RAAF WW2 B-24 Liberator photos

[Liberator]

A mainly mix of RAAF various WW2 RAAF B-24 Liberator photos and some others thrown in...

http://library.b24australia.com/photographs.html


Phil

[The Inspector]

Clarification please-
Two of the photos in this post shows RAAF A72-122 sitting on the ramp. I see a 'dustbin' radar pod (??) mounted between the nosewheel doors and the bomb bay doors. First time I've seen this mod, any information on this?

[Django]

Some great photos there for sure. Particularly of the scrapping.

[jdvoss]

Thanks so much for forwarding this great file on the Australian B-24's! I was especially interested in the photos taken at Tocumwal, NSW that illusrated the scrapping operations that went on there. One of my other references stated that 200 B-24's met their final fate as well as 350+ other A/C types as well. I visited Tocumwal about 15 years ago as it was on my way from Melbourne to Wagga Wagga. The airport is just a sleeply little strip with a lot of sailplanes on the ramp. The original B-24 hangers are still there and the former cantonement area is a nice golf club. As a point of interest RAAF Tocumwal was originally developed by the USAAF as McIntyre AAB and was once the largest USAAF airbase in the southern hemisphere. I've posted a few pictures.

Entrance to the former RAAF Tocumwal


Line of former B-24 Hangers


Sailplane operations at Tocumwal


Former B-24 parking ramp area.

[Invader26]

The B-24 crash at RAAF Base Amberley at the end of the war killed several passengers who were going on a "joy flight" to celebrate our victory over Japan. It was alleged that the pilot was drunk! The aircraft failed to get airborne and went off the end of the runway into a creek.

My father helped pull survivors and bodies from that wreck.

[Ewan]

I look after the Tocumwal Historic Aerodrome Museum website, which has been live for just a few weeks. But in there is a decent gallery of images including some of the scrapping of many aircraft including B-24's (not for the faint hearted!) . Just updated today with a story in the blog about the loss of one of the hangars and two B-24's inside, complete with pics in the gallery. Feel free to check it out at http://www.tham.org.au

Cheers

Ewan

[The Inspector]

EWAN,
Welcome aboard! you've got a good looking site and well designed too. There are some sad sights in the gallery, like the pile of bars of aluminum that 'used to be..' but this site will help keep the memories alive into the future.

[Ewan]

Thank you Its my first attempt at building a website ! Felt that even though the aircraft ended up being scrapped it was still a very important airfield "downunder" during the war and the museum, while small and mainly photos/press stories/maps, had no presence on the web for those interested in this sort of thing. I took an interest as I was researching where a lot of parts originated from out of my grandads old shed and it led me to Tocumwal.....this is my thank you to them for all their help and putting up with loads of phone calls !

[jdvoss]

Ewan:

Great website indeed!! Your museum looks like a first class presentation of the history of the base. I guess I have reason to return!! A review of Tocumwal on google.earth reveals that the B-24 hangars seem to have disappeared since then mid 1990's. True?

[Ewan]

The two big hangars up the back of the airfield (photos in an earlier post) are still there. I'll check it out and let you know, but I have stood out the front of the two big ones last week and been past the igloo hangar on the airstrip. A more recent update from Google Earth would be nice - those images are pretty old !


I've only just started on all this stuff in the last year so am playing catch up. I live in Melbourne so head up there every few weekends to take pictures and do some research, talk to locals etc. Theres been some issues in the past but its proving to be a very useful learning experience.

[Ewan]

Should clarify myself - I'm not the museum owner - just giving the guys a helping hand. The museum itself is a large room at the back of the info centre, and is a a big gallery of pics and stories, and a few models etc (simply no room for a full aircraft as much as they would like it !). It was to go in the igloo hangar but there are asbestos issues so its all fallen thru for now.
There is a scale B24 on a pole at the entrance to the golf club which is only recent. Very nice indeed and worth checking out.

I mentioned I was tracing stuff I inherited when I cleaned out the shed - theres a blog for that http://mygrandpasshed.blogspot.com which will give you an idea of what I've got myself into ! It hasn't had an update for a while but there will be more updates soon - I've been flat out getting the Toc stuff up and travelling an awful lot !

[Second Air Force]

Great website and posts, Ewan. It is good to see the two hangars still standing and in use. If they were in Central Kansas the municipal governments would have torn them down by now. Thanks for helping preserve the history of the airfield for the future.

Great pics, jdvoss, and thanks for the link to start the thread Phil!

Scott

[Second Air Force]

Clarification please-
Two of the photos in this post shows RAAF A72-122 sitting on the ramp. I see a 'dustbin' radar pod (??) mounted between the nosewheel doors and the bomb bay doors. First time I've seen this mod, any information on this?

That radome is the H2S/H2X location. Incidentally, the Weribee Liberator, A72-176 has the radome opening in the same place and there are a few photos of it.

[The Inspector]

2AF,
Thanx, that's what I thought it was but I've never seen the radar in that location, usually the belly turret was jerked out and the antenna went there, cool item to file away for a future B-24 model!

[Second Air Force]

I doubt I could find the reference material since I put all the H2X stuff in storage but here's what I recall about moving the scanner forward: Having the radar operator back in the radio room area on both the Fortress and Liberator made coordination between the bombardier and radarman somewhat difficult. There was a repeater screen up front that showed what the operator was seeing, but this relocation was thought to improve the communication between the bombardier, navigator, and radar guy. Coincidentally, the few B-24s and B-17s that recieved the APQ-7 radar located everything up front for much the same reason.