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Dixie -> Dixie's BBMF stuff (9/1/2013 9:59:33 PM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: wdolson
From Joe Baugher's site, it was built as a B-25J-20/22
http://www.joebaugher.com/usaf_serials/1944_1.html
29507 converted to TB-25N. To civilian registry as N3698G.
Now operated by Duke of Brabant Air Force at Gilze Rijen AB,
the Netherlands. Registered as N320SQ (referring to RAF Dutch 320 Sq.).
Was painted as RAF Mitchell HD346/NO-V/Lotys II, but since 1999
painted as 218 Sqdn ML-KNIL (Royal Netherlands East-Indies
Air Force) Mitchell N5-149, SARINAH
and flies regularly during airshows in Europe.
Will be re-registered PH-XXV in 2009. Reported Nov 2008
now owned by Dutch AF Historic Flight
My father was in a special photographic unit. When he was in the war zone he never knew what the unit designation was. Initially he was stateside making training films as part of the 1st Motion Picture Unit which is known for using a number of Hollywood stars in their films. My father was involved in getting the flying footage rather than the studio work so he wasn't "rubbing shoulders with the stars", but there were a lot of Hollywood cameramen in his unit.
He also worked on some R&D projects. In mid-1943 the USAAF was trying to figure out the best way to knock out V-1 bunkers which were being built in France. They tested a number of different techniques including B-25Gs and Hs. He was part of the film crew filming the tests. He was quite impressed with the cannon armed B-25s. He was also sent to the Bell plant in Georgia to shoot footage of a bunch of B-29s when the plant was first opened. He remembers the B-29s were in olive drab which would make them very early Renton built versions.
In late 1943 they split the unit and half was sent out to the Pacific. Most of the time he was never told why he was there, but his unit would be attached to a bomber unit and they would fly with them. One unit I've been able to track down was the 17th Tactical Recon Squadron flying B-25s. They were being used both for combat and recon. He stayed with them up most of the north side of New Guinea and into Tacloben. It was the 1st non-fighter unit into the beachhead after the invasion. He remembers lots of USN planes pushed off into the surf next to the landing strip and was told the Navy had lost some carriers, but that's all he knew about Leyte Gulf until after the war.
He then was transferred to Saipan and flew in recon B-29s filming all the run ins to all targets in B-29 range. The plan was to show these films to the navigators so they could know the land marks to look for when heading for a target. One of the guys on the project was a Geography professor who was an expert on the Geography of Japan.
After that he was transferred back to the states and the other half of the unit was sent to the Aleutians. However one of the officers who was supposed to go got sick the day before they shipped out and they needed a replacement. There were only two guys from the first group who weren't sick with tropical diseases, my father and another guy who was married. Since my father was single, he was tagged to go. He was only a corporal and he went into his CO's office and told him that he was replacing an officer on this deployment, so he should get an officer's pay, or maybe he would give them work commensurate with his pay. His CO said he doubted that, but got him a field promotion to 2nd Lieutenant anyway.
He spent the last months of the war on Attu which he found terrifying. The weather was so bad that he said they only took off once when there was no fog and that day he saw all the planes that hadn't made it through the gap in the mountains at the end of the runway. They were attacking shipping in the Kuriles and attacking the northernmost Japanese outposts. The flak over these was intense. He brought back a picture of a B-25 that took a direct hit a couple of days before the end of the war. All that was left was one wing.
He said the nose of the B-25 was incredibly loud with the exhaust vented directly out the cowling bumps and the 4X .50s up there. He has permanent hearing loss from that.
The B-29 was a luxury liner by comparison. It was fully pressurized and climate controlled so you didn't need heavy flight gear. It was also the quietest WW II bomber. Those engines were big, but the way the exhaust was routed, the plane was very quiet. Inside it was as quiet or quieter than a modern airliner.
He said he felt safest in a B-17 though. He flew in those stateside. He said they were so heavily over engineered you were left with a feeling the plane could survive anything. He felt least safe in the B-24 which he also flew stateside.
Bill
Thanks for the info, it's always interesting to hear the veterans stories from a more personal source, for some reason they're more interesting (alive/colourful/less sterile?) than most that make it into books.
I'd encourage anyone who wants to share (relevant) pics/stories to do it in here.
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