THE USS ENTERPRISE (CV 6)
The most decorated ship of World War II, the legendary "Big E" was commissioned on 12 May 1938, and the following year was ordered to the Pacific, where she became the flagship for Commander Aircraft Squadrons, Battle Force, Vice Admiral 
William F. Halsey, Jr. Away from Pearl Harbor delivering a Marine fighter squadron to Wake Atoll at the time the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941, Enterprise spent the ensuing months engaged in hit-and-run raids on Japanese islands in the Pacific. In April 1942 she steamed in company with the carrier Hornet (CV 8) to the waters off the Japanese Home Islands, where Hornet launched the famous Doolittle Raid against Tokyo on 18 April 1942. Returning to Pearl Harbor, where Rear Admiral Raymond A. Spruance replaced Halsey, who was hospitalized with a skin rash, Enterprise sortied for the waters around Midway on 28 May, as flagship of Task Force 16, which included Hornet, six cruisers (New Orleans, Minneapolis, Vincennes, Northampton, Pensacola, and Atlanta) and ten destroyers (Phelps, Worden, Monaghan, Aylwin, Balch, Conyngham, Benham, Ellet, Maury, Dewey, and Monssen). Planes from Enterprise struck some of the lethal blows that doomed the Japanese carriers during the Battle of Midway.
Following her participation in the Battle of Midway, Enterprise saw heavy combat during the campaign for Guadalcanal, suffering bomb damage at both the Battle of the Eastern Solomons and the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands. After helping hold the line during the desperate months of 1942, Enterprise joined the great offensive across the Pacific, carrying the war to the enemy from Tarawa to Tokyo. Along the way she changed the face of naval warfare. In November 1943 aircraft from the carrier, led by famous fighter ace Lieutenant Commander Edward H. "Butch" O'Hare, pioneered carrier-based night operations, and three months later an Enterprise torpedo squadron performed the Navy's first night radar bombing attack. Her planes also flew into the gathering darkness on 20 June 1944, during the Battle of the Philippine Sea, participating in the epic mission that culminated in Vice Admiral Marc A. Mitscher illuminating the fleet to guide his aircraft home.
It took the deadly breath of the divine wind to knock Enterprise out of the war. Operating in the embattled waters off Okinawa during April-May 1945, the ship suffered two separate kamikaze hits, the second one destroying her forward aircraft elevator and killing 14 members of her crew. She departed the war zone for the final time on 16 May 1945, sailing eastward across the wide expanse of the Pacific that had been the scene of so many of her great triumphs.
Enterprise statistics
Length: 809 ft., 6 in.
Displacement: 19,800 tons
Crew: 2,919
Speed: 33 kts.
THE USS HORNET (CV 8)
The last aircraft carrier to join the fleet before U.S. entry into World War II, Hornet (CV 8) was commissioned on 20 October 1941. She cruised in the Atlantic during the first months of World War II, including one occasion in which two 
Army Air Forces B-25 bombers were taken out to sea and successfully launched from her deck. This foreshadowed her first combat mission, which culminated on 18 April 1942 with the launching of sixteen B-25s under the command of Lieutenant Colonel James H. Doolittle from the carrier. Hornet returned to Pearl Harbor following this daring foray into Japanese waters, and on 28 May departed as a component of Task Force 16 that also included the carrier Enterprise (CV 6), six cruisers (New Orleans, Minneapolis, Vincennes, Northampton, Pensacola, and Atlanta) and ten destroyers (Phelps, Worden, Monaghan, Aylwin, Balch, Conyngham, Benham, Ellet, Maury, Dewey, and Monssen). Their destination was the area around Midway Atoll. During the ensuing battle, tragedy befell Hornet's air group. In the first strike launched against the Japanese fleet on 4 June 1942, only one of the carrier's squadrons, Torpedo Squadron (VT) 8, found the enemy. Attacking without fighter cover, the lumbering TBD Devastators were decimated, with only one man (Ensign George Gay) surviving the attack. The other aircraft had to turn back without engaging the enemy, with many of the fuel-starved fighters having to ditch at sea. Though her aircraft did participate in the successful attacks against Japanese cruisers later in the battle, Hornet finished the battle having lost more aircraft (33) than either of the other two American carriers engaged.
Hornet participated in action off Guadalcanal during the latter part of 1942, where for about a month she was the U.S. Navy's sole fleet carrier in theater. Severely damaged by bombs and torpedoes during the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands, she sank on 27 October 1942.
Hornet Statistics
Length: 809 ft., 9 in.
Displacement: 19,800 tons
Crew: 1,889
Speed: 33 kts.
THE USS YORKTOWN (CV 5)
Commissioned on 30 September 1937 at Norfolk, Virginia, Yorktown (CV 5) was the lead ship of a class of two carriers that included her sister ship Enterprise (CV 6). Both were destined to play a leading role in the dramatic first six months of 
the war in the Pacific. Assigned to the Pacific Fleet in 1939, Yorktown returned to the Atlantic the following year as part of an effort to bolster forces in the area in response to increased activity on the part of German U-boats. To this end, Yorktown made four Neutrality Patrols helping protect American shores during 1941, arriving in port after completing the final one on 2 December 1941. Five days later the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor plunged the United States into war, and prompted a decision to return Yorktown to the Pacific. Arriving at San Diego on 30 December 1941, she soon headed to the South Pacific, launching air strikes against Japanese positions in the Marshalls and Gilberts, as well as at Lae and Salamaua in New Guinea. On 7-8 May 1942, operating with the carrier Lexington (CV 2), Yorktown participated in the Battle of the Coral Sea, the first engagement in the history of naval warfare in which the opposing forces never came within sight of each other. Though the battle proved a strategic victory for the U.S. Navy given the fact that a Japanese move towards Australia was thwarted, the loss of Lexington and heavy damage to Yorktown versus the Japanese loss of the light carrier Shoho made Coral Sea a tactical defeat. However, so decimated were the air groups on board the other two Japanese carriers in the battle-Shokaku (also damaged) and Zuikaku- that they were pulled from the next operation, a planned attack against Midway Atoll.
Having been hit by one bomb and peppered by shrapnel from near misses, under normal circumstances Yorktown would have been out of the next fight as well. However, with knowledge of a Japanese fleet approaching Midway, the carrier was desperately needed. Arriving at Pearl Harbor on 28 May 1942, she was immediately placed in dry dock, where yard workers swarmed over her. She departed Pearl Harbor on 30 May as flagship of Task Force 17, which included two cruisers (Astoria and Portland) and six destroyers (Hammann, Hughes, Morris, Anderson, Russell, and Gwin). Rendezvousing with Task Force 16 at a patch of ocean near Midway appropriately called "Point Luck," Yorktown prepared for action. On the morning of 4 June, having received the electrifying word of the spotting of Japanese carriers, the three U.S. Navy flattops launched their air groups. Like the torpedo squadrons of Enterprise and Hornet, Yorktown's Torpedo Squadron (VT) 3 was decimated by Japanese fighters, but its sacrifice paved the way for attacks by SBD dive-bombers. By the end of the day, four Japanese carriers were flaming infernos.
Yorktown proved to be the object of Japanese revenge. Hit by two torpedoes and three bombs, the carrier went dead in the water and began to list to port, her crew abandoning ship. Yet, the gallant ship refused to die and efforts began to attempt to place her under tow. However, the Japanese submarine I-168, lurking nearby, put an end to these plans. One torpedo sank the destroyer Hammann (DD 412), which was alongside the carrier, while two more slammed into Yorktown. These were blows from which she could not recover, and the carrier sank on the morning of 7 June 1942. On 19 May 1998, a team led by underwater explorer Robert Ballard discovered the carrier in 16,650 ft. of water.
Yorktown Statistics
Length: 809 ft., 6 in.
Displacement: 19,800 tons
Crew: 2,919
Speed: 33 kts.
F4F WILDCAT
Naval aviation’s front-line fighter aircraft when the United States entered World War II, the F4F Wildcat contrasted sharply with its primary adversary in the Pacific, the vaunted Japanese Zero. While the former possessed unmatched maneuverability, rate of climb, speed and range, the F4F’s strength rested in its ruggedness and firepower. These elements, combined with 
tactics of mutual defense and slashing diving attacks against Japanese aircraft, enabled Wildcat pilots to more than hold their own against their counterparts in the vicious air battles at Coral Sea, Midway, and Guadalcanal during 1942. The Wildcat had its greatest impact in the Pacific, but also served in the European Theater, including support of the landings in North Africa and operations from escort carriers in the continuing battle against German U-boats. Though Grumman-built Wildcats disappeared from the scene in 1943, the Eastern Aircraft Division of General Motors continued production of the design under the designation FM. All told, sixty-one pilots became aces while flying the Wildcat, which achieved a 6.9:1 kill to loss ratio in air-to-air combat during World War II. In addition, of the nineteen naval aviators who received the Medal of Honor during World War II, eight were F4F pilots.
Manufacturer: Grumman Aircraft Engineering Corporation
Dimensions: Length: 28 ft. 9 in.; Height: 9 ft., 2 ½ in.; Wingspan: 38 ft.
Weights: Empty: 5,342 lb.; Gross Weight: 8,152 lb.
Power Plant: One Pratt & Whitney 1,200 horsepower R-1830-76 engine
Performance: Maximum Speed: 328 M.P.H at 21,000 ft.; Service Ceiling: 37,500 ft.; Range: 845 miles
Armament: Four fixed forward-firing .50-in. guns and two 100 lb. bombs
Crew: Pilot
SBD DAUNTLESS
The SBD Dauntless was the brainchild of the creative mind of “Mr. Attack Aviation,” engineer Ed Heinemann. Descended from the Northrop BT-1, the SBD featured perforated dive flaps that steadied the aircraft during bombing runs and facilitated dive recovery. The aircraft was first flown under the designation XBT-2 on 22 April 1938. However, by the time deliveries commenced in 1940, the designation had been changed to SBD in recognition of the Douglas Aircraft Company having taken over production. The first production SBD-1s were delivered to the Marine Corps in late-1940, with the more advanced SBD-2s arriving in Navy squadrons the following year. By the time of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, eight Navy and two Marine Corps squadrons operated the type.
During the first year of the Pacific war, the Dauntless almost single-handedly turned the tide of war. At the pivotal Battle of Midway in June 1942, SBDs were credited with sinking four Japanese carriers. When Allied forces invaded Guadalcanal in August 1942, SBDs based aboard carriers and flying from Henderson Field played a major role in thwarting repeated Japanese attempts to retake the island. Though due to be replaced by the Curtiss-Wright SB2C Helldiver, repeated problems with that aircraft kept the SBDs in service on the decks of the fast carriers until 1944, including participation in the famed mission beyond darkness during the Battle of the Philippine Sea in June 1944.
Marine Corps scout-bombing squadrons flew the venerable aircraft throughout the war. Though the SBD garnered most of its laurels in the Pacific, Dauntless' did participate in Atlantic operations as well, supporting the landings in North Africa in November 1942 and staging a raid on Bodo, Norway, from the deck of the carrier Ranger (CV-4) in October 1943. In addition, under the designation A-24 Banshee, the Dauntless flew some combat missions with the Army Air Forces, including raids against Java during the first months of the war. In addition, New Zealand employed the aircraft during operations in the Pacific, and the Free French and Mexican Air Force operated the aircraft during World War II. Following the war, the French also flew ex-Navy SBD-5s in action against the Viet Minh in French Indochina.
The National Museum of Naval Aviation holds a handful of historic SBDs, including two that participated in the strike against Bodo, Norway, and one combat veteran of the Guadalcanal Campaign. In addition, SBD-2 (Bureau Number 2106) is a survivor of the Pearl Harbor attack, a participant in the March 1942 carrier raid against Lae and Salamaua, and a veteran of the Battle of Midway. The museum also owns the 17th production Dauntless delivered to the Navy.
Manufacturer: Douglas Aircraft Company
Dimensions: Length: 32 ft., 8 in.; Height: 13 ft., 7 in., Wingspan: 41ft., 6 in.
Weight: Empty: 6,345 lb.; Gross: 10,400 lb.
Power Plant: One 1,000 horsepower Wright R-1820-52 engine
Performance: Maximum Speed: 250 M.P.H.; Service Ceiling: 27,100 ft.; Maximum Range with Bomb Load: 1,345 miles
Armament: Two fixed forward-firing .50-in. guns, two flexible-mounted rear-firing .30-in. guns, 1,200 lb. of ordnance
Crew: Pilot and gunner
F2A BUFFALO
During the late 1930s the Navy began to shift its emphasis to the construction of monoplane aircraft with greater performance. To this end, on 22 June 1936 the Brewster Aeronautical Corporation received a contract for the construction of what would 
become the Navy’s fist monoplane fighter. Taking to the air for the first time, the design entered service as the F2A-1 Buffalo with delivery to Fighting Squadron (VF) 3 in 1940. It was followed by advanced versions culminating in the F2A-3, which included armor protection and added equipment. However, this adversely affected the performance of the aircraft and sometimes proved too much of a burden for the landing gear, which could buckle during a hard landing on board a carrier. Though its shipboard performance left much to be desired, many pilots liked the Brewster’s agility in the air, and appreciated its greater range when compared to the F4F Wildcat, the Navy’s other monoplane fighter at the time.
Supplanted by the F4F Wildcat on the decks of the Navy’s carriers by the time of the Battle of Midway, the Buffalo remained a front-line fighter in Marine Fighting Squadron (VMF) 221. On the morning of 4 June 1942, nineteen of them launched from Midway to defend against a Japanese strike group approaching to attack the atoll’s facilities. With little advanced warning of the enemy’s approach, the F2As did not make a coordinated attack and were bounced by Japanese Zero fighters, which dove on them from higher altitude. Only four F2As managed to return to Midway. It was a battle against the odds that few aircraft could have overcome, yet it left a lasting negative reputation on the Buffalo. Wrote one Midway survivor after the battle, “Any pilot who takes off in an F2A should be considered as lost before he leaves the ground.”
Despite the tragedy that befell the aircraft at Midway, the F2A achieved more positive results in the hands of foreign pilots, including the leading Finnish ace of World War II, who racked up nearly a third of his 94 kills in the Buffalo.
Manufacturer: Brewster Aeronautical Corporation
Dimensions: Length: 26 ft., 4 in.; Height: 12 ft.; Wingspan: 35 ft.
Weights: Empty: 4,732 lb.; Gross: 7,159 lb.
Power Plant: One 950 horsepower Nakajima NK1C Sakae engine
Performance: Maximum Speed: 321 M.P.H.; Service Ceiling: 33,200 ft.; Range: 965 miles
Armament: Four fixed forward-firing .50-in. guns and two 20mm forward-firing cannon
Crew: Pilot
PBY CATALINA
Ordered by the Navy in 1933, the PBY possessed many unique design features, including a cantilever wing that limited the need for external struts that reduced performance, as well as retractable landing floats that formed the wing tips during flight. Later, an amphibious version of the aircraft featured landing gear that retracted into the hull of the flying boat.
Catalinas established numerous long-distance flight records during the prewar years and even before the United States entered World War II played a pivotal role in combat operations. In May 1941, a Lend-Lease PBY flown by Ensign Leonard Smith, a naval aviator serving as an observer with the British Royal Air Force, located the German pocket-battleship Bismarck, enabling the Royal Navy to close in and sink her. When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941, a PBY made the only aerial attack against the Japanese, bombing a midget submarine. During the pivotal Battle of Midway in June 1942, PBYs spotted the Japanese invasion and carrier strike forces.
During World War II Catalinas performed a variety of essential duties, including long-range scouting and anti-submarine patrols, convoy escorts, search and rescue and bombing operations. It was in the latter functions that the PBY established its greatest legacy, equipping so-called Black Cat squadrons that carried out effective night attacks against Japanese shipping and installations. Two other PBY squadrons were equipped with magnetic anomaly detection gear in order to locate submerged submarines. Retro-bombs were also installed which, when fired backwards at a velocity equal to the speed of the aircraft, dropped straight down upon a target.
Manufacturer: Consolidated Aircraft Corporation
Dimensions: Length: 63 ft., 6 in.; Height: 18 ft., 6 in.; Wingspan: 104 ft.
Weights: Empty: 17,526 lb.; Gross: 34,000 lb.
Performance: Maximum Speed: 189 M.P.H. at 7,000 ft.; Service Ceiling: 18,100 ft.; Range: 2,990 miles
Armament: Two .30-in. and two .50-in. flexible-mounted machine guns and provisions for four 1,000 lb. bombs
Crew: 7-9
SB2A VINDICATOR
Delivered to fleet squadrons beginning in 1937, the SB2U appeared during a transition period for naval aviation. The first monoplane scout-bomber procured by the Navy, the aircraft was faster than the biplanes that preceded it, and proved a more capable platform for the tactic of dive-bombing, which had assumed paramount importance in the fleet. Nevertheless, the SB2U possessed the inherent flaw of being the ultimate development of the trussed fuselage and fabric concept, which at the time of its introduction into the fleet was being superseded by all metal stressed skin construction techniques. By the time the United States entered World War II, the SBD Dauntless dive-bomber had eclipsed the SB2U, with Marine Corps pilots nicknaming them with the uninspiring moniker “Wind Indicator.” Nevertheless, the type still equipped six squadrons at the time of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. One of these units, Marine Scout Bombing Squadron (VMSB) 241, took the aircraft into combat during the Battle of Midway in June 1942 with devastating results. Eleven of twelve SB2Us were lost to enemy fire or operational causes.
Manufacturer: Vought-Sikorsky Division, United Aircraft Corporation
Dimensions: Length: 34 ft.; Height: 10 ft., 3 in.; Wingspan: 42 ft.
Weights: Empty: 5,634 lb.; Gross: 9,421 lb.
Power Plant: One 825 HP Pratt & Whitney R-1535-02 engine
Performance: Maximum Speed: 243 M.P.H.; Service Ceiling: 23,600 ft.; Range: 1,120 miles
Armament: One fixed forward-firing .50-in. gun and one flexible-mounted rear .50-in. gun
Crew: Pilot and observer/gunner
TBF AVENGER
Destined to be the last torpedo-bomber to fly from the decks of U.S. aircraft carriers, the TBF/TBM Avenger featured an internal bomb bay and proved larger, faster, and more heavily armed than the TBD Devastator it was designed to replace. Avengers entered combat flying from Midway during the epic June 1942 battle. It proved an inauspicious debut, with five of six aircraft shot down during an attack against the Japanese fleet. However, future operations would prove much brighter as the Avenger became one of the most versatile carrier aircraft of the war. Operating from all classes of flat-tops in the Pacific, the aircraft performed the first night attack mission by carrier-based aircraft, scored naval aviation's first nocturnal air-to-air kills, supported invasions from Guadalcanal to Okinawa, and planted torpedoes in the battleship Yamato. In the Atlantic, Avengers helped turn the tide against Hitler's U-boat wolf packs. Surviving into the postwar Navy, the aircraft served in the airborne early warning, antisubmarine, and carrier onboard delivery roles. The last examples of the aircraft were retired from U.S. naval service by 1957. Grumman and the Eastern Aircraft Division of General Motors, which also manufactured the aircraft as the TBM, built 9,836 examples of the Avenger. In addition to the United States Navy and Marine Corps, the aircraft flew in the air and naval forces of Great Britain, Canada, France, the Netherlands, New Zealand, and Brazil. Ironically, the aircraft also flew in the Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force.
Manufacturer: Grumman Aircraft Engineering Corporation
Dimensions: Length: 40 ft.; Height: 16 ft., 5 in., Wingspan: 54 ft., 2 in.
Weight: Empty: 10,080 lb.; Gross: 15,905 lb.
Power Plant: One 1,700 horsepower Wright R-2600-8 engine
Performance: Maximum Speed: 271 M.P.H.; Service Ceiling: 22,400 ft.; Maximum Range with Bomb Load: 1,215 miles
Armament: One fixed forward-firing .30-in. gun, one dorsal .50-in. gun, and one ventral .30-in. gun, 1,600 lb. of ordnance
Crew: Pilot, gunner, and radioman
TBD DEVASTATOR
Advanced when it appeared in 1935, the TBD-1 Devastator was an all-metal monoplane with retractable landing gear and 
power-folding wings. The first monoplane carrier aircraft to enter service in U.S. naval aviation, it could carry one torpedo or 1,200 lb. of bombs. The prototype aircraft made its first flight on 15 April 1935, and by February 1936 work on the first production aircraft began at Douglas Aircraft Company. First delivered to Torpedo Squadron (VT) 3 in November 1937, by the time the United States entered World War II, the TBD-1 was the Navy's front-line torpedo-bomber. The aircraft participated in the U.S. Navy's early hit-and-run carrier raids, and during the Battle of Coral Sea in May 1942, Devastators helped sink a light carrier. The Battle of Midway in June 1942 proved a disaster for carrier-based torpedo squadrons. Attacking the Japanese Fleet without the benefit of fighter cover, 36 of 41 Devastators were shot down during the battle, including all assigned to VT-8. Shortly after Midway, surviving TBD-1s were reassigned to the training command.
Manufacturer: Douglas Aircraft Company
Dimensions: Length: 35 ft.; Height: 15 ft., 1 in., Wingspan: 50 ft.
Weight: Empty: 6,182 lb.; Gross: 10,194 lb.
Power Plant: One 900 horsepower Pratt & Whitney R-1830-64 engine
Performance: Maximum Speed: 206 M.P.H.; Service Ceiling: 19,700 ft.; Maximum range with bomb load: 716 miles
Armament: One fixed forward-firing .30-in. gun, two flexible-mounted rear-firing.30-in. gun, 1,000 lb. of ordnance
Crew: Pilot, navigator, and gunner (Only pilot and gunner flew at Midway)