Geta is the nickname given to small single engine airplanes developed by the Japanese during World War II. The planes were called this because of the resemblance of the floats to Japanese clogs. They were small Yokosuka E14Y Reconnaissance floatplanes with a pair of floats and crew of two. More commonly known by the code name ‘Glen’ to the Allies, they were powered by a 360 horsepower radial engine, cruised at 160km/hr and had a range of some 900 kilometres. The upper surfaces were painted a dark green, with light grey undersides. Armament, if carried, consisted of a single 7.7 millimetre machinegun in the rear cockpit and there was provision for two 100kg bombs, one under each wing.
The planes were originally used for reconnaissance, but a young airman name Nobuo Fujita came up the the idea of attaching bombs to the small planes and using them as attack craft. This plan was changed slightly, and Fujita used the plane to drop incendiary bombs on Oregon forests, in hopes of starting large forest fires. This attack and it's aftermath is written up in another node called Nobuo Fujita's 400 year old Samurai sword.
The interesting thing about these planes is that they were designed to be stored disassembled aboard a submarine, then assembled on the deck of the submarine and launched by a catapult. For takeoff, the submarines turned into the wind at cruising speed and the aircraft with engine at full power was catapulted along a short rail on the forward deck by compressed air. Retrieval meant landing in the sea beside the submarine, being hoisted aboard by a small folding crane, then a thirty-minute disassembly for storage in the watertight hanger in front of the conning tower. This additional superstructure also created instability for the vessel on the surface, causing it to further roll in heavy seas and high winds.
Both during assembly, which often took up to an hour, and launch and subsequent reconnaissance retrieval the Japanese submarines were exceptionally vulnerable. As a consequence reconnaissance was usually around dawn or on a moonlight night when lookouts on board still had to remain particularly vigilant.