Norman Jack "Dusty" Kleiss (March 7, 1916 – April 22, 2016) was a dive-bomber pilot in the United States Navy during World War II.

Kleiss and the other Scouting Six pilots flew the Douglas SBD Dauntless Dive Bomber, a two-seat scout-bomber designed by Edward Heinemann.

On May 27, 1941, Kleiss earned his nickname when he made an unauthorized landing at Marine Corps Air Station Ewa, located on the south shores of Oahu.

[3][4] On December 7, 1941, Kleiss's squadron, Scouting Six, became engaged with Japanese fighters during the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, losing six pilots and gunners.

Kleiss did not encounter any enemy aircraft that day, but he did fly several patrols around his carrier task force and he was involved in a friendly-fire incident on December 8, when several United States destroyers shot at his plane, mistaking it for a Japanese dive bomber.

Later that day, after returning to Enterprise to refuel and rearm his SBD, Kleiss accompanied eight SBDs led by Lieutenant Richard Halsey Best against the Japanese base on Taroa Island.

Kleiss's SBD was hit by machine gun fire and his gunner, Radioman 3/c John Warren Snowden, was wounded slightly in the buttocks.

After USS Enterprise returned from a patrol in the South Pacific, Kleiss received the Distinguished Flying Cross from Admiral Chester Nimitz.

[5][6] On the afternoon of June 4, Kleiss accompanied another dive bomber mission launched from USS Enterprise, this one led by Lieutenant W. Earl Gallaher.

[7] On June 5, Kleiss accompanied Enterprise's dive bombers on their third mission of the battle, one that failed to sink (or damage, for that matter) a lone Japanese destroyer, the Tanikaze.

After marrying his girlfriend, Eunice Marie "Jean" Mochon, at a wedding chapel in Las Vegas, Kleiss became an instructor assigned to an Advanced Carrier Training Group (ACTG) squadron stationed at NAS Norfolk, Virginia.

After the war, Kleiss served as Assistant Head of Structures Branch, Bureau of Aeronautics, under command of Rear Admiral Melville Pride.

In May 1949, Kleiss changed duty again, becoming the Bureau of Aeronautics representative at the Lockheed Corporation in Burbank, California, supervising the Navy's aircraft inspectors, engineers, and test pilots.

After retiring from the Navy, Kleiss worked as Senior Staff Engineer at Allegany Ballistics Laboratory in Rocket Center, West Virginia.

Kleiss died on April 22, 2016, less than two months after celebrating his 100th birthday, and was buried alongside his wife at Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery.

[10] For four years, Kleiss worked on a memoir, Never Call Me a Hero: A Legendary Dive-Bomber Pilot Remembers the Battle of Midway, which was edited and finally published posthumously by co-authors Timothy and Laura Orr on May 23, 2017, by William Morrow, a division of HarperCollins.