A Captain was listed as the pilot and I, being a First Lieutenant, was listed as the co-pilot even though we were both equally qualified as first pilots on the B-29. We equally shared all pilot flying time credit, alternated takeoffs and landings and got along famously having the greatest respect for one another as first pilots. However, since I was a recent graduate of the C-54 Airline Pilots Course at Homestead, Florida where I received extensive training in celestial navigation and use of the sextant for shooting celestial objects to establish positions, I felt that I was much more knowledgeable about over-water navigation. This proved to be an asset later on in our flight and probably alleviated a potentially hazardous situation. Since it was my turn to be pilot, I took off from Natal, Brazil, South America one evening for the non-stop flight across the Atlantic Ocean to Accra, Ghana, Africa. A distance of about 2500 miles and almost eleven hours of over-night flying time. Everything went well throughout the night except when we flew through some moisture and I was startled by my first sight of "St. Elmo's Fire". This was similar to static electricity as white streaks raced back and forth along the leading edge of the wings and around the spinning props. It also sparked and crackled between a temperature gauge mounted in the plastic nose and the airplane's frame. I had heard of this phenomenon before but I was still startled and a bit worried that perhaps it could set the whole plane on fire. The student navigator was a bright, young eager-beaver fresh out of navigators school and he did all the navigating and sextant work throughout the night. He kept showing me his work and I always looked it over very carefully and checked his figures for accuracy. He was exceptionally good but sort of a nuisance always having me check his figures. I finally asked him, "Where's the instructor?" "He's sleeping", he replied. So I let him sleep knowing the student was doing an excellent job and I wasn't worried. The next morning, as we were still out over the ocean, and the African coastline was not yet in sight, the student navigator asked me to make a ten-degree correction to the left. "Why?" I asked. "You've been doing just fine all night long and we should be right on course". "Well", he replied. "This way we'll make a deliberate coastal landfall to the left of our course so if there's any doubt as to our position when we hit the coast and don't recognize any landmarks, we'll know that we're to the left of course and we'11 only have to search the map to our right." "OK." I said and turned the plane 10 degrees to our left. Just about the time I had the plane on its new course, the instructor-navigator woke up and came into the cockpit. "How's it going?" He asked. "OK". I replied. "We just made a ten-degree landfall correction to our left". "No!" He shouted. "That's wrong! Turn twenty degrees to our right!" "How the hell do you know?" I asked. "You've been sleeping all night." "I just checked the plotting chart and figures and we should turn twenty degrees to our right, not ten degrees to our left!" He insisted. "The heck with you. I'm going back to our original course until we figure this thing out. Go back to the radio room and turn on the radio compass. We should be able to receive Accra radio by now. It will tell you if we're on course or not" I ordered. "I tried the radio compass. It doesn't work. It must be broke or something", he replied as he frantically dug out his charts and maps. The plane was on auto-pilot so I told the captain to take over. I was going to the radio room to check the radio compass. In the radio room, I turned on the radio compass but all I could hear in the earphones was a loud hum... and I saw a switch was in the wrong position. I quietly corrected the switch, tuned in Accra radio, and the 360-degree compass needle pointed straight ahead! We were exactly on course! I turned the radio off; flipped the radio switch back to where I found it, and returned to the cockpit. I whispered to the captain what I did and that we were exactly on course. "Don't tell the instructor. Let him sweat it out. It'll teach him a lesson and we'll have some fun with him", he smiled. "Look", said the instructor very agitated. "If you don't turn twenty degrees to the right I'm not taking responsibility for this flight. You might have to ditch in the ocean or maybe put her down on the beach". Needling the instructor, the captain replied, "The hell you're not responsible. And guess who's walking for help if we do put her down on the beach". And so it went until we sighted the coast and shortly thereafter the Accra airport. But not until he sighted the airport did the instructor put away his pile of charts and maps and concede that we were right and he was wrong. Since the remainder of the flight to India was over land we didn't need the navigators anymore. But we sure had one meek instructor navigator aboard who was not as cocky as he was before. I never did tell him that the radio compass was working just fine. This story was edited slightly for clarity and brevity... -L.Y. |