Evon later learned that this was a myth, one of many surrounding the SB2C. The Helldiver was faster than the Dauntless, with a bigger powerplant and a four-bladed propeller.Ī different radioman gunner, Joe Evon, said he’d been told in gunnery school that the tail of the Helldiver was prone to breaking off and causing the aircraft to fall from the sky. In the back seat, which could be rotated 360 degrees so that the occupant could face forward or backward, Aviation Radioman 3rd Class Larry George was manning the Helldiver’s twin, flexible. It was a tandem, two-seat, low-wing, tailwheel-equipped dive bomber of a later generation than the SBD Dauntless (which Downey also piloted). His plane was the sometimes reviled but often well-liked Helldiver, called “the Beast” by both supporters and detractors. Downey, a diminutive pilot who weighed just 123 pounds, was a member of “Bombing Eighty,” Navy squadron VB-80 operating from USS Ticonderoga (CV 14). Task Force 38 destroyed 41 Japanese ships in the South China Sea. “Chuck” Downey had his encounter with an exploding Japanese destroyer – the ship’s name not known – on Jan. Later, I was going to have an additional reason, beyond the plane’s robustness, to be thankful for the SB2C, the plane we called ‘Son of a Bitch 2nd Class.'” Leveling out now, I had to figure out how to get back to my carrier in my crippled dive-bomber alone in enemy waters. It wasn’t the best plane I’ve flown, but the Helldiver was beefy and it had just withstood a tremendous impact. “I’m thankful I was flying an SB2C Helldiver that day. Note the horseshoe symbol on the tail indicating the aircraft’s assignment to the Hancock and the pillow on rear cockpit gun in order to provide some level of comfort for the gunner on the long flight home. An SB2C Helldiver of Bombing Squadron Seven (VB-7) in flight over ships of Task Force 38 after completing an attack against Japanese shipping 25 miles north of Quinchon, French Indochina.
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