Ghost P-40

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The waiting list for this Tesla is currently 6 months, but you can jump that line faster than you can go from 0 to 60 (which is really, really fast). For your chance to win a Tesla Model X Plaid and support a great cause, visit omaze.com/yarnhub. It is the quiet afternoon of December 8, 1942, in Fujian Province, China, near the Taiwan Strait. A lookout scans the sky and sees a lone dot flying in the distance on the horizon... approaching from occupied Taiwan. Alarms ring on the airfield below, pilots Robert Lee Scott and Johnny Hampshire of the “Flying Tigers” fight. They took off in their trusty P-40s and rushed to intercept the mysterious ship.

Flying in formation, they radio the mysterious plane but receive no response. They try again as they stalk him, approaching from behind. It is then that they realize that the plane is another P-40 very similar to theirs, and not only that, but it seems to detect American markings that have not been used for more than 10 months. They talk on the radio one more time, with the same result, and now they're starting to worry. Could it be a P-40 captured by the Japanese? They decide to fire on its wing, making sure the pilot is aware of their presence, but the plane doesn't react at all.

Confused by the situation they decide to investigate, but as they get closer the mystery deepens. The plane has extremely serious damage; Bullet holes riddled the fuselage, pieces of the wing were missing, it had ad hoc repairs with mismatched paint and bare metal in places, and one of its landing gear wells was completely empty. Looking closer at the cockpit, they see it destroyed and the pilot motionless. Americans feel chills; what they see cannot be described as anything other than a

ghost

. An aviator who died 10 months ago is still flying. They radio each other, trying to figure out what exactly to do, but there's just nothing to do.

The

ghost

plane begins to slow down and lose altitude, its engine runs out of fuel. Little by little, it disappears into the clouds and crashes into the rice fields, out of sight. The next day the pilots visit the impact site. The pieces of the plane lay scattered across the field. They find the pilot, long dead and with no identifying information. Next to him in the cabin they see a diary and in his jacket a pile of intact letters, they grab them all before returning to the base. The letters are mailed and the diary is given to superiors, where it is quickly lost in the vast army archives.

The story behind the plane would remain a complete mystery and become legend, with many different variations emerging over the years. At the end of the war, Japanese records revealed that on December 8, 1942, a lone P-40 had attacked military installations in Taiwan and was driven off by interceptor fighters with no confirmed fatalities. It wasn't until years later that more information would emerge and shed some light on the Ghost plane. One day, a writer named Curt Norris mentioned this story at a veterans' meeting, and an old man named Milton McMullen stood up and said, "I helped build that plane!" He later sat down with Curt and told him his story.

It is May 1942. Milton is a sergeant with the 701st Aviation Ordinance Squadron of the 19th Bomb Group. He was stationed on the island of Mindanao, Philippines, when the Japanese fell on the island. The unprepared Americans and Philippines were unable to cope with the Japanese attack and were eventually ordered to surrender by their general. But Milton refused. Together with fellow soldiers from both the Philippines and the United States they formed a resistance, hiding in the dense forests, fighting in guerrilla warfare, sabotaging Japanese efforts or simply surviving in hiding. During this time, they collected pieces of two P-40 wreckage.

One had a crash landing with its wings almost intact in the forest, but the rest of the body was in worse condition and the engine had seized. Locals found the second vehicle sunken and its engine still running. For many weeks they dragged the carcass of a 2.5 ton plane to its hiding place deep in the forest and the mechanics got to work. They played with the planes, took them apart, diagnosed their problems, and put together a single working example. The plan was to evacuate an important Filipino general, allowing him to escape to tell the story of the many brave men who served alongside him.

He accepted letters written by soldiers. One problem, however, was that the P-40 had a range of only 730 miles. China was at most over a thousand miles away. To try to solve this problem, the men removed everything unnecessary from the plane; practically all the armor, the wing-mounted machine guns and some instruments. The nose machine guns were retained, just in case. They also added a makeshift 50-gallon fuel tank. Another problem was the landing gear, or rather, that it was missing one on the left side. To do this, they created a skid with bamboo and scrap metal that would hold the plane until takeoff and then fall.

And lastly there was the landing strip. All the Allied runways had been taken and it was impossible to get such a machine into a clearing long enough to take off. Instead, with the help of locals, they cut a strip in the forest, the first half was under the canopies of the tallest trees, hidden from prying eyes. Only the end was open to the sky, the minimum necessary for a high-speed P-40 to sneak through. By the end of the year, the beast was ready. In its ragged, jagged glory, the engine came to life and the roar of the V12 cut through the Mindanao forest.

All instruments are tested, passing with satisfactory results to the great celebration of the crews. But then the plane stopped. The general did not want to leave his men behind yet. No one knows how long the Ghost P-40 was in the makeshift hangar, waiting for its time to shine. Then came that fateful day. On December 8, Milton McMullen was sleeping in his tent near the hidden airfield. A roar wakes him, listening as he grows louder, the unmistakable sound of the plane's engine pulling everyone from their sleeping places. He races toward the airfield, listening to the plane he has worked on for so long accelerate down a runway, he can hardly believe it.

As he leaves the forest, he sees her already in the air, and he only catches a brief glimpse of her before he escapes into the skies. One pilot, unknown to history, had had enough. If the general did not wish to leave, then he might as well save himself and the letters that the hopeful had written. Milton watches her with teary eyes as she flies away from her, to wherever he wants her to go. The daring pilot traveled 1,090 miles to find land, but unfortunately he did not find China. He found Taiwan occupied. Realizing where he is, he throws his small ammunition at anything he can see on the ground, damaging some buildings and planes as the Japanese rush to intercept him.

He runs out of ammunition and flees to China, but it is too late. The Zeros catch up to him and pepper his plane with machine guns, shredding his fuselage and hitting him several times before he can escape into the clouds. The plane escapes, but he does not. He bleeds out somewhere over the Taiwan Strait, drifting. The Ghost P-40 would crash 2,000 kilometers from Mindanao. Milton and his men would be captured and taken to a prisoner of war camp a few weeks after the flight, never knowing what had happened to their precious P-40. Milton would endure brutal treatment during his time as a prisoner but would survive, sadly few of his compatriots would come to say the same.

He is the only person who claims to have worked on the Ghost P-40. He died in Jackson Hospital, Mississippi, on December 1, 2014, at the age of 93. As sad as it may seem, the final mission of the Ghost P-40 was in some ways a success as the families received the letters of the brave. men who chose to fight. We hope you like our video. To support the channel and a great cause, visit omaze.com/yarnhub Thank you!