Toccoa Letournea Airport - Band Of Brothers C-47 Reference

[Rauhbatz]

Greetings fellow WIX'ers...just started reading Dick Winter's book (ironically during the onset of winter here in Ohio) and was curious about a reference to an airport I used to fly into during our time in Atlanta.

He mentions an airport carved out of a mountain that was used for the first jumps by officers in Easy company. The runway was so short the C-47 had to dive to gain airspeed on takeoff. Needless to say it finally ran off the end of the runway and was wrecked. Jump activity moved to Ft. Benning.

A few questions:

1. Was the runway they built now the current (somewhat rough) runway 9/27 at KTOC Toccoa?

2. Where did the C-47 run off the runway (might be a future warbird debris recovery trip for someone)

3. Any pics of the C-47 while at KTOC? From Mr. Winter's dialog it sounded like it only made a few trips before it ran off the runway

Thoughts/comments welcome as I plow thru this book on a Bastonge-like afternoon here in Ohio...

[Second Air Force]

I did a tiny bit of research on this subject a few years ago, and I think the municipal airport was the site of the accident. LeTourneau opened his equipment facility in 1938 and the airport was built at the same general time. I'd guess the airport was not extensively developed by the time Toccoa was put into operation and it seems likely that they wadded up the airplane there. The available info at the time I was looking into it was pretty sketchy, so look for further sources to be certain.

I may have to get out my copy of Major Winters' book and read it again. I never tire of reading it.

Scott