P-38 Lightning Tribute

[kenmorto]

Hell, where was I in the 40's? Give any 18 y.o. kid fresh out of highschool two 454 engines and two 50cals. What comes next is purely natural... LOL! God Bless America!

[MrDjvaughn]

"I"Love"The"P-38"LIGHTNING"And­"The"P-38-B",,..

"These"two""LEGENDARY"PLANES"A­RE"THE"BEST"PLANES"IN"THE"AIRF­ORCE",,!...

[tkelly411]

what a magnificent a/c,suggest we retrotool the airframe w kevlar for lighter weight,lighter alloys for the engine/exhaust,4 bladed props, 6 shooters in the prop hub, wing mtd x 8 barrett gatling guns,buryem

for a rainy day

[leiker06]

The best looking fighter of all time. Great video!

[gticup13]

wonderful video !!

[aquatodabone]

I loved the p38 lighning and i wished that the air force would not have scraped all those planes in the south pacific and insted they could have sold them.

[Tonyrayism]

If you look closely at the P-38 you will see that the F-14 was fashione after it.

[Riggro]

read them backwards

[Riggro]

Sure we’re braver than hell on the ground all is well, in the air it’s a much different story

As we sweat out our track through the fighters and flak we’re willing to split up the glory

Well, they wouldn’t reject us so heaven protect us until all this shootin’ abates

Give us courage to fight ’em and another small item

An escort of P-38s.

[Riggro]

Byron, Shelley and Keats ran each other dead heats describing the views from the hills

Of the valleys in May where the winds gently sway an army of bright daffodils

Take your daffodils Byron, the wild flowers Shelley, yours is the myrtle, friend Keats

Just preserve me those cuties, all-American beauties

An escort of P-38s.

[Riggro]

In all the days past when the tables were massed with glasses of scotch and champagne

It’s quite true that that sight was a thing to delight us intent on feeling no pain

But no longer the same nowadays in this game as we sail onto the missing state

Take your sparkling wine but always make mine

An escort of P-38s.

[Riggro]

Oh, Hedy Lamar is a beautiful gal, Madeline Carroll is too.

But you’ll find if you query a much different theory amongst any bomber crew

That the loveliest thing of which one can sing This side of the heavenly gates

Is no blonde or brunette of the Hollywood set

But an escort of P-38s

[ssmusic214]

According to Wiki, P-38 Lightning had much lover kill ratio (less than 4:1) than P-51 Mustang 11:1 , P-47 THUNDERBOLT 8:1, Corsair 11:1.

[BikerRussell]

One guy disliked? How can you do that?

[757AW]

hi funtimesteve ~ thought i'd let you know, my father, the p-38 pilot, died in january. i'm happy he got to see this video. he loved his plane ~

[leesherman100]

Or as the Germans refered to it as: Der Gabelschwanz Tueffel. The fork tailed devil!!

[aquatodabone]

its sad there isnt more p38 lightnings around our government screwed up by junking so many wonderful aircraft that should have just been sold off.

[ResolUloseR]

Best plane to fly in the IL2 flight sim 1946...dangerous piece of metal in the right hands.

[ResolUloseR]

This is my favorite aircraft to fly in the WWII flight sim IL2 1946...

[Hellcleaner13]

my most favourite aircraft ever

[ita94spinnaker]

Great vid!

Thank you.

[atoxel]

Stupendous and touching ! Thank you !

Gratefully remembering who made it and those who didn't , fighting back oppression and fascism all over the world.

They kept us free ! What a lecture they would give us today, seeing what's happening.....!

May they rest in peace wherever they are, hoping they're still allowed to fly their beautiful machines in the heavenly skies !

[757AW]

ps ~ sadness and longing i should add. dad is still living and we talk about his pet ship all the time. he loves to reminisce about his days flying the 38. he is glad to be able to watch this ~

thanks for posting, from me and dad ~

[757AW]

hi funtimesteve3 ~ this vid is so great it has spoiled me for other 38 vids. it brings out much emotion in me. the music imparts a sense of loss, both in that this plane belongs to history and the men who flew her are departing ~

[hlaltimus]

I dated a girl in the 70's who's stepdad flew a P-38 in WWII. He did say that it was fast, but he lost his for some mechanical reason...down it went. He also said that you had to be careful just how you bailed out of the P-38 as the horizontal stabilizer could kill you. I think that he said that some pilots turned it upside down and then bailed out. Neat video!

[Dogmeat1950]

a lot of pilots turn there aircraft upside down to bail out., the Stabilizer could kill or knock u out.

[pmm1018]

Awesome! What soundtrack is this music from?

[funtimesteve3]

Crimson Tide

[vladimir2366fa]

hi, the movies is excellent, thanks ★★★★★

[hmrdulcimer]

Thank you for this video! My father was a P-38 pilot who flew forty missions out of Foggia, Italy in WWII. He carried a photo of his plane in his wallet to his dying day. He was, and still is, my hero.

[Dionysos37]

Hello---I happened to notice your P38 post about your Dad flying out of Foggia---my father was a nose gunner on a 15th AF B24 (464th) flying from Pantanella from August '44 to '45, so they probably did missions together. Dad always said there was nothing sweeter to see in the sky than those guys, I'm sure you're as proud of him as I am of mine---Cheers to these great men and aircraft! Jack D

[Capt777harris]

@hmrdulcimer Hats off and a mighty thanks to your dad.

[Ironreign]

AWESOME video & music !!

The P-38 was the USAAF workhorse during WWII. AA, AG and escort duty. IMO the best all around/multi-role fighter of the war; hands down. I don't understand why the "Late Coming" P-51 & P-47 overshadow it

[hutigg]

Same here. It doesn't get the credit it deserved. Have you heard of the Lost Squadron?

[jpllightfoot]

wasn't the lost squadron the one that crashed in Greenland? P-38s were also exelent recon birds in the pacific, only one was shot down due to enemy fire from one recon squadron.

[hutigg]

Yes it was. I think it is often overshadowed by the P-51 and P-47. It was the fasted bird of it's time and had the longest range until the other two planes came.

[OneLancelotLink]

And neither of them, nor any piston engined airplane the enemy had could climb like a P-38.

Also, it's not widely appreciated that this was an extremely agile aircraft when flown by a pilot knowledgeable of it's unique capabilities.

With contra-rotating props, special maneuver flaps and concentrated firepowe, a competently flown '38 could be a deadly dogfighter.

[hutigg]

Exactly. It is not appreciated enough.

[LeoAndRas]

P-38 was a good fighter yes,but it Achiles heel was it hadn't the maneuver capability of single engine fighters as Spitfire FR XIV,P-47 and P-51. Remember what happened when two P-38 fughter aces,McGuire and Rittmayer, underestimate a lonely Zero in the skies: they were both shotdown and killed. If well used its firepower in passing attacks,this way the P-38 really could be a deadly fighter against fighters and bombers.

[MrWINNSLAW]

@LeoAndRas "Bong didn't get that memo."

[LeoAndRas]

No, but him didn't gave the deserved attention to the P-80 Shoting Star as Chuck Yeager gave and,by this, he died in a crash after the take-off caused by a defective fuel pump. Sad end to a great pilot: I think that the three aces probably would have survive to the war if had been kept in action against the japanese kamikaze pilots. Am I not right ?

[MrWINNSLAW]

@LeoAndRas "At least you knew about Bong! Some of these people don't know a thing about how the P38 was the mount of America's two top aces!"

[LeoAndRas]

Sometimes I think that was a mistake take Bong out off his P-38 cockpit before the end of the war. I think that he could have survive to the war because in the last weeks the japanese pilots almost hadn't skill enough to more than take of and landing,being more and more dedicated to kamikaze missions,and the marine's ace McCampbell didn't shotdown nine in a single flight ? How much could Bong have shotdown in his P-38 against pilots as these ?

[OneLancelotLink]

Not so. The P-38 was actually more maneuverable than most single engined counterparts. If flown by a experienced, competent pilot, it could turn inside both the BF-109 and FW-190 & famously won mock-dogfights with Spitfires. The only "Achilles Heel" was the by the compressibility effect in high alt (>25kft) dives; eliminated in the late J & L versions. Significantly, It could also out-climb any of the other piston-engined aircraft it encountered. It was more difficult to fully master than....

[OneLancelotLink]

...single-engined types. In the atypical encounter you mention, McGuire was not shot down. He and the other '38 were at low altitude( <300ft), @ low speed & weighted-down by two full 160 gal tanks. The Zero was flown by Shioichi Sugita; an 81 kill ace. McGuire tried to rescue the pilot being shot-at by Sugita; attempting an impossible maneuver under those conditions & went into a stall, with no room for recovery. Big picture? P-38s destroyed more Japanese fighters than any other allied aircraft.

[OneLancelotLink]

@hutigg The P-38 was a ground-breaking aircraft, technologically. had the capability to far out-range the P-47, which was a gas-guzzler and also, the P-51, as it's load carrying capacity far exceeded either of them , or indeed any single engined fighter. It could also easily out-climb and, with zero torque, turn inside both; especially after being fitted with hydraulic aileron boost in the J-25 & L versions.

[iamstarstuff001]

@Ironreign Longer range of the P-51 and a lot more agile. Hope spelling is good. The 51 stayed in production long after the war. 38 pilots always took shots at 51s thinking they were Germans. Most of the time they didn't come close, but there was always exceptions.

[mikeleebaker]

i absolutely agree.



[P214Stearman]

My grandfather flown the Lighting. It was a captured one. He made the test flights and cashed by overspeed aerodynamic mistake .

[hutigg]

That plane is a forgotten hero. Only three are left that are airworthy, out of over ten thousand built.

[BravoEcho3991]

bad ass plane

[19maos80]

Ein schönes Video, ein schönes Flugzeug.

Ich habe ein altes Foto von einer abgeschossen P-38 aus dem WW2.

Die P-38 gingen in den Sturzflug, welchen das Flugzeug exelent beherrscht, um einen Zug in Beschuss zunehmen. Aber die P-38 ist nur leicht gepanzert und die Flak hat drei von vier in der Luft zerrissen.

Schade, dass die schönsten Flugzeuge nur für Kriegszwecke dienen.

[OutbackBros]

Ohh, that was AWESOME!!

[757AW]

this is the *best* marriage of music and film on youtube. beautiful work ~

[757AW]

hey funtimesteve! ~ great to see you again! thanks for bringing this wonderful video back! ~

[Midgetmedic]

This is great.  My Dad was a crew chief on P-38's. Thank you for this tribute.

[hutigg]

To me, they are the most important fighter of WWII.