Presentation Date: September 28, 2000
Robert Tyldesley
P-61 Black Widow Pilot, 547th and 418th Night Fighter Squadron, Philippines P-61 Black Widow Pilot, 547th and 418th Night Fighter Squadron, Phillipines
Robert Tyldesley took dinner-goers at the September meeting of the Golden Gate Wing on a tour of aerial night fighting - - from its roots in World War I through the life of the first aircraft the U.S. Air Force dedicated to controlling the night skies over Allied bases, the P-61 Black Widow.
In World War I, British single and two-seat fighters intercepted German Gotha bombers on nighttime bombing raids over England, using ground-based searchlights to spot the raiders. In World War II, radar dramatically changed the nature of nighttime interceptions, with ground-based radar allowing the Royal Air Force to vector fighters onto incoming bomber formations at the last moment, improving effectiveness and conserving interception resources.
As radar improved, it was built to be carried by RAF Beaufighters and Mosquitos, and by USAAF A-20s and P-70s. Interception strategy evolved to ground-based radar vectoring night fighters towards incoming "bogeys", with lower-powered aerial radar enabling pilots to find and attack individual intruders.
The first USAAF night fighter units, which became the nucleus of the night fighter program, were equipped with British Beaufighters. They carried Signal Corps Radar (SCR) 540 devices, modifications of the British Mark 4 radar. Observers from those operations came back to the States to create a training center for night fighters at Orlando, Florida.
Having graduated from Stockton High School, Robert Tyldesley joined the Army Air Force and was excited about flying a night fighter - - he had seen Spitfires in that role in the Battle of Britain. Finishing his advanced training, Bob went to night fighter school at Mather Field near Sacramento for transition to B-25s. Then it was a step back, into single-engined T-6s for gunnery training. At that point, the future must have looked a bit dismal.
"This was July of 1943. Luke Field in Gila Bend, Arizona...in July. Anybody who's been there... sitting in an open machine, even trying to climb into it...with the ramp about130 degrees... We survived that one and then went on down to Orlando," Tyldesley recalls.
Pilot washouts generally became candidates for radar observer, or "radio operators" as they were first known, to conceal their identity as the handlers of secret radar equipment. Training stints in Orlando were seven weeks for pilots and four weeks for ROs. By the end of 1943, training was split up, with pilots coming to Hammer Field near Fresno, and to Hayward and Salinas. Boca Raton, Florida, the Air Force center for electronics, became the training hub for radar operators. And that's where Bob set up shop.
Tyldesley described 1943's state-of-the-art in radar - - the SCR 720. It had a 36 inch parabolic reflector dish, which quickly narrowed the list of aircraft capable of carrying radar. Those planes were the AT-11, A-29 Hudson, B-34, B-18 and B-26. Later, with the arrival of the P-61, the P-70 would provide a platform for night fighter crew training. Bob says the drills were very strenuous, and pilots' hands frequently shook involuntarily after landing.
Bob says after getting down the basics of acquiring a target, and keeping a bogey on the scope,"an RO had to learn to lose the bogey and then anticipate where the bogey would be. It was part of a team concept in night fighting. The pilot relied on the RO all the way through. He did everything the RO asked him to do - - turn this way, boom, boom, bap, boom - - and the pilot just reacted. Sometimes they got off the scope, but they just kept with it."
Interceptions required the radar operator getting the P-61 close enough for the pilot to get a visual fix on the aircraft, from below and behind, then positively identify it before opening up with guns.
The Northrop P-61 Black Widow was the first aircraft designed from the ground up as a radar-equipped (and later, all weather) interceptor. The twin-engined, twin boom fighter carried two R-2800 engines capable of 2000 horsepower each. And, despite weighing three times as much as a P-51, the Black Widow had a comfortable combat range of 1000 miles and, due to full-span wing flaps, could land at the incredibly low speed of 70 mph.
The P-61's potent armament included four 20mm cannon in its belly, with 200 rounds per gun. The aircraft's original design featured a dorsal turret with four .50cal machine guns. Tyldesley explained that the turret was controlled through the forward 180-degrees by the gunner, who sat in a compartment behind the pilot. Control would be passed back to the radar operator if the P-61 were attacked from the aft 180-degree range, with interrupters for the booms and tail.
Tyldesley says buffeting, which affected aerodynamics of the tail, became a problem for the original turrets. As a result, late P-61A models and the first of the B models had the turret removed until modifications eliminated the buffeting. Tyldesley says the P-61 was a joy to fly, and capable of 370 knots, could outrun anything in the sky but friendly P-51s. "In competition, the P-61 outdid the British Mosquito in speed and maneuverability at 5- ,10- ,15-thousand feet."
While the P-61 debuted at training fields in the early months of 1943, night fighting was being conducted by crews in P-70s. The first squadrons equipped with the Black Widow flew in the skies of Europe, starting in May 1944. In the Pacific, the 6th NF Squadron became operational in June 1944, with the 419th starting in August. Early victories for these night fighters came to crews based on Guadalcanal. By the end of WWII, there were 16 operational night fighter squadrons, including units in the Mediterranean and China/Burma/India theaters.
Tyldesley says many of the missions he flew were Combat Air Patrols from Lingayen Airfield in the Philippines. Japanese Navy "Bettys" and smaller aircraft would fly over U.S. forces, drop a few bombs and disrupt everyone's sleep. P-61s were largely instrumental in preventing such harassment, although Bob says of those bogeys, "they never got in my way."
SCR 720 radar was an improvement over earlier radar, and was operational from eight to twelve miles for interception, and 100 mile range for mapping. Tyldesley says tropical conditions affected performance - - the jungle's high humidity took a toll on equipment as it did on crews.
Tyldesley says that as Allied forces got within range of the Japanese islands, a number of his P-61 operations were intruder missions from Okinawa to Kyushu, to bomb Japanese airfields. As always, the P-61s flew solo. They dropped bombs and sometimes strafed. If they found no enemy aircraft aloft to chase when they arrived on station, they could loiter in search of prey before returning to base.
Bob Tyldesley's Air Force career carried him from the Stearmans he flew in basic training at Oxnard in 1942 through all manner of multi-engined military aircraft into the Vietnam War, where he flew C-141 Starlifters until 1971.