A WASP Flies Again (continued)

In Service as a WASP...

Upon completing her training Dorothy was assigned to Moore Field in Mission, Texas, towing targets in an AT-6 for advanced flight school cadets. In these flights, she would fly with an enlisted tow target operator in the back seat. At altitude, she would tell the "young man" (who was often older than her) to unspool the target cable. She would fly a set pattern and six cadets in AT-6's would attack the target banner with machine guns, with their gun camera footage being used at the end of the day to grade their performance. Dorothy says she was never really worried about being hit by one of the maneuvering cadets or getting hit by the gunfire (although some WASPs were killed in midair collisions, and others did end up with .30 caliber holes in their aircraft); what she did worry about was one of the cadets hitting the cable between the target and her aircraft. At the end of the flight she would fly low over an auxiliary field and the tow target operator would release the banner. He would then reel in the 600-lb cable, and Dorothy would land back at the 'home field'.

During one approach for landing, she saw in the pattern the airplane of an instructor whom she had been dating. Wanting to impress him, she concentrated extra hard on the landing. Of course, she bounced her AT-6 all the way down the runway, "the worst landing I'd ever made." She figured that he would never speak to her again, but her landing must not have been that bad - she and Lt. Lucas ended up getting married.

On December 20, 1944, the WASPs were abruptly disbanded, and Dorothy thought her AT-6 days were over.