Page 5 - DFCS News Magazine Spring 2013

Ace played role when San Diego became naval avia on "center of universe"
It never entered my mind that I would ever get shot down,” he said. “I thought I was too good.”
Now a Coronado resident, this Northern California native was a bit player in global drama. He saw the transformation of the Na- vy and its tactics, a transformation that also changed the ser- vice’s key West Coast port.
“In World War II, the aircraft carrier rapidly emerged as the domi- nant ship type,” noted Karl Zingheim, staff historian at the Mid- way Museum. “And San Diego was the center of the universe for U.S. naval aviation.”
San Diego retains that role. While World War II ended nearly 70 years ago and its veterans now account for only three out of every 1,000 San Diego County residents, we live in a region Laird helped shape. The pilot witnessed the expansion of North Island and Miramar. He saw the founding of two local groups honoring military fliers, the Distinguished Flying Cross Society and the Tail- hook Association. And this ace is among the thousands who initially viewed San Diego as a duty station and eventually saw it as home.
Laird, 91, remembers it all: Air-to-air combat, storms at sea, the sudden deaths of comrades. What he doesn’t remember is being frightened. “I had complete faith in my ability,” he said. Bad timing?
One day in December 1944, eight Hellcat dive bombers dropped through anti-aircraft fire to strafe Japanese positions in the Philip- pines. The squadron’s commanding officer may have been the first casualty; his plane disappeared in a fireball. Laird saw the explosion, then was jolted by another. His rudders were gone. Ditto his radio.
He limped 250 miles across the Pacific to the U.S. fleet, but his problems mounted. His landing gear refused to drop and, as Laird slowed to belly-flop on the deck of the carrier Essex, the engine’s torque pulled him left. He banked in the opposite direc- tion, straightening at the last moment.
“I made one of my sterling landings,” Laird joked, “and put on the brakes. Nothing happened.”
He throttled back, allowing the deck crew to slip chocks under
Dean “Diz” Laird, 91, is the only World War II Navy Ace known to have shot down both German and Japanese planes. He flew Japanese planes during the filming of the 1970 movie “Tora! Tora! Tora!”. SEAN M. HAFFEY
ON WINGS, HE BECAME A LEGEND
Flying ace who took missions to avoid seasickness watched Navy evolve
By PETER ROWE & JOHN WILKENS THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE, OCT. 28, 2012
Dean “Diz” Laird is a legend, the only known U.S. Navy ace to shoot down both German and Jap- anese planes during World War II. Despite close calls — once, his shot-up plane skidded across an aircraft carrier’s flight deck — Diz possessed a fighter pilot’s essential attribute: Supreme self-confidence.
his wheels and stop the plane. Hanging from the Hellcat’s fuse- lage was a rat’s nest of shredded cables and hydraulic lines.
Laird walked away unscathed — just another mission for the man the American Combat Airman Hall of Fame called “the quintessential fighter pilot.”
Growing up in rural Placer County, 20 miles east of Sacramento, Laird wanted to follow in the contrail of his older brother, an Army Air Corps pilot. But a friend persuaded the lean college baseball player with 20/10 vision to join the Navy. The fleet’s long-reigning kings — battleships — were being overthrown by a mighty warship that had debuted at the close of World War I. By the time Laird won his flying wings in August 1942, American aircraft carriers were leading task forces in the Pacific and Atlan- tic.
“I wanted to go to the Pacific,” Laird said. “That appeared to me to be where the Navy’s air war was.”
But the Navy assigned him to the carrier Ranger, supporting the British fleet in Scotland. The young pilot, already disappointed, was soon nauseated. Seasick on the tossing North Atlantic, Laird felt well only when he was aloft. He volunteered for mission after mission.
On Oct. 4, 1943, flying through rain squalls near the Orkney Islands, Laird thought he saw a shadow flit behind a cloud. The pilot and his section leader pounced, catching a German fighter. This was Laird’s first kill — and a floatplane, ambushed later that day, became his second.
Two months later, Laird was transferred to the Pacific. As eager as he had been to duel Japanese pilots, he fretted about his tim- ing.
“We were out there at a really rotten time for fighter pilots,” he said. Earlier battles “had destroyed so many Japanese aircraft, there were hardly any left to shoot at.”
But there were some. In November 1944, he shot down a Japa- nese fighter. In January 1945, another. On Feb. 17, 1945, two more.
Soon after, orders arrived sending him back to San Diego. He obeyed — under protest.
Page 5 The Distinguished Flying Cross News