“LUCKY” THE ODYSSEY OF “NINE-LIVES MOONEY,” AN UNSUNG GROUND-ATTACK PILOT, FROM THE INVASION OF SOUTHERN FRANCE TO THE BREACHING OF THE RHINE First employed in multiple roles, including bomber escort, the P-47 Thunderbolt soon demonstrated its superior worth and survivability as a high-speed, low-level ground attack aircraft, dueling at close quarters against the determined flak-gunners of the 3rd Reich. But while Thunderbolts were being designed, manufactured and prepared for combat, a quiet young man named Frank Mooney was finishing up his first year of college and preparing for pilot training. Just after the D-Day Invasion at Normandy, Lt. Mooney and the Thunderbolt came together on the island of Corsica, birthplace of Napoleon and current operational station of the beloved French author and aviation pioneer, Antoine de St.-Exupery, who was flying reconnaissance to support the imminent invasion of Southern France. Lt. Mooney’s first combat missions in the T-Bolt were fighter sweeps over the invasion beach and harassing missions against the Nazi forces fleeing up the Rhone River Valley toward Alsace-Lorraine, and ultimately back into Germany. Between the summer of 1944 and spring of 1945, he successfully completed 61 combat missions over France and southwestern Germany, narrowly escaping death, by the Providence of God, at least a dozen times. For every one of his narrow scrapes, Lt. Mooney said he had seen a corresponding situation in which one of his friends had died. His own escapes from death were nothing short of miraculous. This is his story. Tim Mooney (His Son)