PLANE TALK
Glenn Baker, L-5 Liason Pilot Part 2
In Part 1, we left Baker ‘self-washed-out’ of Basic Training in the detested BT-13 program, as of January 1943. Adding to that, he said, “My bad luck continued. The next week I got my orders, reverting me to the grade of PFC, and transferring me to the Army Air Force Base at Newport, Arkansas.” Insult to injury came when he was assigned as flight line chief, training 20 recruits to work on, yes, BT-13s! Good luck followed though, in April: promotion to corporal. June came, and a notice that applications were being accepted for Liaison pilot training, primarily for instruction of field artillery pilots learning target spotting and fire-control missions, at Ft. Hood, Waco, Texas. He went. The site was a triangular grass field, with one long runway parallel to a railroad, and two others shorter, in an “L” around a tree grove. The aircraft used were Piper 65hp L-4s and 185hp Stinson L-5s (quite a reduction in power from the 220hp Stearman PT-17). Instruction involved in the L-shaped 90° runway meant starting the taking off with one wheel lifted, once airspeed was gained, turning around the trees, gaining more speed, and pulling the plane off. Nearly everyone passed, and it was on to Lamesa, Texas, on a Panhandle grass-sand field, for more navigation, meteorology, and maintenance. Flying included night flying (cross-country being difficult with lack of landmarks), message pick-ups, and daytime cross-country. They were taught short-field landings, according to Baker: “We would come in at a nose-high, near-stall attitude, power-on, and upon clearing a simulated fence, cut power, and pull the stick all the way back to complete the stall. The plane would ‘plunk’ right down.”
What was spectacular was the L-5 Efficiency Takeoff. 185hp in 1550 lbs of plane provided a thrill. Here’s Baker’s account: “ Confronted with a short field or over trees, we were taught the ‘efficiency’ takeoff. We’d set the plane at the end of the area, even getting out and pulling it back manually to utilize every inch of space. We’d lock the brakes, advancing the throttle to full open. At full power, brakes were released, allowing plane to gain maximum ground speed. Just before reaching barrier to be cleared, pull stick full back, dropping flaps to full 45 degrees. Combined full-up elevator and full-down flaps rotated the plane to a nearly vertical climb, jumping it up to about 200 feet IMMEDIATELY. But that was all—200 feet. You had to anticipate that point and advance the stick to bring it to level-flying attitude, or an actual stall would then result, not a pleasant situation at 200 feet. With the flaps and full-length leading edge wing slots, it was a nearly stall-proof plane, almost impossible to spin. Like any flying machine, though, with airspeed reduced too far, it would quit.” He would learn more. He was moved on in October 1943 to the 72nd Liaison Squadron, at Knollwood Field, a beautiful grass field surrounded by huge pines in every direction, in Pinehurst, North Carolina. On the check ride, just clearing the runway at about 500 feet, the instructor chopped the throttle and said, “Forced landing!” Following previously-taught teaching, Baker popped the stick forward and set up as though making as soft as possible a landing straight ahead into the trees. The instructor took over, opening the throttle, regaining the altitude, banking in a nearly vertical 180° turn, and returning. Upon landing, he lit into Baker with, “What were you trying to do, kill us?!?” Baker responded that he’d been trained the straight-ahead because trying a turn back could result in stall-spin. The instructor told him the L-5 was a very tolerant plane capable of some maneuvers that would be fatal in other aircraft. They then took off for a demonstration. At a later date, a Stinson factory rep showed another impressive maneuver, flying a 360-degree circle within the area where two runways crossed, with the wingtip only a few feet off the ground.
The next few months involved some minor adventures in various locations on different occasions, from Tennessee to South Carolina. Then, in June, the 72nd Liaison Squadron moved out to Newport News, Virginia, for loading onto a Navy ship headed for Oran, Algeria. En route they would learn the exciting news of the D-Day Allied landing in France. It would not be until July that the group would finally ship out, this time to Naples, Italy. From there, the 72nd went to an abandoned former fighter airfield about 20 miles north of Naples. Shortly thereafter, their L-5s arrived, boxed, on flatcars, and were offloaded and eventually reassembled. Interesting side note: the planes were originally intended for another squadron, but the savvy 72nd C.O. ‘appropriated’ them. Here is Baker’s account: “These planes had been at the Capaduchino airport at Naples, and had been intended for the 121st Liaison Squadron. The C.O. of the 121st was flubbing around, and while he was goofing around we got their planes. Our Major had done it again.” Expediency, I think they call it. Baker gave his L-5 the name “Flak Foot Swoosie,” similar to a then-current popular song, “Flat-Foot Floogy with the Floy Floy.”
I’ll let him finish this: “We spent the next month ‘slow-timing’ our engines, flying around Italy, mostly sightseeing. While we cruised around Naples, Capri, Mount Vesuvius and Rome, we did fly some ‘official’ missions for army Headquarters and the Signal Corps. “With some time on our hands, it was more than natural that some tomfoolery would result. One of the fellows found that if a Coke bottle was thrown out of a plane window, the resulting air passing across the open mouth produced a loud, screaming whistle, with interesting reactions from anyone on the ground. The fun had to come to an end one day when one of the bottles fell directly on the roof of a barn and tore a sizeable hole in the metal roof. Major called a halt to the bottle dropping.”
Next time: ‘Capturing’ a Messerschmidt and messing around with a volcano.