Hit and set on fire by Chinese machine-gun bullets, a Japanese bomber safely returned to its base, 500 miles distant on Monday, a Japanese naval spokesman said yesterday.
The feat, he said, "verged on the miraculous." He attributed the safe return of the twin-engined craft and its crew to the presence of mind of the: pilot, a warrant officer; the ability of the flier and an "exceptional share of good luck."
Attacked by 15 Chinese pursuit craft, the bomber was hit in one of its fuel tanks, which burst into flames.
The pilot, Warrant Officer Chikara Suehiro, First Class, "gave the gun" to his motors and nosed his huge machine in an almost perpendicular dive.
Fanned by à terrific slip stream. current, the flames shot back, roaring fiercely.
Nearing the surface of Poyang Lake, the pilot righted his machine, and again sought altitude in a desperate attempt to put out the flames.
"The theory," the spokesmarm explained, "was to get enough wind pressure to just blow the fire out."
In a second dive the pilot did not straighten out until he was only 400 metres from the lake surface, but this time the flames were extinguished.
The machine was then safely brought back to its base.
Another occupant of the machine was Lieut. Takeshi Ogawa.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.