Friday, September 22, 2000

Nomination of Honorary Member


“We are dedicated to the proposition that most of the world's greatest discoveries have been made by sailors who were lost”*

The Legend of Saburo Sakai
Zero fighter pilot Saburo Sakai ended WWII with 60+ victories and is considered by many to be the top pilot of WWII. Once, over Guadalcanal, gunners shot up the cockpit of Sakai’s Zero, sending one bullet smack through his brain. Losing consciousness, Sakai rolled into a dive heading for certain death. Sakai describes how during that dive he had a vision of his mother... a vision that somehow shook him to recover his will and focus. Sakai also writes of tears of pain that helped to drain some of the blood from his eyes.

What followed was a classic piece of WWII flying lore. Running as lean as possible, and on fumes by the end of his journey, Sakai managed to fly the shredded Zero FIVE HOURS over open seas back to Rabaul airbase, navigating entirely without instruments based only on whatever directional sense the vision of his mother had initially provided and eventually (since he was only blinded in one eye) his keying visually on cones he recognized from a volcano chain. When he landed a crowd of pilots and crewman gathered around amazed at what they were seeing. Sakai is then said to have filled out a full report before collapsing.

After the war, Sakai became a devout Buddhist and “never killed another living thing, including mosquitoes” as long as he lived. Sakai visited America later in life, even meeting some of his aerial adversaries, including the men who shot him down. He died in September of 2000 at age 84. As Sakai later so fully understood, "any wind will take you there... if you don't know where you're going.”*


NOTES:
[*International Society of Ancient Mariners and Lost Navigators]

—Information taken from Secrets of the Dead - Dogfight Over Guadalcanal DVD ~ and liberally borrowing from Amazon Review by D. Doppes'
http://www.amazon.com/Secrets-Dead-Dogfight-Over-Guadalcanal/dp/B000NA21X6