Japanese Captured F4F-4

September 1942

The Grumman F4F Wildcat was the primary US carrier fighter in the early years of WW2. Therefore, it was the main opponent of Japanese Zero fighters in this time of the war. Obviously, Japan wanted to have some of those aircraft to evaluate the right tactics against it.

The chance for this came up during the campaign on the Solomon Islands in August 1942. After the American attack on Guadalcanal in this month, heavy sea and air fights took part between and over the islands.
On this occasion one F4F Wildcat, flown by Lt. Jeb Kerbalski was hit by Japanese anti aircraft fire, disrupting the fuel flow. Kerbalski was able to ditch the plane near the beaches of Vangunu Island. While he could escape the plane and hide on the island (from where he was rescued 2 weeks later), his plane rested more or less intact at the beached of the island.
There it was spotted by an returning Japanese ships to Rabaul and in the night of August 27, a Japanese engineering team was able to salvage the plane and transport it to Rabaul. From there, it was brought to the main land and evaluated at Mitsubishi Jukogyo K.K in Nagoya.

After the required repairs, the freshly painted F4F was first flown by Japanese pilot Yuta Yamakawa on September 29 of the same year. In the following weeks and months the plane was use for test flights and simulated combat against various Japanese fighter planes. However, with the introduction of the F6F Hellcat in early 1943, a new opponent for the Japanese Navy had arrived and tests with the captured Wildcat stopped. The last recorded flight was in March 20, 1943.
The plane was then stored at the Mitisubishi factory, its final fate is unknown.

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