437th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron

437th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron
Convair F-106A Delta Dart 57-2486 of the 437th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron
Active	1944-1946; 1952-1968; 1968
Country	United States
Branch	United States Air Force
Type	Fighter-Interceptor
Role	Air Defense
Part of	Air Defense Command
Engagements	Pacific Theater of Operations
Insignia
Patch showing the 437th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron Emblem

The 437th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron is an inactive United States Air Force unit. Its last assignment was with 414th Fighter Group at Oxnard AFB, California, where it was inactivated on 30 September 1969.

The squadron was first activated during World War II as the 437th Fighter Squadron, a very long range fighter escort squadron. It deployed to the Pacific Ocean Theater of Operations a month before the Japanese surrender in August 1945, and flew several escort and fighter sweep missions over Japan before the end of the war. It moved to the Philippines after the war ended and was inactivated there in 1946.

The squadron was first established in late 1944 at Seymour Johnson Field, North Carolina as the 437th Fighter Squadron, one of the three original squadrons of the 414th Fighter Group. The 414th was a very long range P-47N Thunderbolt fighter group that trained under I Fighter Command at Selfridge Field, Michigan and Bluethenthal Field, North Carolina.

The squadron deployed by ship to Iwo Jima in the Pacific Ocean Theater of Operations where it became part of Twentieth Air Force as a long-range escort squadron for Boeing B-29 Superfortress bombers engaged in the strategic bombardment of Japan. The extreme length of these missions stretched to fuel capacity of the squadron's Thunderbolts. Lt. Robert Dunnavant, piloting a squadron P-47N, spent the astonishing period of 8 hours and 45 minutes in the air. His aircraft's fuel tanks were so depleted when he eventually reached Iwo Jima, that he dared not try to reach his base at North Field, landing instead at a small US Navy airstrip he located on the coast.