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[[newspaper article]]

WHY JAPANESE CAN'T STOP YANKS IN THE AIR

Stratford, Conn. - (AP) - Those man-made comets streaking across Japanese skies these days are new Corsair [←] fighter-bombers, amazing planes that can fly faster than seven miles a minute and carry 2,000 pounds of bombs plus a load of rockets plus the standard armament of six .50 calibre machineguns in their wings.

The Chance Vought Division of the United Aircraft Corp. has been making the new plane-designated F4U-1 here for some time, and a description of the deadly aircraft was announced last night in Washington by the navy.

The F4U-4 already has been in action, and the first Japanese pilot who ever saw one lived only two minutes thereafter. Marine Lt. Douglas M. West of Excelsior, Minn., flying with a group of the new planes over the Japanese home islands, saw the enemy pilot first, dived on him from out of the clouds and watched him crash in the ocean after firing only 100 rounds from his wing guns.

The big change in the F4U-4 is the use of the Pratt & Whitney Double Wasp 2800-C engine for its power plant, the navy said. This gives it its speed of at least 425 miles an hour, its ability to climb almost 1,00 feet a minute faster than the F4U-1 and a ceiling high enough to give it an advantage over high-flying, land based Japanese planes.

The engine is rated for 2,100 horse-power, and this can be increased in emergencies by water injection.

The new plane's four-bladed propeller, which the navy says literally "chews holes in the sky," measures 13 feet, 2 inches from tip to tip.