Tulsa Oilman Brings Classic 'Corsair' Fighter Plane To Town

When you ask Trent Latshaw what's the best thing about owning an F4U, he will struggle to put his answer into words. 

Latshaw, 61, has owned the Vought F4U-4 for about a year.

He's gotten used to people telling him it's their favorite airplane, but he hasn't gotten used to the effect it has on him when he flies it. He probably never will.

"I was flying home from Fort Worth a few weeks ago. It was about 7 p.m. and I was above the clouds with the sun off to the left. The sun was reflecting off the wing and the tips of the prop. 'How neat is this?' I asked myself. I'm flying a piece of history."

The first F4U flew in 1940. Designed with folding wings for storage on aircraft carriers, it took a while for the airplane to catch on with the U.S. Navy. In the meantime it became popular with U.S. Marine and British squadrons based on land. 

The Corsair was fitted with the powerful Pratt & Whitney R-2800 Double Wasp radial engine, which has two rows of nine cylinders each. The engine drives a huge propeller more than 13 feet in diameter. The designers selected an inverted gull wing design, allowing for shorter main landing gear and giving the Corsair its distinctive look.

Latshaw's Corsair is an F4U-4 built in 1945 and delivered to the U.S. Navy in 1946. It saw combat in Korea where it was used by squadrons on three different aircraft carriers.

He bought it from a seller in California in 2013 and keeps it in a hangar at Tulsa International Airport. He's averaging about one hour of flight time in it a week, with his last flight a trip to Bartlesville for the big biplane fly-in a couple weeks ago.

Latshaw, a petroleum engineer who owns Latshaw Drilling, moved to Alaska after graduating from high school in 1971 to follow his dream of owning his own drilling company. He said he quickly learned that being a pilot was almost a necessity for anyone living in Alaska and bought his first airplane at age 22. Latshaw's stable of aircraft now includes six diverse models, including a P-51, a T-6, a Grumman Widgeon floatplane, a Cessna 185 and a B-25 that's currently being refurbished. 

"You have to have a special wife to own airplanes," he said. Once, before they were wed, he asked, "If we were to get married and I told you I wanted to buy a P-51, what would you say? She said, 'What took you so long?' I've got a keeper," he said.  

Latshaw will be showing his Corsair to the public at an event at the Tulsa Air and Space Museum this weekend. It's the third installment of the museum's "Just Plane Talk" series, where attendees get to see rare or historic airplanes up close and can talk to the pilots and owners.

Tulsa Air And Space Museum

Just Plane Talk
Saturday, October 4
11 a.m. - 1 p.m.

Entry fees are included in the price of museum admission: Adults $8; Youth 5-17 $5; Children 4 and under free.

Latshaw has more than 6,300 hours of flight time now, with about 50 in the Corsair. Getting qualified to fly it was a challenge. No two-seat versions were ever built, so there's no way to get training with an instructor pilot on board. Instead, Corsair pilots-in-training use the T-6, a two-seat trainer used extensively in World War II. 

Latshaw got a Letter of Approval from the FAA, which he said allowed him to fly the Corsair before officially being certified, so that he could practice flying it. Once he was ready, one of the four pilots qualified to do so watched him perform a check flight and approved him. Latshaw said the 500 hours of flight time he has in T-6s helped, as did the training he received at a P-51 school in Florida.

His Corsair features the names of two important naval aviators. One is Ensign Jesse Brown, the first African-American aviator in the U.S. Navy who died in Korea. The second is Lt. Thomas Hudner, who was Brown's wingman and received the Medal of Honor for trying to rescue Brown after Brown was shot down.

So far the only issue Latshaw has had with the F4U was during a trip to College Station, Texas about a month ago. He'd just crossed the Red River when he noticed he'd lost all hydraulic pressure. The landing gear and the flaps both rely on the hydraulic system, so he immediately tried to lower the gear. The backup electric pump didn't do any good, neither did the hand pump. The last backup was to use nitrogen to blow the gear down, but that system had a slow leak and only showed 500 pounds of pressure instead of the required 1,700. But it worked.

Latshaw landed at the airport in Gainsville, Texas, using about 5,000 feet of the 6,000-foot runway. then rented a car and drove to the dinner in College Station. A mechanic fixed the problem with the airplane a couple days later and he flew it home.

Latshaw said his F4U was one of seven used in the filming of the 1970s television series "Baa Baa Black Sheep," which was loosely based on the exploits of legendary World War II U.S. Marine Corps pilot Greg "Pappy" Boyington.

The F4U is fitted with eight mockup rockets that look just like the real ones Corsairs used to attack ground targets. It still has its original six Browning .50 caliber machine guns, but they've been rendered inoperable. He's considering removing the mock rockets to reduce drag and increase speed. 

Latshaw said he really enjoys flying the P-51 and F4U on business trips. "This is my executive transport. Any fool can buy a Lear Jet and hire a pilot," he said with a grin. 

So which is his favorite airplane to fly? Whichever one he's flying at the moment, he said.

The 2,000 horsepower Corsair is a real gas hog, burning 90 gallons of expensive Avgas per hour at cruising speed, which is about 250 miles per hour. "I'm doing my fair share to keep oil prices up."