Re: Aircraft Used in Korea-AD's

[Love Shack <Home@DanSources.com>]

Interesting.. it seems the best fighter aircaft that survived WW2 and used the
longest were those with great Range or Loitering time.

And had very good maintenance and lower operational cost records.
Zeke, Mustang and Skyraider all seem to fit.

My guess is that the AD was a better plane overall then the Corsair.
Probably had less performance quirks.

It would be cool to see a Corsair pitted against an non-loaded AD.
 
 

AMPSOne@aol.com wrote:

The AD was there for one reason and one reason only -- it was a flying dumptruck. The aircraft could carry up to (maximum overload!) 15,000 pounds of ordnance but most missions seem to have used around 3,000-6,000 plus drop tanks. As the liaison officer notes in "Men of the Fighting Lady" it carried more than a B-17 Flying Fortress.

It also carred out more varied missions -- night attack/bombing, night fighter, all-weather search, ASW, ELINT and radar jamming -- the list is long. 210 were lost in action in Korea, of which 133 were in combat and the others in accidents.

F4Us were either ground attack, night fighter or photo, and could not carry as much ordnance nor loiter as long as the Skyraider.

Cookie Sewell
AMPS