Richard Bong of Poplar, Wisconsin earned 40 aerial kills flying a P-38 Lightning over New Guinea - a record no American pilot has ever broken.
TaildraggerThe Lockheed P-38 Lightning was the most distinctive American fighter of WWII - a twin-boomed, twin-engined design that dominated the Pacific and carried America's top ace to 40 kills.
TaildraggerRichard Bong scored 40 aerial kills in a P-38 Lightning during WWII - a record no American pilot has matched in any conflict since.
TaildraggerThe Lockheed P-38 Lightning's twin-engine range made it America's deadliest Pacific fighter and carried Richard Bong to 40 aerial victories.
TaildraggerRichard Bong scored 40 aerial victories in WWII - more than any American pilot in history - before dying in a jet accident on August 6, 1945, the same morning as Hiroshima.
TaildraggerRichard Bong flew 40 aerial victories over the Pacific in a P-38 Lightning, becoming America's greatest fighter ace - and died in a California test flight on August 6, 1945.
TaildraggerRichard Bong shot down 40 Japanese aircraft over the Pacific - a record no American fighter pilot has matched in over 80 years - and died the same morning the atomic bomb fell on Hiroshima.
TaildraggerRadio Hangar explores The Lockheed P-38 Lightning, the Fork-Tailed Devil With Two Booms and Two Engines That Outran Everything and Brought Its Pilots Home.
TaildraggerHow Kelly Johnson's twin-boom P-38 Lightning became WWII's 'fork-tailed devil' and why it still stops the show at Oshkosh.
TaildraggerThe Lockheed P-38 Lightning was WWII's most distinctive fighter - twin-engine, twin-boom, and with the range to change the outcome of the Pacific war.
TaildraggerRichard Bong scored 40 aerial victories in the Pacific, making him the highest-scoring American fighter ace in history.
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