As we came over the edge of the trees, the field just opened up like blossoms. It lit up with a thousand winking points of light from every direction, and none of them were friendly...

I continued across the field, making a slight turn to the left, and saw a machine gun nest with two men firing at me. Lined up with them, I dropped my tanks and started firing. My bullets hit the dirt far beyond them. I dropped ten degrees of flaps and, with the plane pitched over in a nose-down attitude, my bullet strikes marched back toward, but not quite to, the nest. Then my speed took over and marched them forward again. I stopped firing and continued across the field, where I shot at a small white building. That was my mistake. The minute you line up with something, you've given the enemy added time to correct his aim and get you.

Moments later, I heard a loud whump--there's no other way to describe it--and the plane jumped as if it had been kicked by something big, maybe a 20 mm. The engine coughed and then caught up and started running extra smoothly, quieter than it had on the run-in...

A few moments later, I noticed short tongues of flame coming from the exhaust stacks. I cleared the trees at the edge of the field and stayed at treetop level for perhaps a minute or more to get out of sight of ground observers...The flames grew longer, but the engine continued to run smoothly...

The flames coming from the exhaust stacks were in the shape of very colorful, long tubes like the balloons you see at a carnival sideshow--the kind a clown twists into animal shapes. The tubes of flame grew longer and longer, and in a short time they were flowing around the bubble canopy. I knew now that I would not make it back to base or to the coast in this plane. So would I allow myself to be so bedazzled by the beauty of those playful flames that I would sit and fry? Not me! I would have to bail out...I sent out a Mayday call to inform someone, anyone, of my plans.

"I will walk in from here," I said, but I heard no reply.