The Vintage Flyer
F-80 – One of the American Fighter Jets of Korea
The Shooting Star, P-80, was America’s first serious step into the jet age. A WWII design, it began in 1943 as the XP-80 Pursuit aircraft. The prototype, nicknamed Lulu-Belle, made its maiden flight on January 8, 1944. Fortunately WWII ended before the aircraft could be deployed in combat. I say fortunately because anytime war ends is a good thing. The Shooting Star was the first U.S. Air Force aircraft to exceed 500 mph in level flight, (although the Mustang and P-38 came pretty close); it was the first American jet to be manufactured in large quantities, and the first jet to be used in combat. The aircraft was re-designated in 1948 to "F" for "Fighter."
Slightly more than 1,700 aircraft were built. Unlike the well-known German 262 or the first British military jet, Meteor, which flew with two jet engines, the F-80 had a single engine located in the fuselage behind the pilot. Air was delivered to the engine by twin side inlets located on the fuselage just ahead of the wing root. It was capable of 600 mph and a maximum range of 1,200 miles. The cockpit of the Shooting Star was pressurized and air-conditioned. Its development was costly both in financial terms and in lost pilots. Lockheed chief engineering test pilot Milo Burcham was killed in the third test model, Tony LeVier escaped death by bailing out of a disabled XP-80 and noted ace Major Richard Bong was killed on an acceptance flight of a production P-80 in the United States on August 6,1945. Each aircraft cost about $110,000 in 1949.
As the clouds of war descended upon Korea, America’s enemy deployed the Soviet-built MIG-15 and although the F-80 was designed as an air-superiority fighter it could not compete. The F-86 jet fighter proved much better in fights with the MIG. The F-80 was however superb in a ground-attack mode. Armament consisted of six .50-caliber machine guns in the nose and externally mounted bombs and rockets. It was extensively employed in Korea and later Vietnam for ground attack.
Eleven squadrons were equipped with the F-80 in Korea and many pilots achieved 100 missions because the aircraft could absorb tremendous punishment. Lt. Richard T. Durkee of the 80th squadron thought back to some of his 1952 missions. He recalled how napalm was “unpopular” with both the enemy and the F-80 pilots. The reason pilots disliked missions where they deployed napalm was that the napalm tanks were occupied Japan-supplied and poor quality. Because the tanks were such poor quality there was a speed restriction on the jet. If you exceeded the designated speed, the tanks would be torn apart in flight by the airstream. Flying at the slower speeds allowed the tanks to stay intact but also made the jet a sitting duck as it approached its low altitude, very flat bomb run ground targets.
One mission stood out in Durkee’s mind. The squadron was given a target to methodically knock out a heavily defended supply dump. The problem was that the supply dump was positioned in a valley with a maze of anti-aircraft emplacements on the surrounding hillsides. The attack plan called for three strikes attack the anti-aircraft gun emplacements at first light, then two napalm attacks on the target. Durkee was the wingman for the new squadron CO and remembered that eerie feeling that seeing the red glow of enemy projectiles coming toward you in the early morning haze could cause. After the first attack, it was determined that the mission was not very successful – there was more flak coming up when they left than when they started. Did they miss their targets or did Intelligence misjudge the number of defenders?
Durkee said, “After returning to base, we knew the next two missions would be hot ones. I was again assigned to fly wingman for the CO. As we approached the target, we started our descent to near ground level so that we would be at the proper altitude for our napalm run and we hoped that, by coming in low, we would achieve some element of surprise…At our low airspeed it seemed that we were standing still. The napalm drop was on target.” The CO’s aircraft was hit during the run and crashed before the pilot could eject. The F-80 was the first jet to use the ejection seat although Durkee’s CO didn’t get to use it. Durkee didn’t fly the third mission which also took losses.
On June 28, 1952 the 8th Fighter-Bomber wing, which the 80th Squadron was part of, celebrated the 50,000th combat sortie flown by the wing. Think about that, 50,000 sorties, by one Fighter-Bomber wing, in a one-country war. The pilot, 2nd Lt. Warren R. Guibor of the 80th Squadron was credited with the honor of flying the mission. He flew the aircraft named Spirit of Hobo. On May 6, 1953 the 80th squadron transitioned to F-86 jet fighters ending the combat log for the F-80 with the squadron. While flying the F-80 they were credited with destroying 45 enemy aircraft (air and ground) plus a multitude of other impressive credits. On their final F-80 mission, an airfield in the Haeju peninsula, no aircraft were lost. On their return several pilots commented they were sorry to see the old bird go! We’ll never really trust another one the way we trusted the F-80. She got a lot of us home safely from hell.
The F-80 was rapidly pushed out of the headlines, over shadowed by the newer, swept-wing, faster F-86 jets. The aircraft, born in WWII, was transitional in many ways – if flew alongside WWII Mustangs and the faster F-86 jets in Korea. The pilots still painted nose art on many of the aircraft. It was the first combat ready single engine jet (that could fly more than 6 minutes) that still used non-swept wing designs. We have to give kudos to Lockheed's design team led by the legendary Clarence L. "Kelly" Johnson, the designer of the WWII P-38 and America’s Cold War secret weapon, the U-2 aircraft, for putting together a jet aircraft designed to intercept the German 262 yet fly in combat years later. May we never need a warplane again…
Sprit of Hobo and pilot Lt. Warren Guibor, photographed October 28, 1952, a few months after the pair flew the 50,000th sortie of the 80th Squadron. (By Warren Guibor)
Two F-80s from the 36th Squadron were photographed on the ramp at K-13 in 1952. The Beer City Special and the Evil Eye Fleegle sport the paint scheme used while the squadron was initially based in Japan and which was only used for a short period in Korea. (Lt. Thomas Owen)
by John Cilio