Don Sheppard's Oscar kills on 4 Jan 1945

[Skyraider3D]

Does anybody have more details about the two Oscars that were shot down by Lt. Don Sheppard on 4 January 1945 during strikes at oil refineries in the East Indies?

Lt. Sheppard was flying 1836 sqn Corsair Mk.II JT410/T8H from the HMS Victorious at the time.

I would like to know more about the Ki-43 Oscars and the dogfight itself.
What unit were the Oscars from?
Were they the newer Ki-43-III variant or older models?
When and how did the dogfight take place?

Any info is extremely welcome.

Many thanks!

Ronnie

[Laurent Rizzotti]

These claims wer done during the operation Lentil, a raid of the Royal Navy with 3 Cvs against the Pankalan Brandan oil refinery, Sumatra. Avengers and Fireflies flew the raid and were escorted by 16 Corsairs and 16 Hellcats. They were intercepted by Ki-43 and claimed nine shot down(4 by Hellcats, 3 by Corsairs and 2 by Fireflies).

The Japanese unit was the 71st Independant Fighter Chutai (an unit most of the time equivalent to a RAF flight or a German staffel) that lost two pilots killed. It is not known if other pilots were shot down and survived.

The above is from Shore's book "Air war for Burma". He adds that during the post-strike review fighters pilots were criticised for having allowed themselves to be drawn away from the bombers when hostile fighters appeared, even if in this case only one Avenger was damaged by a Japanese fighter. A pilot of 1836 sought to justify this by saying that FFA fighter pilots had few opportunity to engage enemy aircraft and so tried to make the most of these opportunities. There is no more details on the dogfight.

According to the IJAAF book of Shores, Hata and Izawa, this unit was using Ki-43-III Oscars. It was a part of the 1st Ysen Hikotai (Field Reserve Group, an operationnal training unit).

[Skyraider3D]

Fantastic information, Laurent! Many thanks for your quick reply.

I will go and see if I can find more info about the 71st Independant Fighter Chutai.


If anybody has any eye witness or encounter reports, describing the actual dogfights in detail, that would be most welcome.


Thanks again!

[Nicholas]

1st Lt MURAKAMI, Terubumi and WO HIRATE, Kamao of 71st Dokuritsu Hiko Chutai (Independent Flying Squadron) were KIA.

Murakami was reportedly killed in a ramming attack.

At the time of these combats the 71st was based at Tandjungpura in Sumatra equipped with Ki-43 III Hayabusa (Oscar) fighters and commanded by Capt IEDA Toriyuki.

It was the operational fighter element of the 1st Field Air Replacement Unit (Yasen Hoju Hikotai) based at Singapore.

[Skyraider3D]

Thank you very much, Nicholas!
Assuming for the moment that Hirate was one of Sheppard's victims (we'd need to find pilot encounter reports or guncam footage to be sure, I guess), do you think it would be at all possible to reconstruct what Hirate's aircraft looked like? Unike American, British and German aircraft, the Japanese aircraft markings seem to have been a bit more "free" and unstructured. But that could be just my impression only, due to my relative unfamiliarity with the JAAF.

[Nicholas]

Hello Skyraider3D

The Ki-43 III model was rather distinctive. It was factory painted by Tachikawa with upper surfaces in an Army colour known as 'Ohryoku 7 go shoku' (literally yellow-green number 7 colour) also referred to as Homeland Defence Khaki and sometimes mistakenly identified as 'Late War Brown'. This was actually the standard IJA equipment colour - a brownish olive green somewhere in the range FS 33070 to 34088. Could be browner, could be greener but exposure to the sun faded it to a khaki shade, degrading the green pigment. The undersurfaces were said to be expediently painted in a mix of the upper surface colour and titanium oxide - white - giving a creamy grey appearance. This was close to FS 36405.

Sometimes the JAAF field depots applied dark (jungle) green mottles over this colour but this was unusual in the case of the Ki-43 III and most sources depict the 71st in plain single colour schemes. Combat reports describe brownish green or greenish brown colours!

The propellor and blades were painted a grey-green, close to FS 24172 although one Japanese source has provided a sample closer to FS 34079. Prop blades had a 50mm yellow-orange tip.

Underwing drop tanks were a neutral or mid grey - or a similar grey green to the prop.

Most aircraft had a 200mm wide white 'senchi hiyoshiki' or so-called 'combat stripe' painted around the fuselage in front of the tail. The wings had the usual yellow orange IFF strips on the leading edge, to a width of 200mm and about half the length of the wing. The yellow orange colour was similar to FS 33538.

The tail marking for the 71st was a stylised "71" in red or orange. If I could work out how to attach pictures here I would provide some!

[Skyraider3D]

Thanks very much for the comprehensive description, most useful! I was indeed under the impression all Ki-43-III were a dark brown colour, good to know this is a misconception.

To attach a file, when replying in the "Additional Options" simply click the "Manage Attachments" button which will bring up a window were you can upload the files.

Alternatively I would be very grateful if you could e-mail (http://contact.skyraider3d.com/) me the pictures.

[Frank Olynyk]

Sheppard's combat reports for January 4, 1945 can be found in the PRO in ADM 199/842, pg 401 and pg 408. For the sake of completeness, his other combat reports can be found in the same (bound) volume on pages 434 (a prob), 451 & 452 (both shared with Ronnie Hay), and 555.

Frank.

[Skyraider3D]

Thanks very much Frank! Looks like I'll be visiting the PRO sometime soon. Good to know his combat reports are still around.