7 Things Japanese Pilots Found Strange About the F4U Corsair

February 14th, 1943. Japanese Zero pilots easily shoot down a bizarre, bent-winged American fighter over Bougainville. They assumed the F4U Corsair was just another plane they could beat. They were completely wrong. Built around a massive 2,000-horsepower engine, the Vought F4U Corsair had a strange gull-wing design, a terrifying whistling sound in a dive, and rugged armor that allowed rookie pilots to survive their mistakes and become aces. Initially rejected by the US Navy for being too dangerous to land on aircraft carriers, it was handed to the Marines—who used it to rewrite the rules of air combat in the Pacific. This is the true story of "Whistling Death," including the unbelievable morning a Marine with frozen guns used his own propeller to saw the tail off a Japanese plane at 35,000 feet. If your father or grandfather flew the Corsair, or kept one flying, with the Marines or the Navy, honor them by putting his name and his squadron in the comments below. Hit the Like button to help keep the story of these incredible aviators alive, and Subscribe for more history about the planes and pilots that changed the course of the war. Chapters The Valentine's Day Massacre Thing 1: The Bent Wings Thing 2: A Carrier Fighter With No Carrier Thing 3: It Would Not Turn Thing 4: The Sound (Whistling Death) Thing 5: It Would Not Burn Thing 6: It Kept Changing Jobs Thing 7: The Propeller Attack at 35,000 Feet The Verdict #F4UCorsair #WWIIAviation #WhistlingDeath #MilitaryHistory #TrueStory