{"id":1399,"date":"2016-06-05T06:02:58","date_gmt":"2016-06-05T11:02:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/planesintheair.com\/?p=1399"},"modified":"2016-06-05T06:06:39","modified_gmt":"2016-06-05T11:06:39","slug":"battle-of-midway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/?p=1399","title":{"rendered":"The Battle of Midway takes place on June 4, 1942"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Battle of Midway<\/strong> takes place on June 4, 1942, turning the tide of World War II in the Pacific Ocean. The Battle of Midway took\u00a0place just 6 months after Japan’s surprise attack on the United States Naval Base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.\u00a0The attack\u00a0was meant to cripple the U.S. Navy’s ability to wage war\u00a0in the Pacific theater of operations. Japan made a critical mistake in the\u00a0timing of its\u00a0attack though, as\u00a0the American\u00a0aircraft carriers\u00a0were not present in Pearl Harbor on the morning of December 7, 1941.\u00a0These aircraft carriers were the primary targets of the Japanese attack on that day. Sinking those missed aircraft carriers was\u00a0also the primary goal of Japan’s planned attack on Midway Island. Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto was confident that those aircraft carriers would come to the defense of the U.S. base on Midway Island if Japan attacked the isolated outpost in force. Unfortunately for Yamamoto, U.S.\u00a0Intelligence had cracked the Japanese Naval code used to encrypt messages, and were lying in wait just to the Northeast of Midway Island on June 4, 1942.<\/p>\n

The Battle of Midway sequence of events<\/h2>\n

The contact between U.S and Japanese forces actually started on the 3rd of June. The\u00a0U.S. Navy sent out 22 PBY reconnaissance airplanes to search for the Japanese naval forces. One of these planes spotted ships about\u00a0500 miles\u00a0to the west-southwest of Midway Island around at around 9:00 a.m. The ships that were spotted were part of\u00a0the invasion force sent to occupy the Island. They were not part of Yamamoto’s aircraft carrier force.\u00a0The Japanese carrier force launched their\u00a0initial attack on Midway Island\u00a0around\u00a04:30 a.m. on\u00a0June 4th.\u00a0Around the same time,\u00a0they also launched 8 reconnaissance\u00a0aircraft to search for any U.S. naval forces that may be in the area.\u00a0One of the 8 planes was\u00a0delayed by\u00a030 minutes due to technical problems. This delay, combined with a very poor search plane, would come back to haunt the Japanese\u00a0naval forces before the day was over.<\/p>\n

Around\u00a05:3o a.m, American\u00a0PBY’s once again searching for the enemy forces spotted\u00a02 Japanese aircraft carriers. They reported the location of the ships, and alerted\u00a0Midway Island that\u00a0attacking aircraft were headed\u00a0their way. The\u00a0Japanese air strike on the island\u00a0was comprised of half the aircraft of the carrier fleet. The other half was held in reserve in case enemy ships were spotted by their search planes. The U.S.\u00a0carriers started to launch their counter attack\u00a0on the Japanese aircraft carriers around\u00a07:00 a.m.\u00a0Admiral Raymond Spruance,\u00a0in\u00a0command of Task Force 16, ordered\u00a0his attacking\u00a0aircraft to proceed to their target immediately. This contradicted\u00a0the normal protocol of\u00a0allowing\u00a0the strike force to assemble together before proceeding to attack their target. This decision would prove to be fatal\u00a0for\u00a0both sides before the day was over.\u00a0Admiral Spruance\u00a0had taken over the task force\u00a0just 2 days before it\u00a0departed\u00a0Pearl Harbor. He replaced Admiral “Bull” Halsey, who\u00a0had been hospitalized\u00a0with a severe case of Shingles.<\/p>\n

Vice Admiral Chuichi Nagumo was in charge of the Japanese carrier force. He\u00a0had been\u00a0under a steady attack from planes based on Midway Island following the\u00a0launch\u00a0of\u00a0his air strike\u00a0earlier in the morning. As his first wave of aircraft were returning to land, the flight leader informed command that they had failed to destroy the air strip on the island.\u00a0Nagumo was preparing his reserve aircraft for a second ground\u00a0attack when the delayed scout plane from\u00a0signaled that it had sighted an American naval force located to the\u00a0east of their position.\u00a0The\u00a0scout plane then sent word that\u00a0the force spotted included an aircraft carrier. Nagumo decided that while the returning attack group\u00a0was landing,\u00a0the reserve aircraft would be re-armed for sea action.<\/p>\n

Torpedo Squadron 8 from the Hornet was the first\u00a0American\u00a0carrier group to engage\u00a0the enemy. The group, lead by Lieutenant Commander John C.\u00a0Waldron, began their attack without any accompanying air support. This was due to the decision by Admiral Spruance to proceed directly to the target on takeoff.\u00a0All 15 of the TBD Devastator torpedo bombers in the squadron were shot down by the Japanese fighter cover without inflicting a single hit on the enemy.\u00a0The only member of the group to survive the attack\u00a0was\u00a0Ensign George Gay, who was later rescued after the Battle of Midway was over. The attack\u00a0was followed\u00a0by the\u00a0Torpedo\u00a0Squadron from the USS Enterprise, which\u00a0lost 10 of their 14 aircraft. The\u00a0Torpedo\u00a0Squadron from the USS Yorktown came next, and lost 10 of\u00a0its 12 planes. There was not a single hit from the 3 decimated groups attacks, and the\u00a0TBD Devastator aircraft was never used in combat again.\u00a0While the 3 torpedo groups were being decimated by the defending Japanese\u00a0air patrol, 3\u00a0squadrons of dive bombers\u00a0from the American carriers Enterprise\u00a0and\u00a0Yorktown arrived over the fleet.\u00a0With the\u00a0Japanese air patrol\u00a0focusing on the torpedo attacks, and her carriers re-fueling and re-arming their bombers,\u00a0the recipe for destruction was set.<\/p>\n

Two dive bomber squadrons\u00a0from the USS\u00a0Enterprise and USS Yorktown came in\u00a0to attack the Japanese carrier force. The\u00a0Kaga\u00a0was hit by 4 bombs and was quickly engulfed in flames. Only 1 bomb hit the Akagi, but it exploded in the hanger deck where the fuel\u00a0and\u00a0the ordinance was located. The resulting conflagration devastated the ship, resulting in heavy casualties. The Soryu was hit with 3 bombs, which ignited gasoline and ammunition, turning the ship into\u00a0a floating inferno. In a little more than 5 minutes, the Imperial Japanese Navy was down\u00a0to a single remaining aircraft carrier.<\/p>\n

The Hiryu,\u00a0Japan’s sole remaining operational carrier, launched\u00a02\u00a0separate attacks\u00a0on\u00a0the USS\u00a0Yorktown. The first one resulted in 3 bomb\u00a0hits on the U.S carrier\u00a0which\u00a0smashed through the flight deck and exploding deep inside the ship, bringing her to a halt. The USS Yorktown’s damage repair teams sprung into action, patching her flight deck and\u00a0repairing\u00a0her boilers. Within 1\u00a0hour\u00a0the ship was operational again and\u00a0resumed its air operations. When the second strike force\u00a0from the Hiryu came in to\u00a0attack, since there was no smoke coming from the ship, they believed it to be a different American carrier.\u00a0Two torpedoes slammed\u00a0into her port side, causing the carrier to list 23 degrees.<\/p>\n

Later that\u00a0afternoon, an American\u00a0scout plane\u00a0finally located\u00a0the Hiryu.\u00a0The carrier Enterprise\u00a0launched what would be the final blow of the Battle of Midway. Four bombs smashed through the deck of the Hiryu, leaving her\u00a0in flames. Despite their best attempt to\u00a0get the fires under control,\u00a0the crew was unsuccessful. The crew of the Hiryu were ordered to evacuate the ship. She sank early the following morning, with her commander Admiral Yamaguchi going down with his\u00a0ship. With an American victory at hand, the Battle of Midway would go down in history as the turning point of the war in the Pacific.<\/p>\n

\"battle<\/p>\n

Image from\u00a0www.historynet.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Battle of Midway takes place on June 4, 1942, turning the tide of World War II in the Pacific Ocean. The Battle of Midway took\u00a0place just 6 months after Japan’s surprise attack on the United States Naval Base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.\u00a0The attack\u00a0was meant to cripple the U.S. Navy’s ability to wage war\u00a0in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[89],"tags":[366,357,362,365,369,359,368,371,355,361,358,356,367,364,363,360,370],"class_list":["post-1399","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aviation-news","tag-admiral","tag-akagi","tag-battle-of-midway","tag-bull-halsey","tag-devastator","tag-enterprise","tag-fletcher","tag-george-gay","tag-hiryu","tag-hornet","tag-kaga","tag-soryu","tag-spruance","tag-yamaguchi","tag-yamamoto","tag-yorktown","tag-zero"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1399","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1399"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1399\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1405,"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1399\/revisions\/1405"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1399"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1399"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1399"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}