Spectacle in the sky          

[May 17, 2007]  Whether it is warm-blooded with feathers and a giant wingspan, like the Lawndale "Thunderbird" that is said to have picked up a 7-year-old boy in 1977, or if it is a cold metal design of human ingenuity in colossal proportions, any unusually large object moving through the sky gets rapt attention.

The latter is surely what tantalized thousands of central Illinoisans Saturday as they looked to the sky to see what was creating the deep, resonant "RRUUUMMM." It came from a plane commonly referred to as a warbird. This one was a Grumman TBF/TBM Avenger and was flown in to Logan County Airport from its home near St. Louis by pilot Clyde Zellers of Springfield.

The end of World War II produced a warbird nicknamed the "Avenger" and dubbed "The Lt. George H. Bush," which wowed the crowd gathered for the Young Eagles and the Heritage In Flight Museum open house.

First the giant flew the runway about 20 feet off the ground. Then it circled and came in for a spectacular landing. Jaws dropped when the aircraft stopped on the taxiway and went from being 52 feet wide to16 feet wide as it drew up its wings. Then pilot then taxied up to the HIF hangar and made a sweeping turnabout on a point before shutting down the aircraft, allowing spectators to get a close-up study. (See background information.)

What's it take to pilot an aircraft like that? Well, Zellers said that he began flying with his father when he was a boy and began his real training having several flight instructors at age 11. You can still see the joy on his face when he talks about his 16th birthday. That day his principal let him out of school to go solo. He got his pilot's certificate at age 17.

Clearly Zellers was made to fly. He worked many years in the commercial airline industry while honing warbird and aerobatic performance skills in his off time. Today he flies high-performance aircraft for the state of Illinois, flying for the governor in recent years, and he flies a number of different warbirds and show planes in his spare time. He provides flights for hire in warbirds to individuals, and he performs in air shows and events. He'll be performing in the Peoria River City Air Expo on July 20-22, flying his SNJ-5.

Zellers said that he likes to fly the plane slow and low to give people a chance to hear it, wonder what is going on and come out to see it as he flies over. This saves fuel, as he can lean the fuel-to-air mixture to get about 60 gallons an hour, but it also gives him more time doing what he likes best: flying.

County administrative assistant JoAnne Marlin saw Zellers fly in to Logan County and greeted him. She then went to Springfield to watch a grandson's baseball game. The warbird flew over the game and grabbed everyone's attention. She said she couldn't help saying, "Hey, I know him."

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See more on Clyde Zellers at the Warbird Aviation Rendezvous site, Fly a Warbird.

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Avenger specifications and history

ST. CHARLES, Mo. -- From background information sheet from the Commemorative Air Force, Missouri Wing:

Commemorative Air Force
Missouri Wing
Ghost Squadron
TBM Avenger

• Wingspan: 52 feet, 2 inches, or 16 feet with wings folded

• Length: 40 feet

• Height: 16 feet, 5 inches

• Empty weight: 10,843 pounds

• Loaded weight: 18,250 pounds

• Engine: Wright R-2600-20, rated at 1,900 horsepower

• Maximum speed: 267 mph at 16,000 feet

• Service ceiling: 23,400 feet

• Range: 1,130 miles; 2,180 miles with bomb bay fuel tank

• Crew: three

• Fuel burn: 75-100 gallons per hour

• Oil burn: 2 gallons per hour

• Armament:

  • Two forward-firing, wing-mounted .50-caliber machine guns

  • One .50-caliber machine gun in a Grumman 150SE power turret

  • 2,000 pounds torpedo, bombs or rockets:

  • Eight 3.5-inch or 5-inch rockets

  • Four 350-pound MK 54 depth bombs

  • One 2,000-pound MK 13 torpedo

  • One 1,600-pound armor-piercing bomb

  • One 2,000-pound general purpose bomb

  • Two 1,000-pound general purpose bombs

  • Four 500-pound general purpose bombs

  • Twelve 100-pound general purpose bombs

Grumman TBF/TBM Avenger

• April of 1940 -- Contracted for two prototypes.

• December 1940 -- Order 286.

• Aug. 7, 1941 -- First flight.

• Jan. 3, 1942 -- First production TBF rolled off Grumman assembly line.

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• The second prototype made its first flight on Dec. 15, 1941, and coming so soon after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor was christened the "Avenger."

• Dec. 23, 1941, the Navy officially accepted it and changed contract from 286 to open-ended production contract.

• By late June 1942, Grumman was building 60 TBFs per month. The Navy needed more desperately.

• General Motors Eastern Aircraft produced TBMs, and Grumman produced TBFs. Both Avengers were virtually identical and could not be differentiated except by comparing the Bureau of Aeronautics numbers. Grumman continued to build TBFs until December 1943, producing a total of 2,291 aircraft. Taking over production, Eastern Aircraft built 7,546 aircraft. By 1945, Eastern had reached a phenomenal 350 aircraft per month.

• Because of its size, the Avenger was often referred to by the nickname "Turkey." During World War II, the term "turkey" meant simply "a big bird."

• First combat was June 4, 1942 -- Battle of Midway.

• Jan. 11, 1944 -- TBM made the first American rocket attack against an enemy submarine, U-758, which was hit by two rockets and was forced to return to port with heavy damage.

• TBMs armed with bombs were often used to support group troops during the island-hopping campaign of the Pacific war.

• Not all Avengers operated from carriers. Both Navy and Marine squadrons flew missions from shore bases. The first such land-base use of the TBM was from Henderson Field during the battle for Guadalcanal.

• TBM Avengers flying from the USS Bataan scored four torpedo hits on the Japanese battleship Yamato, the world's most heavily armed warship.

• The MK 13 torpedo was limited to drops from less than 100 feet and speeds under 100 knots. During a torpedo attack, one section of Avengers would approach the target from one direction while a second section attacked from the opposite side, in what was known as an "anvil" attack.

[Text from background information sheet from the Commemorative Air Force, Missouri Wing]