The Vought F4U Corsair was rejected by the Navy for carrier operations yet became the most feared propeller-driven combat aircraft of World War II in the hands of Marine aviators.
TaildraggerHow five minutes of SBD Dauntless dive bombing on June 4, 1942 sank three Japanese carriers and permanently shifted the balance of the Pacific War.
TaildraggerThe Vought F4U Corsair was the fastest American single-engine fighter of WWII, earning an 11:1 kill ratio after the Navy handed it to the Marines for being too dangerous to carrier-land.
TaildraggerOn April 18, 1943, sixteen P-38 Lightnings flew 400 miles over open ocean to ambush and kill Japan's most powerful admiral using a decoded schedule.
TaildraggerThe Aichi M6A1 Seiran was a WWII Japanese submarine-launched floatplane built to bomb the Panama Canal. The only survivor hangs at Udvar-Hazy.
TaildraggerOn the night of October 13–14, 1942, Japanese battleships reduced Henderson Field to rubble - and nine Marine dive bomber crews flew anyway.
TaildraggerHow five minutes of dive bombing on June 4, 1942 - and the torpedo crews who made it possible - turned the tide of the Pacific War at Midway.
TaildraggerThe F4U Corsair was rejected by the Navy for carrier use, handed to the Marines, and became the most feared propeller-driven fighter in the Pacific.
TaildraggerRejected by the U.S. Navy as unfit for carriers in 1942, the Vought F4U Corsair became the Pacific's most feared fighter in Marine Corps hands - and its enemies named it Whistling Death.
TaildraggerOn April 18, 1943, sixteen P-38 Lightnings flew a 435-mile dead-reckoning intercept to kill Admiral Yamamoto, changing the course of the Pacific War.
TaildraggerThe Grumman F6F Hellcat achieved a 19-to-1 kill ratio in WWII, accounting for 75% of all U.S. Navy aerial victories in the Pacific theater.
TaildraggerOn April 18, 1942, sixteen B-25 Mitchell bombers launched from the USS Hornet and struck Tokyo, cracking Japan's myth of invulnerability and setting in motion the chain of events that led to Midway.
TaildraggerThe Vought F4U Corsair was rejected by the U.S. Navy for carrier operations yet became one of the most feared combat aircraft of the Pacific War.
TaildraggerThe Grumman F6F Hellcat reversed American fortunes in the Pacific, earning a 19-to-1 kill ratio and destroying Japan's carrier air arm.
TaildraggerThe Vought F4U Corsair was too fast and too difficult for carrier operations - so the Navy gave it to the Marines, who turned it into one of the most effective fighters of World War II.
TaildraggerThe F4U Corsair was rejected by the Navy for carrier use, given to the Marines, and became the most feared fighter in the Pacific - serving through two wars across 13 years of production.
TaildraggerThe Lockheed P-38 Lightning produced America's greatest ace, executed the killing of Admiral Yamamoto, and flew further than any Allied fighter of WWII.
TaildraggerOn August 7, 1942, Japanese ace Saburo Sakai flew 560 miles home over open ocean with a fractured skull and a destroyed right eye - a story of survival that defines human limits in the cockpit.
TaildraggerHow a downed Japanese Zero fighter recovered from an Alaskan bog in 1942 gave the U.S. Navy the intelligence it needed to turn the tide of the Pacific air war.
TaildraggerThe Curtiss SB2C Helldiver survived over 800 engineering changes and a reputation its own crews despised to deliver more combat ordnance than any other Allied carrier dive bomber in the Pacific.
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