into the group. If they had been able to separate we wouldn7t have been able to shoot down as many as we did. Realizing the advantage to be gained from this increased air superiority, Mitscher was anxious to close the enemy force. The exact position of the japanese ships was not known, however, and therefore little progress was made toward that end during the night. After a fruitless search to the west the following morning, Mitscher finally turned northwest around noon. As the day wore on TF-58 had to reverse course several times to launch aircraft, and it was beginning to appear that the enemy would evade detection and attack completely. At 4:00 p.m. a search plane finally reported the enemy vessels about 220 miles WNW of the U. S. Force. Although this was .M ..m...- ..... l . El