A Ghost Returns

The war in the Aleutian Island chain in World War II was cold, storm-tossed and brutal to both sides.  After a brief flurry, it became in the minds of the public a forgotten sideshow, while the world slugged it out elsewhere.  But the “1,000-mile War” was fought, year round, in blizzards, Williwaws, the rare sunny day and over thousands upon thousands square miles of dark, frigid seas only hinted at by such popular fare as “Deadliest Catch.”  Through that war soldiered what started off as an improvement on a purely ad hoc bomber (the “Hudson), the Lockheed PV-1 “Ventura.”  Combat experience led to better wing, better arms and armor, better engines.  From the sunny factories of southern California they came North, then West, and were called PV-2 “Harpoons.”  They manned up, and bombed up, and went west, hunting.  In a war few knew much about, nor cared about, really.  Unless you had a loved one there.  Or were there yourself.

Only two Harpoons remained flyable for people to hear their engines make that beautiful noise only a radial engine can make. Until recently.  Join this late spring afternoon’s flight of Harpoon #3, down the western shores of San Francisco, past the Golden Gate Bridge, across San Francisco Bay, heading east over the Berkeley Hills and small valleys off of it, as the third bird, in glorious high definition and sans and ersatz musical soundtrack, goes for a stroll. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lzSJPZFYx3E