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Published: July 25th 2013
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FEARLESS DICK
The photo shows a diecast model in 48 scale of P-47D Thunderbolt flown by LT Richard Kik. It is variant that had a water system for improved performance at high altitude, a larger propeller, and telescoping landing gear struts. The larger propeller increased power, but the pilots had to be careful about keeping the tail down during takeoff and landing. Telescoping struts enabled a few inches more ground clearance for the prop. propeller. FEARLESS DICK
The Republic P-47 Thunderbolt was the work of a couple of Russian guys from Tbilisi named Seversky and Kartveli. They immigrated to the US to flee the Bolsheviks because Joe Stalin did not trust aeronautical engineers. His best engineers often found themselves pounding rocks in Siberia whenever one of their planes crashed. It started out to be the Seversky P-35. In one of its early versions it was the P-43 Lancer of which a few were brought into service. Colonel Robert L. Scott flew a Lancer to photograph the top of Mt Everest in the Himalayas. The Thunderbolt hit its stride as the P-47D, and a great many were produced. It was the largest, heaviest, and most expensive piston engine fighter in history. Fully loaded it weighed over 8 tons. It must have been akin to leaping aloft in a D6 bulldozer, but it could carry half the bomb load that a B-17 could carry. It was powered by the Pratt and Whitney R-2800 Double Wasp engine which gave it a maximum speed of 433 mph at 30000 feet, a combat range of 800 miles, and could climb to altitude at 3120 feet per minute. It was a dependable, sturdy plane that was armed to the teeth with eight wing-mounted 50 caliber machine guns, plenty of ammo, 10 rockets, and a hefty bomb load. It was a useful high altitude fighter and bomber escort, and superb in a ground attack role. It was not a perfect plane but each production block carried improvements so it just kept getting better. It came fondly to be called “the jug” because of its resemblance to a milk jug.
LT Richard Kik earned his pilots wings with Class 43 E and was assigned to duty with the 395
th Fighter Squadron of the 368
th Group. They were called the Panzer Dusters and did most of their work out of forward bases in France that had been established prior to the D-Day invasion. Primarily their mission was to attack Nazi ground forces along supply routes. Those ground attacks were not without peril, but LT Kik realized soon enough that a flight of Thunderbolts could rain down from the skies far greater destruction and terror than the ground forces could send up in their own defense. Nazi gunners realized soon enough that a flight of four Thunderbolts approaching with 32 machine guns blazing at 400 miles per hour was hard to draw a bead on. Typically the gunners fired off a few bursts at long range and then ran for cover like everyone else. Kik was well liked among his messmates and they soon began calling him Fearless Dick because of his willingness to attack any position. The nickname stuck, it appealed to him, and he had it painted on his engine cowling. Attacking the supply routes was not always a romp. The desperate Nazi would sometimes score a hit.
The following account is from the 368
th Group website:
A Mission to Remember
August 12th, 1944
By Richard Kik Jr. & Kenneth Kik My grandfather always said that "a war story usually means that something went wrong"
August 12th, 1944 was one of those days.
As told by Richard Kik Jr. 395th Fighter Squadron.
We took off on a usual mission, armor cover flight at the Falaise track. Down at the Falaise track it
was hard fighting, a lot of anti-aircraft fire, a lot of infantry, armor, trucks, a lot of everything. I went
down on a strafing run and hit this truck Previous to that I heard a thump somewhere in the
airplane and I didn’t realize what it was, but when I came off the strafing run my wingman, Chuck
Rife said "have you got the water on?" I said "no, why?" Chuck said "you’re trailing smoke." He
came up and looked around and said "it’s coming off the bottom of the engine." It turned out a 20
mm knocked two or three cylinders off my engine. That Pratt & Whitney never stopped. I’m telling
you, those people deserve a medal for that engine, I’ve never seen one like it.
Our element leader, Captain Mazur said "well Rife, escort him home." So we started back across
the line and as we got going along, Chuck caught a burst of anti-aircraft fire. Both of his wings
were struck by 40mm rounds. The flak rounds exploded and pieces of metal entered his cockpit.
The explosion damaged his instruments and shredded his parachute pack. So as we got across
the line I told Chuck, "You better get ready to bail out." He said "I can’t, my parachute’s all tore up."
I told Chuck you’ve got two live bombs on your wings, you’re not going to be able to belly land with
those, can you drop them? He said "no, I can’t" and held up his bomb release, "cause here’s my
bomb thing." It was a mess. He said "all my instruments are gone and I can’t put the gear down."
So anyway, as we were going home and I’m talking to him all the time, telling him try to do this, try to
do that. Chuck said he had to take both legs and hold the stick over cause it kept wanting to roll.
Finally he got the gear down manually. I said "okay, let’s just fly her in." Chuck said "I don’t have
any instruments, I don’t have any idea what the speed is." I told him okay, I’ll tell you what, you fly
on me, just stay right with me and we’ll get you down. So I kept the speed up pretty high and took
him down to the runway. He made it down safely.
Then when I turned around to land it dawned on me, I’m burning! I forgot about myself during this
whole thing. The smoke’s really rolling out now. So I whipped it around and landed, turned off the
runway and the engine quit.
We made it! I jumped out of my plane and ran over to Chuck and helped him out of his damaged
jug. Then I discovered that I also had two live bombs on I had forgot to drop. And one of them was
hanging by the rear shackle, nose down. What happened was when I strafed that damn truck I was
a little too low, Something had hit the nose fuse and I had a hanging armed bomb. They (the ground
crew) were a little unhappy that I didn’t drop the bomb. Hell, I was happy to just be on the ground.
There happened to be a whole bunch of AP reporters around that day, they write an article for the
AP news.
Cliff Gamble stated that after Kik pulled Rife out of his plane he (Cliff) gave Kik a big hug and told
him "Don't you ever do that again!"
Kik was awarded the Silver Star.
Charlie Rife was wounded in the lower back and spent a few days in the hospital.
The 395
th Fighter Squadron occasionally drew a bomber escort mission into Germany. On one such mission over Bonn, Germany on April 22, 1944 Fearless Dick scored his only aerial victory by bringing down a FW-190. After the war he returned to Kalamazoo, raised a family and became a physician. He passed away in 2005.
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