Tang Fei was one of the 36 reconnaissance planes in the fleet that were assigned to fly south. Before five o'clock, the young pilot arrived in the hangar and inspected his plane with the aviation crew. Like other pilots, Tang Fei took great care of his flight, and although the bomber was the property of the Imperial Navy, Tang Fei regarded it as his own property, even a part of his body. This is the common opinion of the pilots, only by taking care of the plane, then in the heat of battle, the plane will return you to the fleet safely.

The inspection work before take-off is more troublesome, it stands to reason that this should be the responsibility of the aviation crew, but each group of crew members is responsible for the maintenance of at least two aircraft, and the amount of labor is very large. Often, these attendants start work three hours earlier than the pilots, which may not necessarily complete the task on time, so the pilot's help is more needed. Pilots themselves are "aviation crews" who know the aircraft no less than those who specialize in maintaining and repairing them. The difference is that each pilot only cares about his own landline.

Just after five o'clock, the order to set off was given. One by one, the overhauled "waterbirds" were put on the lifts and transported to the flight deck.

"Hurry up, how many of my takeoffs will I take?" Tang Fei saw that the busy and sweaty orderly was still loading the plane's self-defense machine gun, and he was also anxious.

"Major, you are the fifth to take off, don't worry!" A sergeant with oil on his face raised his head, wiped the sweat from his forehead and added another grease stain to his forehead, "Twenty-five minutes left, we guarantee you can leave on time." ”

"That's good, I'll go to the aviation operations center first, and I'll see you on the flight deck later!"

When Tang Fei arrived at the aviation operations center located at the bottom of the island, almost all the pilots assigned to carry out reconnaissance missions had arrived, and then the fleet commander Huang Xiaotian walked in. Begin to deploy detailed reconnaissance missions for pilots. This made Tang Fei a little surprised, he knew that the commander was also a pilot, and he could go to the commander to rarely arrange reconnaissance missions in person, and usually arranged bombing missions. It seems that this reconnaissance mission is quite important, otherwise Tang Fei and a few other major pilots would not have been dispatched to lead the team.

Fifteen minutes later, Tang Fei was on the flight deck, and his bomber, painted with dozens of bombs, had been sent to the flight deck. Aviation crews were attaching fuel tanks to the bomber, and then a battery tractor towed the "waterfowl" behind several other bombers of the same type.

"Major, everything is ready, I also checked the propellers, it's not a big problem, and it's guaranteed to let you fly back." The sergeant walked over with his oil-stained cotton gloves off and said, "But next time it's time to get a new pair of propellers, which have flown twenty times, right?" ”

"Twenty-five times, like. It's time for a new one. Tang Fei was very satisfied with the sergeant's work. He noticed that the skin of the plane had also been cleaned. "Yes, wait until I get back. Thinking about replacing the propellers, I'm ready to go. ”

"See you later!"

"See you later!"

After saying goodbye to the person in charge of his service team, Tang Fei nodded to the navigator who had just gone to get the flight route map and was running over, and then walked towards his landline. An aviation officer wearing a yellow striped jacket who was waiting next to the plane pulled down the boarding stairs on the plane, and handed the pilot's leather flight cap to Tang Fei as he approached.

"Our route is the 17th, and the course is about 185 degrees, which is basically south." After sitting in the cabin, the navigator gave a brief debriefing. "The maximum patrol radius is 350 nautical miles, and we can fly around the perimeter for about 20 minutes, so as long as the service personnel don't hang up an empty auxiliary fuel tank for us, then we don't need to rush back."

"Maybe we'll be able to go a little faster." Tang Fei was checking the instruments on the plane, he had already turned on the power, but many equipment needed to be warmed up.

"Old Tang, I don't want to ride an alpine pulley!"

Tang Fei laughed. "Don't worry, I still want to come back and hang up the bomb on the bombing mission!"

At this time, the aircraft carrier took off from the ground and the navigation lights were on. Then a ground attendant who assisted in the take-off patted the hood of the plane, then raised his hand upward, and his arm made two quick turns in the air, which was the ground signal for the pilot to prepare to start the engine.

When the service personnel used the battery car to help the bomber start the engine, Tang Fei let go of the accelerator, and then, the plane shook violently a few times, the huge propeller rotated, and a strong wind blew head-on, Tang Fei immediately pulled down the goggles. The roar of the engine drowned out all the sounds, and Tang Fei could only use simple sign language to communicate with the orderly outside. Now the engine is warming up and running at its lowest power.

The first "waterfowl" was ejected, which was the plane of another major. Tang Fei was lined up for the fifth take-off, his plane was dragged to the left side of the catapult, Tang Fei poked his head out of the cockpit, and two service personnel were crawling under the belly of the plane, hanging the towing hook in front of the bomber's belly, which is now the bomb pylon with the auxiliary fuel tank, on the towing cable of the catapult.

When the take-off director gave a thumbs up, Tang Fei immediately pushed the throttle to the bottom, the roar of the engine became louder, and the oncoming wind made Tang Fei feel as if there was a knife scraping on his face. Then, when the take-off director put down his hands and quickly climbed down on the flight deck, Tang Fei released the bomber's brakes, and a huge force ejected the bomber out. By the time the dizziness disappeared and Tang Fei looked back at the aircraft carrier, the huge aircraft carrier had turned into a group of flickering points of light, and the huge hull was hidden in the gray sea.

It's finally time to go! Tang Fei thought to himself, and at the same time paid attention to the index on the altimeter, and when he reached 1500 meters, he began to adjust his course.

"Major, keep up the speed and go up to 3500 meters."

"No problem, sit tight!"

The bomber continued to climb, only much slower. Tang Fei reasonably controls the climbing speed, in fact, he is trying to save fuel as much as possible, and only at a reasonable speed can he be the most "economical". He was not saving money for the Imperial Navy, but he was fighting for himself a chance to return home, and one more drop of fuel would give him one more chance to return safely.

When the bombers began to fly level. Tang Fei didn't control the plane much, he could even clamp the steering stick with his knees, and free his hands to do other things, of course, this is strictly forbidden in the flight manual, but in the sky, who else can control it? There is still about an hour before dawn, so. During this hour, both the pilot and the navigator can take a break without the need for frequent, non-stop monitoring of the sea surface.

The navigator is processing the flight route information, and every ten minutes, he has to record the flight situation, which is his job. Tang Fei only needed to occasionally glance at the instruments in front of him to confirm that the plane was in normal condition, which meant that he had nothing to do. This made Tang Fei think of something unrelated to this mission.

Tang Fei was not a reconnaissance pilot. He was a dive bomber pilot. The bombs painted on the left side of his plane's fuselage and the ship's logo broken in half can be seen in how brilliant his record was. Although Tang Fei is only 27 years old this year, he is already a veteran pilot with 5 years of "flying age". Before being assigned to the 4th Air Wing. He was an ordinary pilot of the 1st Air Wing, participated in many battles with the Japanese Navy, and by that time had already become an ace bomber pilot, during which he had hit at least 6 Japanese battleships, 2 of which were aircraft carriers. But at that time, the First Air Wing was full of talents, and Tang Fei was not given a chance to show his face at all, and his record was nothing. Later, he was assigned to the 4th Air Wing and became a squad leader. Later, he became a squadron leader. By this time, Tang Fei had more than 50 records, and in the "Battle of the Coral Sea", he dropped a bomb to eliminate the small aircraft carrier "Bataan", and in the final pursuit of the 31st Task Force, he also sank a cruiser.

"Old Tang, you're flying too fast." The navigator handed over a piece of cardboard, "Flight route map, now we're flying in front." Looks like I'll have to get back five minutes early. ”

Tang Fei was stunned for a moment, only to find that the sky was already slightly bright, and the sun appeared on the sea antenna in the east, and it was rising. He took the cardboard, on which the navigator drew 36 reconnaissance routes, which were very sloppy and sketched casually, and the red one represented Tang Fei's flight route, and his landline had already flown in front. Looking at the 36 routes, Tang Fei felt like 36 torpedoes fired at the enemy, and they were still flying in the air. Then he was amused by it, he was a dive bomber pilot, and he always felt that dive bombers were more powerful than torpedo bombers.

"Alright, let's start searching, rotate every ten minutes, you come first."

"You'd better come first, Old Tang, I need to take a break."

Tang Fei smiled and shook his head, after pulling down the goggles, he looked at the sea below the front of the plane, the sea reflected the golden light, gorgeous and dazzling, making him feel like an immortal in the sky, free and unrestrained, this is the pilot's world. Tang Fei occasionally glanced at the sea on both sides, the weather was good, there were not many clouds in the sky, and those few puffy clouds were very thin and small, which could not cover the huge fleet, so the bombers did not need to change course to search the sea area covered by the clouds.

Ten minutes later, the navigator replaced Tang Fei. Looking at the sea for ten minutes in a row, even if he was protected by goggles, it still made Tang Fei's eyes hurt, especially when looking at the sea to the east, the strong reflection of the sea surface made him very uncomfortable. Just two, the two rotate every ten minutes, so as to avoid excessive fatigue, and at the same time constantly monitor and search the surrounding sea.

"Colonel, we've already flown 300 nautical miles."

"I know, it seems, we have to fly another 50 nautical miles!" Tang Fei pulled down his goggles, and he prepared to search the sea surface for the third time.

"Damn, I don't know what the Fifth Fleet is doing, is Spruance a mouse?"

"Still a cunning mouse." Tang Feichang took a breath, then took out a piece of chocolate. It was almost ten past seven o'clock, the sun had risen for more than half an hour, and he had been flying in the sky for nearly 100 minutes, and more than three hours had passed since his breakfast, perhaps, it was not breakfast, but supper.

"Two minutes left, damn it, we should propose to have a couple of plastic pockets on the plane!"

"You're having cystitis again?" Tang Fei laughed.

The navigator laughed too, he just wanted to find a place to solve the emergency. When he looked at the sea to the east again, a strong reflection made him unable to open his eyes, at first he thought it was just a reflection of the surface of the sea, but then he realized that the reflection of the sea surface would not be so strong, only the smooth surface of the metal, or the reflection of the mirror would make people unable to open their eyes.

"On the left, old soup, look, is it a fleet?"

Tang Fei immediately threw away the remaining half of the chocolate, and at the same time looked to the east, and then he picked up the telescope hanging on his chest, which made him feel a little rustic, pilots have a pair of eagle eyes, do you need a telescope? It is really needed, even eagles cannot see targets more than a dozen nautical miles away.

"Yes, damn it, we've finally found the Fifth Fleet, contact the fleet!" Tang Fei glanced vigilantly at the surrounding sky, the nearest clouds were still a few nautical miles away, and there was no shadow of enemy fighters, which made him feel a lot more relieved, and then he looked at the huge fleet again. "Three aircraft carriers, almost ten cruisers, and a dozen destroyers. No, no...... God, we're lucky this time, damn it, the Fifth Fleet is all here! ”

When the "Shooter" circled from the west of the fleet, the six aircraft carriers in the Fifth Fleet, which were divided into two large groups, were exposed, and by the time the F6F rushed over, this "Shooter" had already sent two telegrams in a row, and it must have figured out the specific situation of the US fleet.

Under the encirclement and suppression of several F6Fs, no matter how skilled Tang Fei was, he found that the "Shooting Water Bird" was just a bulky dive bomber. He held out for five minutes, allowing the navigator to hurry up and send the intelligence back to the fleet. This is already the best effort he has made. Then, a 50-caliber machine gun bullet hit the right side of the bomber's cockpit, and two pilots were killed before the bomber crashed into the sea. They walked fast and did not feel the pain yet, and the intelligence they sent out would determine the outcome of the battle.

……