Gideon Lichtman

Born in ?, USA

Combat Record

WWII?

June 8: REAF Spitfire Mk ? (in S-199)

Sept. 22: Arab Airways De Havilland Dragon Rapide (in S-199)

Story

Test pilot, USAAF

Lichtman scored the S-199's third kill on June 8 when he downed an REAF Spitfire south of Tel Aviv. The Egyptian pilot, Flying Officer Jamal Orfan Safe El-Nasser, was captured by Israeli ground troops.

One Dragon Rapide that Boris Senior had bought had been interned by Egypt on its way through the country. Egypt released the crew but kept the airplane and sold it to Jordan's Arab Airways, which registered it as TJ-AAQ and painted it in the company's bright red colors in July.

On Sept. 22, Lichtman was on a solo patrol sortie when he spotted this very same red Dragon Rapide flying at 2,000 feet over Safed on a northwesterly heading. Lichtman caught up to the Dragon Rapide and lowered his gear, indicating that he wanted the other airplane to land. The British pilot turned his Dragon Rapide into a 180-degree turn with no apparent effort to land, so Lichtman fired a short burst in front of it. The Arab Airways plane continued to seemingly ignore Lichtman, so he finally fired at it and set it on fire. Several dozens of feet from the ground, three passengers, including two British journalists, jumped out of the flaming airplane and were killed by the fall. The pilot muscled the plane into a crash landing and, along with two passengers that hadn't jumped, survived the crash.

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