During the Battle of Midway, Marine Bombing Squadron VMSB-241, flying SB2U-3 Vindicator bombers, attacked the Japanese heavy cruiser HIJMS Mikuma. The marines were led by Capt. Richard E. Fleming, USMCR. Fleming's plane was hit by anti-aircraft fire and caught fire. Fleming was unable to pull out of his dive and crashed into "X" turret of the cruiser. Flaming AvGas was pulled into the air intakes of one of the engine rooms, reducing the speed of the ship. Mikuma was sunk on the following day. Fleming was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions, and the South Saint Paul, MN Airport (Fleming Field) is named in his honor.

The Vindicators were at the end of their operational life and weren't structurally sound enough to dive bomb, so Fleming led the squadron in a glide bombing attack. The painting depicts his attack at the typical 30 degree angle of a glide bombing attack, on the port quarter of the Mikuma, shortly after 8:00 am on June 5, 1942.

This painting was a study done in preparation for the larger painting "Fleming Attacks the Mikuma". White 2 refers to the aircraft number painted on the side of the rear fuselage. An interesting comparison of both paintings shows that the plane in "White 2" is noticably darker in tonal value than in "Fleming Attacks the Mikuma". This is a result of the tonal value of the backgrounds in each painting. Both planes are virtually identical in size and layout.

This is a "generic" B-17 (no specific squadron or historical incident), inspired by a much more complicated work by Robert Taylor. My focus here was to develop the light and shadow on the curves and angles of the plane to heighten the 3-D illusion of flight.

The Royal Australian Air Force used the Bristol Beaufighter in a naval interdiction role, attacking transports and light naval vessels. Here a Beaufighter TFX makes a pass at a Seishin Maru class merchant ship.

Although the most famous group sporting the "Shark's Teeth" motif as a unit marking may be the Flying Tigers (the American Volunteer Group in China) in 1942, They were not the first to use that idea. The Luftwaffe's JG-72 adopted the "Shark's Teeth" motif as their squadron emblem in 1940. Here a Bf-110c of JG-72 patrols along the British coast at the beginning of the Battle of Britain.

The Curtiss BF2C-1 was only used by Squadron VB-5B (Bombing 5) of the USS Ranger between November, 1934 and February, 1936. While the new metal-frame wings of this design had performed well on prototype aircraft, the natural period of vibration of the metal wings harmonized with that of the Wright Cyclone engine of the production model, and the airplane nearly shook apart at cruising speed. As a result, they were withdrawn from the fleet after barely a year in service. Interestingly, the export version of this model, the Hawk III, used wooden wings and did not have a vibration problem.

The first six TBF-1's to see combat were assigned to VT-8 of USS Hornet, but operated from Midway Island for the Battle of Midway in June 1942. Of the six Avengers that attacked the Japanese, only one, 8-T-1, survived.

The EA-6B provided electronic countermeasures for their carrier air group. Here a Prowler of VAQ-133, "The Wizards", is seen with its home carrier USS America, CV-66, in the background during the Viet Nam War.