You gain an extra life as soon as the blow up animation ends. So is it OK if I do this:

It's stated in the rules that if I get shot down before I destroy the island the run is not valid. If I'm trying to skip the blow up animation and the bonus stage afterwards I can dive (or get shot and crash in the water) shortly before the island is destroyed and I don't get a game over. Here is an example: Would this run be considered valid? Is this tactic allowed to skip time for the red island category?

I've played the game a lot when I was a kid but my style was to fly high and shoot down most of the planes. I only dove down to drop the bomb on the island. It seems you like attacking the naval forces a lot more. Maybe sinking ships or submarines in some particular order might have caused the paratrooper to appear. I will experiment a bit. Do you remember what he looked like or what was his pattern?

Solid Run! I don't see much room for improvements now. I saw your note about shooting down a paratrooper and gaining 1ups. Can you elaborate a bit? I haven't seen any paratroopers in the game and I thought that the only way to get extra lives is to blow up the islands.