Women Airforce Service Pilots
The Women Airforce Service Pilots , WASP for short , was a group of civilian female pilots who were deployed during World War II to transfer military aircraft across the Atlantic under the direction of the United States Army Air Forces .
In 1942, the Women's Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron was established by the Air Force Air Transport Command . Pilots were supposed to transfer planes from the USA to Great Britain , where they would then be handed over to Air Force pilots for combat missions. This should make more male fighter pilots available for combat missions. The idea for this unit was introduced by the pilot Jacqueline Cochran , but initially rejected. Only an advance by William Henry Tunner , the commanding officer of the US air transport units , the Ferrying Division , which was being established, made it possible to set up and deploy a female group of pilots who were paid less and were strictly limited to domestic missions, especially the transfer flights of new machines from factories to military airports within the US. There the machines were taken over by male pilots and flown abroad or for combat use. In 1943 the management of the company was handed over to Jacqueline Cochran and the transfer wing was renamed WASP.
From 1942 to December 1944, 1,830 women were admitted to the WASP courses. 1074 passed the training. The WASP pilots transferred a total of 12,650 aircraft of 77 different types and covered more than 60 million flight kilometers. 38 female pilots were killed, 27 of them in action and 11 during training. The highest number of active female pilots was 303, while 8,000 male pilots were on duty at the same time.
On July 1, 2009, President Barack Obama and the US Congress honored WASP members with the Congressional Gold Medal for Service to their Country.
The British Royal Air Force operated a similar organization with the Air Transport Auxiliary , in which, however, not only women but also men did service.
literature
- Byrd H. Granger: On Final Approach. The Women Airforce Service Pilots of WW II. Falconer, Scottsdale AZ 1991, ISBN 0-9626267-0-8 .
Web links
- Interview with a WAS pilot (PDF file; 360 kB) in the Houston Chronicle
- Article in Greenwich Magazine (PDF file; 5.4MB)
- scanned original documents with admission requirements
- www. wwii-women-pilots.org/ Info page with extensive information, photographs, commands and other documents
- Female WWII Pilots: The Original Fly Girls
- WWII Female Pilots Honored With Gold Medal
Individual evidence
- ^ William H. Tunner, Over the hump . New York: Duell, Sloan, and Pearce 1964 (reprinted with a new foreword, Air Force History and Museums Program 1998, Chap. 2 Ferrying Division, pp. 35 ff.)
- ↑ Tunner, Over the hump , chap. 2, Ferrying Division, p. 39
- ↑ Women Airforce Service Pilots Congressional Gold Medal (PDF file; 128 kB) United States Government Information