Re: US Fighter Pilot Losses in Korea

["Diego Zampini" <dzampini@hotmail.com>]

Dan:

>Seems the Radial Engine planes were just as venerable as the P51. So much 
>for the hole in the radiator knocking down a Mustang. May need to evaluate 
>number of sorties.

Perhaps I can help you in that matter: according to USAF Statistical Digest 
1953, the F-51s did 62,507 sorties in Korea, and 194 were lost by enemy 
action -10 in air-to-air combat (9 by MiGs, 1 by a NKAF Yak-9), 172 by AAA 
and 12 unknown cause- plus 32 disappeared Mustangs more, or a total amount 
of 226 P-51s. How many of the ´unknown´ and ´dissapeared´ Mustangs were 
actually victim of MiGs is not known yet. We must add to such figure 125 
more lost due to accidents, etc; with a total amount of 351 Mustangs lost. 
Their crews usually were not lucky, according to the same source: 131 P-51 
pilots were killed and 133 are MIA (total: 264) so I guess that most of the 
Mustang pilots shot down by MiG-15s did not survive the encounter.
Taking into account the confirmed losses by enemy action, USAF lost a 
Mustangs after 322 sorties, and if we consider the ´unknown´ and 
´dissapeared´ cases, it raised to one P-51 loss after 277 sorties.
I hope this helps you,
Diego.

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