OBJECTIVE: Reconnaissance flight over Canton airfields
RESULTS: Pilots overfly Tien Ho and White Cloud airbases to take pictures with recon cameras; they also overfly satellite fields and report that the White Cloud satellite field has been ditched to render it unusable.
TIME OVER TARGET: ~3:30 p.m.
AMERICAN UNITS AND AIRCRAFT: Two P-40s from the 118th Tactical Reconnaissance Squadron (attached to 23rd Fighter Group)
AMERICAN PILOTS AND AIRCREW: Major Edward O. McComas; Lt. Penning
ORDNANCE EXPENDED: None
JAPANESE UNITS, AIRCRAFT, AND PILOTS: Pilots spot eight aircraft taking off from White Cloud airbase, where one aircraft is observed burning on the runway.
AIRCRAFT LOSSES: None
SOURCES: Original mission reports and other documents in the Air Force Historical Research Agency archives at Maxwell Air Force Base in Montgomery, Alabama.
Information compiled by Steven K. Bailey, author of Bold Venture: The American Bombing of Japanese-Occupied Hong Kong, 1942-1945 (Potomac Books/University of Nebraska Press, 2019).