Saturday, November 9, 2002

Wartime aviators should be remembered

By RONALD WILLIAMSON | News-Journal Staff Writer

Long before sunlight brightened the sky toward Daytona Beach, the roaring thunder of warplanes ripped through palmetto flatwoods north of DeLand as powerful engines and propellers exploded into life.

Ammunition and bombs lay on the oil-stained concrete, among rows of dive bombers. Below a drab wooden tower, small swarms of men checked, fueled and loaded planes for another day of strafing, bombing, and sometimes death.

World War II put thousands of warplanes over the St. Johns River as pilots trained at area bases, including the DeLand Naval Air Station. In 1943, the east half of the flightline, maybe 75 planes and their ground crews, were managed by a young line chief named Ken Torbett from Virginia. He worked in a low metal hut where fliers and ground crews got assignments.

"It was dangerous as hell out here. No doubt about it," Torbett said recently as he bypassed a chain-link fence and walked between metal airport buildings. He was looking for the place where his line shack stood nearly 60 years ago.

"Just think about it. You've got 50-60 guys running around in the dark with all these propellers turning, fueling going on, ordnance loading up, bombs on the deck, planes taxiing, and all so loud it knocks your ears out. With all that activity, you're going to have a few problems."

After losing many fliers in the Pacific, the Navy was desperate for aviators. It needed them faster than they could be trained. Men here got three months' training in bombing and gunnery before being rushed to the front.

"We had guys on this line who had been behind plows in Georgia three months before," said Torbett, 82, Palm Coast. "This was hurry up. We had a war going on and we were in trouble."

But today, the only trouble is finding the line shack.

"This was all grass," he said, walking across the asphalt.

They've changed things so damned much." Then he stopped. "Here. The line shack stood right here."

It was a bit moving to stand exactly where Chief Torbett and others worked to keep planes flying safely so America's warriors could learn deadly skills.

"We had all kinds of incidents," he said. Mostly little stuff like a taxiing pilot hitting another plane. Or cutting too close and damaging wing tips.

Once before dawn, a taxiing plane's engine caught fire. The crew jumped out as the plane swerved into others, exploded, and caught them on fire. Torbett's hand moves across the horizon, tracing a fateful flight of two low-flying planes that collided over the field.

"One man bailed out, but his chute didn't open. It trailed." He points to a stand of cypress. "He hit right over there. Killed him. We lost two crewmen and two pilots."

Walking back, Torbett looked east, down the same slab of shimmering concrete he watched so often in that other time.

"Hell, we had them crash on the end of the runway and burn. You'd see guys sitting there, burning up." His words were low, intense, clipped. "We had a lot of them die here."

How many? Air station veterans disagree. Just ask one. Many are in DeLand today for Memorial Day weekend events. Torbett says at least a few dozen died -- maybe 100, maybe more. The deaths were war secrets, so no one really knows.

Which is too bad. Fliers who died here should be known, remembered, and honored. They walked across this same concrete flightline, climbed into rumbling, armed aircraft and flew to their deaths in the service of freedom.

Torbett says there ought to be a memorial to them. The old line chief is right. It's a debt past due.

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