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[1971.022.001] Aircraft - 'F6F-5 Aircraft, Bureau Number 94203' |
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F6F-5 Aircraft, Bureau Number 94203
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| Accession Number |
1971.022.001 |
| Accession Date |
14/07/1971 |
| Creator |
| Creator |
Creator Role |
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Manufacturer |
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| Date Created |
1945 |
| Object Desciption |
F6F-5 Hellcat that was delivered to the fleet on 27 July 1945, and over the course of the next twenty-six months served in Fighter Squadrons (VF) 3, 3A, 5B, and 6B, also spending time flying with Fleet Air Service Squadrons (FASRON) 5 and 3. Its final service listed was as in the aircraft pool at Naval Air Station (NAS) Alameda, California, in June 1948. Purchased by a civilian and assigned the Federal Aviation Administration registration N7865C, the aircraft was obtained by the museum from Aerial Classics, Inc., of Atlanta, Georgia, in 1971. It is painted in the markings of "Minsi III," one of the aircraft flown by Commander David McCampbell, the Navy's all-time leading fighter ace with 34 kills. |
| Object Notes |
This aircraft was acquired in 1971 as result of a trading accession an F6F-5K drone (1965.009.001). |
| Place of Origin |
Bethpage, New York |
| Notes |
"If it could cook, I'd marry one" was one pilot's assessment of the F6F Hellcat, and few could dispute the magnificence of the fighter that flew from carrier decks during the latter half of World War II. Superior to the fabled Japanese Zero in virtually every way save for rate of turn at low speed, the Hellcat was the platform upon which naval aviation swept the skies of enemy air power during the period 1943-1945. In the Battle of the Philippine Sea alone, nicknamed the "Great Marianas Turkey Shoot," Navy fighter pilots shot down nearly 300 enemy aircraft in one day. Flown by capable Allied airmen, among them Commander David S. McCampbell, the Navy's leading fighter ace with 34 kills, F6Fs shot down 5,216 Axis aircraft in 24 months and compiled an enviable kill ratio of 19:1. All told, the F6F produced more fighter aces, those with five or more aerial kills, than any other aircraft of World War II.
In the island-hopping campaigns across the Pacific, the Hellcats proved invaluable. Invasions were spearheaded by waves of F6Fs conducting fighter sweeps over enemy airfields, destroying planes that could threaten transports and landing craft. As troops went ashore, combat air patrols scanned the skies for aerial attackers while other Hellcats supported Marines and soldiers by hitting ground targets. Indeed, while it was in aerial combat that the F6F achieved lasting fame, it was a capable air-to-ground platform, with Hellcat pilots unleashing 60,000 rockets on land targets and enemy shipping during the war.
All told, Grumman Aircraft Engineering Corporation produced 12,275 Hellcats during World War II, at peak production rolling one off the assembly line every hour, around the clock. Reaching the fleet, these aircraft logged a total of 110,162 combat sorties, their final flights in the war they helped so much to win fittingly coming as part of a wave of carrier planes that flew over the battleship Missouri (BB 63) in Tokyo Bay as Japanese government and military official signed the instrument of surrender on her deck.
In the postwar years Hellcats flew primarily in the training command and squadrons of the Naval Air Reserve, with some converted to radio-controlled drones to support the atomic bomb tests at Bikini Atoll. Loaded with explosives, some of these drones also were launched against targets during the Korean War.
One of the F6Fs on display, an F6F-3, was recovered in 1970 from 3,400 feet of water off the coast of California where it had crashed in 1946 and restored to its present condition. The aircraft is painted in the wartime colors of Fighting Squadron (VF) 31 assigned to the light carrier Cabot (CVL 28), and reflects the fourteen aerial kills scored by Lieutenant (junior grade) Ray Hawkins prior to his 22nd birthday. The other F6F on display, an F6F-5, is painted in the colors of Commander David S. McCampbell, the Navy's leading ace.
Specifications for F6F-3 Hellcat
Manufacturer: Grumman Aircraft Engineering Corporation
Dimensions: Length: 33 ft., 7 in.; Height: 11 ft., 1 in.; Wingspan: 42 ft., 10 in.
Weights: Empty: 9,023 lb., Gross: 12,415 lb.
Power Plant: One 2,000 HP Pratt and Whitney R-2800-10 engine
Performance: Maximum Speed: 388 M.P.H. at 25,000 ft.; Service Ceiling: 35,500 ft.; Range: 1,085 miles
Armament: Six fixed forward-firing .50-in. guns
Crew: Pilot
Aircraft in the Museum Collection
F6F-3 (BuNo 66237) - On indoor static display
F6F-5 (BuNo 94203) - On indoor static display
F6F-5 (BuNo 70185) - On loan to Quonset Point Air Museum, Quonset Point, Rhode Island |
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