General Schmidt, considering the 3d Division attack in the center to be his main effort, provided priority fire support from Corps artillery, and directed the other two divisions to allocate half their own regimental fire support to the center. None of the commanders was happy with this. Neither the 4th Division, taking heavy casualties in The Amphitheater as it approached Hill 382, nor the 5th Division, struggling to seize Nishi Ridge, wanted to dilute their organic fire support. Nor was General Erskine pleased with the results. The main effort, he argued, should clearly receive the main fire. Schmidt never did solve this problem. His Corps artillery was too light; he needed twice as many battalions and bigger guns--up to 8-inch howitzers, which the Marine Corps had not yet fielded. He had plenty of naval gunfire support available and used it abundantly, but unless the targets lay in ravines facing to the sea he lost the advantage of direct, observed fire. [Illustration: _“The Grenade,” an acrylic painting on canvas by Col Charles H. Waterhouse._ Marine Corps Combat Art Collection ] Schmidt’s problems of fire support distribution received some alleviation on 26 February when two Marine observation planes flew in from the escort carrier _Wake Island_, the first aircraft to land on Iwo’s recaptured and still fire-swept main airstrip. These were Stinson OY single-engine observation planes, nicknamed “Grasshoppers,” of Lieutenant Tom Rozga’s Marine Observation Squadron (VMO) 4, and they were followed the next day by similar planes from Lieutenant Roy G. Miller’s VMO-5. The intrepid pilots of these frail craft had already had an adventurous time in the waters off Iwo Jima. Several had been launched precariously from the experimental Brodie catapult on _LST 776_, “like a peanut from a slingshot.” All 14 of the planes of these two observation squadrons would receive heavy Japanese fire in battle, not only while airborne but also while being serviced on the airstrips as well. Yet these two squadrons (and elements of VMO-1) would fly nearly 600 missions in support of all three divisions. Few units contributed so much to the eventual suppression of Kuribayashi’s deadly artillery fire. In time the mere presence of these small planes overhead would influence Japanese gunners to cease fire and button up against the inevitable counterbattery fire to follow. Often the pilots would undertake pre-dawn or dusk missions simply to extend this protective “umbrella” over the troops, risky flying given Iwo’s unlit fields and constant enemy sniping from the adjacent hills. [Illustration: Department of Defense Photo (USMC) 110922 _A Marine dashes past a fallen Japanese killed a short time earlier, all the while himself a target of searching enemy fire, during heavy fighting in the north._]