by John Henderson
The order to `pack up and ship out' came on the 30th or 31st of December, 1950. I heard from either M/SGT Lowe, the 336th FIS line chief, or one of the three pilots I bunked with at Kimpo. It had been slim pickings for the pilots of Det A since the 22 December shootout when we scored six MiGs, which took the fight out of the Russian pilots. until the 30th, when Commander Paul Pugh, a Navy exchange pilot with the 334th Squadron, and Capt. Jim Jabara both scored.
The detachment flew its last Yalu River sorties on the 31st, and many of those aircraft went directly back to Johnson AB, Japan, following the mission. I don't recall exactly how many went to Johnson at that time, but I do recall that it was a much shorter distance to walk the entire line of Sabres parked at Kimpo following the mission.
We had about twenty aircraft remaining on the line at Kimpo after the departure of the first group to Johnson. That included one `sick bird'. That airplane had been involved in a fatal accident the evening of 1 January. It was on that date that the move back to Johnson was confirmed and the rest of the detachment would leave on the 2nd. I'd packed up my personal gear and put it with my tentmate's bags for transport, and went back to the flight line.
Time was divided between boxing up and loading of the GSE, special tools, and spares, once we knew they would not be needed to maintain the Sabres. We were in good shape maintenance-wise, and by mid-day, all aircraft were ready to fly. The biggest chore was to in-stall the big 200 gallon ferry tanks in place of the 120 gallon combat tanks normally carried.
The word was passed - `anything useable by the enemy that couldn't be sent to Japan, was to be destroyed.' So, between drop tank installations, we continued to clear the parking ramp of useable items, which were either burned or destroyed using a sledge hammer.
As evening came, we were warned that no fires or lights would be allowed as the perimeter of the base might come under small arms attack. We had reports that the Chinese had traveled so fast that their artillery couldn't keep up, which must have been true since Kimpo suffered no heavy weapons fire while I was still there through the 2nd.
We were preparing to run up the remaining F-86s with replacement drop tank installations, checking for fuel transfer from the underwing tanks to the main fuel tank. The engine had to be run at about 70% throttle to pressurize the tanks and make them feed. In most cases, there would be a man on each tank which would preclude one man from having to go from one tank to an-other while checking. But on 1 January 1951, we were very short of personnel, and there was only one airman for the checks.
We started the feed checks and had five or six engines running at the same time. As they started, I walked down the line into the run-up area, walking well in front of the aircraft. Perhaps fifty feet past the second Sabre, I heard the sound of an engine change - from the high pitch roar that was characteristic of the J47, to a deadened, muffled roar. It got my immediate attention.
As I turned toward the sound, I had the fleeting image of someone's legs disappearing down the intake. Due to the lack of personnel, one of the airmen had to cross to the other drop tank for his check. Procedure called for a man to cross under the fuselage and behind the nose gear. To this day, I wonder why Sgt. Witherspoon crossed in front of the nose gear. I checked to make sure the gear door was closed during the run-up and fuel transfer tests. It was. We had no bell-mouth screens nor run-up stands. And none would have been available this late on this particular day anyway. All such items were either already enroute to Johnson or packed up and awaiting transportation.
This young man, like most of us, was wearing a GI-issue, hooded parka. The parka was bulky and probably affected his ability to easily bend over and scoot under the nose behind the nose wheel. So he tried another route. How many times he passed in front of the nose wheel in the past, I have no idea. I would guess this might have been his first. It was also his last. It cost him his life.
It was a bad time to lose an engine. But it was a terrible time to lose a promising young man. Sgt. Witherspoon was dead before the violent vortex slammed him into the accessory cover on the nose of the engine. His body tore off the airspeed pitot pickup, which is welded in the intake on an F-86A. It was the pieces of the pitot that destroyed the engine, when they passed through the compressor section. The engine whined to a stop and the medics removed Sgt. Witherspoon's body from the intake duct.
Now we had a problem. Do we destroy the airplane on the ramp to keep it out of the hands of the Chinese, or do we change the engine and try to make it flyable? Fortunately, we had a spare engine, built up and ready for installation. But we were still in a bind. To safely change an engine at night, we needed light. But we couldn't risk that with the Chinese close at hand. The engine clearance on the right side was very, very tight. It would be extremely risky in the dark.
We would have to use a `sling' to control the engine as we had no other means to lift it. We couldn't roll the `cherry picker' to the airplane so we had to roll the air-plane onto the engine. Over uneven ground, with mini-mum clearance - it was a bad deal. Someone made the decision - we would remove the engine in the dark on that night. The old engine lay on some sand bags while we removed the replacement from the transport dolly. We'd still have sheet metal repair to the hole in the in-take where the pitot had been torn out. But that would be done in the morning.
There would be time while the sheet metal work was being done, to install the replacement engine and be ready to check it out once the intake was patched and checked for FOD. Work began on the engine change and intake patch well before the sun came up. Inspection revealed no other damage. It was anticipated that the remaining Sabres would launch after the noon hour, giving us the entire morning to make this last Sabre ready. As the scab patch was being riveted over the hole inside the intake, we started installing the new engine.
We had sufficient light to watch the close tolerances and the engine slid securely into the mounts. We made all the connections and replaced the aft section. The engine checked out satisfactorily as did the drop tank fuel transfer. When all systems were `Go!', we put it up for a test hop, knowing full well that if the check flight was OK, the aircraft would not return to Kimpo. Capt. `Mac' Lane, later to be USAF's Inspector General, took the dam-aged bird up, flew by, and then attached himself to Capt. Max Weill's wing for the flight to Johnson.
Lt.Cols. Zack Taylor and Bruce Hinton, Capt. Quay, the armament officer, a flight line M/Sgt., and myself were left behind to see to the damaged engine and clean up the odds and ends before we abandoned Kimpo. It was a lonely afternoon and evening, and more than a little scary. I was airlifted out about midnight aboard a C-54 air-evac flight for the walking wounded. I'm not certain how the 4th Group officers got my name on the manifest, but I'm eternally grateful. They saved me from a long hike to Inchon Harbor. Detachment `A' operations at Kimpo Air Base were finished.
No portion of this article may be used or reprinted without permission from the President of the F-86 Sabre Pilots Association or the editor of Sabre Jet Classics magazine.