June 26, 1944

Luke Field

Phoenix, Ariz

June 26, 1944

Dear Bill:

I was more than glad to hear from you yesterday (Sunday).  I hadn't given up hope but I thought maybe you had a lot on your mind.  Mother has promised you would write so I half expected to get that letter.

I thought I had written I am flying an AT6 which looks like a BT 13 but performs a lot different.  The BT you saw in "A Guy Named Joe" was either a BT 9 or 13, I don't know which.  They are both very similar.  The AT has retractable landing gear and a much smaller tail assembly making it much more maneuverable at high speed and easier to handle.  Of course it is the most sensitive plane I have been in yet.  Your rudders and stick control are easily coordinated so not much thinking is needed to fly it.

A Guy Named Joe - Trailer with Spencer Tracy

It will cruise at an indicated air speed of about 145 at 5000' but can be made to go straight and level  175 with everything fire walled and hellbent.  It also uses a gallon of gas a minute at such speed.  It carried about 110 gals and can stay in the air 6 hours if the mixture is leaned way out and the prop spent in full high RPM and manifold pressure about 23".  At that setting you get about 120 mph indicated at 9000'.  You can see that its range can be about 1 hour and 50 minutes long or apron 6 hours long.  Of course the difference in air speed makes some difference.

This ship can do most any kind of aerobatics maneuver thought of.  It has speed restrictions and other than inverted spins it has no other than the speed restrictions.  It is red lined at 240 but can withstand 300 easily.  It is very sturdy because today I dove it to 200 and hauled back on the stick and put 6 1/2 g's and the meters.  You are supposed to "Black out" at 4 g's but you won't if you know how to handle them.

I can't say much about the radio because I don't know much about it.  It is a command set and standard army equipment.  Of course it uses crystal tuning in connection with coils.  The receiver is quite easy to tune to any station but this transmitter is really a baby.  I doubt if I could tune the radio and keep it on st. and level.  When you want to transmit on anything but a preflight frequency you have a headache.

Some ships have two radios in them so that you can hear 2 stations at once.  So! we listen to "Max Perkins" "Kate Smith" et al while listening to the tower.  The purpose of the radio is to get a radio fix by the intersection of two radio beams.  I have never heard of it being done.

Well we have sweated out 5 weeks here and the upperclass graduates tomorrow.  Most of them are going to P39 school or instructor school.  We have 39 days to go and each one brings the day that much closer.  I now have 36 hours so I am half through now which is quite a feeling.  You know I will be through before I know it and then I may get home.  Its a swell feeling to know you will get home soon but the wings and bars don't mean as much as they did once.  I guess the reason is that just like anything when you can't have something it looks a lot better but when you have it in grasp it loses some of its luster.  I also don't feel old enough to take on the responsibility.  Maybe I will be a flight officer but I hope not.

I wish we had a plane when I got home so I could take everyone for a ride.  I like this low flying.  It sure is a lot of fun to see how close you can come to something and miss.  We haven't had any low flying yet but my instructor has flown up some of these washes out here.  Pretty soon we get a low cross country max alt 500' and the way some of the heat come up around here I guess I shall fly in the shade of the cactus most of the time; well maybe not that low.

We got a look at a lot of combat planes here.  we see 47's , 39's, 17's and 24's every day.  B25's come in for repair every so often and A24's and A25's come in frequently.  We often get visited by 3 Culva Cadets with tricycle landing gear.  They come in at about 110 mph and look just like 39's.  Those little buggers cruise at about 130 and are really a nice looking ship but much too small.  Civilian planes in general are not allowed on the field but these need a long smooth runway and we have the only one available.  For my money I will take a Luscombe.  Any Army plane will not be suitable for civilian flying because they are not safe for the general run of the mill of flyer.  They have to be flown out of a spin and do not come out by themselves.  Any C.A.A. plane comes out hands off in 1 1/2 turns.  The AT 6 falls like a brick.  You have a very high wing loading and therefore make recoveries difficult.

I got some more pictures the other day and the only comments were that I had a nice looking sister; they mean the young one I guess.  You don't seem to change but Mary seems to be growing up.  Maybe work and w -ing people changes everyone.

Well I guess I could shoot you an old line but my social life is rather restricted.  I haven't left the post in 5 weeks.  What I saw of Phoenix didn't impress my particularly.  Say!  Tell Mary to get her gang on the ball and paint those dials straight.  I could do as well myself on some of the ones I see.

Give my love to Dot?

Austin