Personal Recollections of
Theodore R. "Dick" Newell
Pilot, 12th Squadron
Sarasota, Florida
I was a pilot with the 12th Squadron over in Korea, at K-14. I arrived at Kimpo toward the end of the war. That was late in 1953, right when it ended. I didn't get in on any of the big action. About all that I encountered was being chased a couple of times at night by planes that our radar said were not our own. At the time, I was a 2nd Lieutenant.
The 12th was a night photo reconnaissance outfit. We took bomb damage assessment (BDA) photos and did visual reconnaissance at night, using flash bombs that were timed with the camera. We had to retake a lot of photos that the 45th Squadron had tried to get during the day. The 45th had RF-80s, which maybe weren't quite as good as the B-26 for the task. They'd send us up to 28 thousand or so to retake them. The B-26 had to chug a little to get up there. I also flew test operations, which is maintenance testing. Of course, after the war, a lot of stuff was just a matter of practice. We would go up there and monitor the scene as it was.
