News

Former RNZAF Air Commodore Mal Gunton, a long-time honorary member of NZBCA, is one of the very few surviving RNZAF fighter pilots from WWII still with us.

He was recently reunited with Vought F4UCorsair ZK-COR, the fighter type he flew in the Pacific, at Classic Flyers Tauranga thanks to owner Mike Jones and pilot Frank Parker who flew the Corsair from Ardmore where it is now based.

Mal joined the Air Force in 1942. Once he got his wings, after training in New Zealand and Canada, he was intent on serving in Europe.

“A mate of mine, Len Crotty, he and I decided the only way we could get to England was to join the Fleet Air Arm, [the Royal Navy’s aviation component], so we applied to do that. We were hauled up in front of an Air Force group captain and had a big strip torn off us for wanting to go to ‘an inferior service.’ He said we were definitely going to the Pacific, which is what happened.”

Mal joined No. 23 Flight Squadron, flying Corsairs on air-to-air and air-to-ground missions against the Japanese. After the war, he spent a year in Japan with the occupation squadron, stationed 13km from Hiroshima. “I decided to stay in the Air Force and make a career of it, later flying Sunderlands, and then Orions, eventually making it to Air Commodore.”

In all he flew more than fifty different types of aircraft and amassed over seven thousand hours of flying time.

Mal’s daughter Lyn captured the mood of the day with a post on the RNZAF Corsair Supporters Facebook page “Amazing day today with my darling Dad being reunited with his first love – the mighty Corsair (his words).”

Current owner Mike Johns reported that it was lovely to meet Mal. “He was able to share some professional Corsair Pilot tips on taxiing the Corsair. He said they would taxi it standing up, to improve visibility.”