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/One of the Liberator pilots who has been “handing it out** to the enemy in North Africa is Lt Frank J, Rinehart, son of Mr. and Mrs. F. A. Rinehart, formerly of 1903 Polk. Lieutenant Rinehart attended high school and junior college here and received his wings in California 18 months ago. His parents now reside in San Antonio.An account of Rinehart’s experiences in North Africa is included in an Associated Press dispatch from Correspondent Gladwin Hill, who writes from “Somewhere in England.'* The squadron to which Rinehart belongs now is back in England for a rest period, and Hill quotes its members as stating they would like to live in England and fight in North Africa.Lieutenant Rinehart’s Liberator bomber is known as “The Eager Beaver;1’The new* dispatch . quotes an account by Rinehart ! and Lt. Ripley Archer of Houston; co-pilot, as to how a cigaret case given the Wichitan by his wife almost cracked them up and how they later were saved from a crackup by an Algerian train.Near Crash Landing They were landing at an Algerian base froqn a raid on Bi-zerte and were almost out of gas.“I pulled back the throttle to slow down for the landing but it wouldn’t go back far enough,” Archer said. “At the last second I noticed the throttle lever was being jammed by the cigaret case I had laid beside it and yanked it out just in time. Frank set her down and we rolled off the end ( of the runway but there was no damage. If we had had to try another pass at the field the gas , would have failed and we’d been sunk.”The second close shave occurred only a few days ago on the way back from Africa. With 15 aboard, including five ground crewmen, they were five hours out on a 10-hour, 1,500-mile flight 1 from, an Egyptian desert base to the Algerian base. It was 5 a. m., and most of the men were asleep and the plane was flying by automatic control.Train Locate* Airport “All of a sudden flak started busting around us, Rinehart said.“I found the wind had blown us off the course and over Gabes (enemy territory). Quickly I switched off the automatic pilot and got the hell out of there.“At the base we found it all fogged in and the ceiling only 35 feet. 1 talked with the control tower but couldn’t make out a thing. I circled around upstairs until the gas tanks were almost empty. Just then Archer saw smoke from a train puffing below. The control tower said they could see it also. By comparing . our sightings on the train we got a bearing on the field and got in.“We /led in ^two other of our planes which had been circling, too, and had given up and were ready for a crash landing. One had already dumped guns out.” Two more close shaves were experienced when Rinehart's tent burned up and later when that of Walst-Ounner Sgt. Rupert G. ThacSer of Roanoke, Va., burned and set a case of 20 millimeter 1^ ■“ —■ * « a t _ * (
Newspaper Details
Wichita Daily Times
Wichita Falls, Texas, US
Sat, Mar 27, 1943
Page 2
Full Page
Clipped by
Christie L.
NA, 31 May 2020
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