Free War Stories III by Oliver L. North

ingenuity found a way to get the planes to ’em anyway.
    Eventually, 7,926 aircraft were transferred to the Soviet Union through Fairbanks, Alaska. Dubbed Operation ALSIB—for the secret Alaska-Siberia route—it was a way for American pilots to ferry planes from factories throughout the U.S. to Great Falls, Montana. From there, aircraft destined for the Soviets headed north across Canada to Ladd Field in Fairbanks. There, Soviet pilots took possession of the planes and flew them across the Bering Straits, back to the USSR.
    By 1942, nearly all of the planes that the Russian received at Ladd Field had arrived there courtesy of American women. Not only did a labor force that contained millions of women build the planes—but also the aircraft often began their journey to war with an American woman at the controls.
    Though female pilots were barred from flying military aircraft outside the continental U.S. during World War II, more than 1,000 WASPs—Women Air Service Pilots—ferried planes from factories to airbases around the United States. Within hours of installing the last rivet, WASPs would take off—sometimes on a 3,000-mile transcontinental delivery trip.
    One of the largest airplane manufacturers was Bell Aircraft. At its Buffalo, New York, plant, Bell manufactured the P-39 Airacobra. This maneuverable single-seat fighter with its nose-mounted cannon and
wing-mounted machine guns became a favorite of the Soviet pilots. Thousands of them were flight-ferried from Buffalo to Great Falls by WASPs like Betty Shea—who loved the challenge of piloting fighters with Russian markings 1,600 miles across America.
    BETTY SHEA, WOMEN AIR SERVICE PILOT
    Bell Aircraft Factory, Buffalo, New York
24 November 1941

    Flying had been my dream since I was a little girl. The government started the CPT—the Civilian Pilot Training program—in 1938. I got in during’39 while I was in college and got my private pilot’s license. As soon as I could, I signed up for the WASP program, took a test, and was accepted. It was perfect for me—I was from Buffalo and I had been around Bell aircraft since I started flying.
    I was only in my very early twenties when I became a ferry pilot. We weren’t trained in formation flying so we generally flew on our own. I was a loner and liked to have that airplane—with a red star, the Russian emblem, on it—out there by myself. The plane was essentially ours until we got it to Great Falls—about a twelve- to fourteen-hour flight—depending on the weather. A typical route: Buffalo to Niagara Falls to South Bend to remain overnight—then the next day to Bismarck and on to Great Falls, where the men would take them to Alaska for turnover to the Russians.
    Once, one of the girls crashed and burned at Bismarck. There was a lot of suspicion that it was sabotage. The FBI, the Flight Safety people—everybody came to Bismarck to try and figure it out. I was pretty sure that the airplanes were all right but there was a lot of apprehension. I guess that’s understandable after a friend goes down and nobody can find out why. It’s a terrible thing.
    A few weeks after the crash, I was in a flight of two—about twenty minutes out of Great Falls. I was tucked under the wing of my flight
leader and he had just called me on the radio to tell me that there was thunderstorm activity in the Great Falls area—when my engine suddenly quit.
    Afterwards, someone asked me, “Weren’t you afraid?” The answer to that is no. It gets your attention pretty fast, but we were well trained in emergency procedures, and in that kind of a situation, you just start doing what you have to do in the cockpit. I was working trying to get the engine restarted but it just didn’t catch. I didn’t want to lose the plane so by trying to start it I ended up waiting a little too long to get out.
    Just before bailing out I grabbed ten bucks out of