Warbird Information Exchange

The sun comes up a little after 4 am in Dubai and sets about 7:20 pm roughly. Makes for a long hot day. This is close to the International Airport with just a little problem with visibility due to haze and blowing sand. Gee, reminded me so much of Texas in August that I felt right at home. Of course, the temperature real feel was 118 which is a little closer to Phoenix in August. Practically needed my sweater when I stepped off the plane in the Republic this morning!! It was only 99 degrees today. JR

"Strat" (Mike) is putting our new Cherry Max rivet gun to good use on the sheetmetal repair under the rudder area. What a big help that donation has turned out to be!! Oops, tornado warning is sounding. Gotta go. JR

Well, no tornado, but severe thunderstorm has damaged our hangar. Nearly tore a section of the east door off and put some holes thru the west side. Still assessing the damage. More later, JR

This is a section of the east door that was blown out of its tracks. Luckily it fell outward instead of inward toward the 26. Without power, it is difficult to assess the damage, but it appears the airplane may not have been badly hit. Will know more in the morning. There are several other hangars damaged or collapsed at Meacham. They had some corporate airplanes in them so the dollar value will proably be considerable. We have armed security guards on site tonight to keep any looters out. What a mess. Unhappy in Ft Worth, JR

The really bad news is that "Billie" the C-47 that Seth W. was restoring to honor his dad's WWII squadron, was all but destroyed this evening. The high winds ripped it off the trolley it was bolted to and then blew it about 100 yards thru a chain link fence and down a hill. It tore down a power line and then split in half. This picture is of the nose and cockpit section. It is laying on the top left side of the cockpit. This is a real tragedy. Seth had been looking for years for an airplane from his dad's squadron and this was the only one left. It was a veteran of the early Pacific campaign. If you look back several pages to last October, we held a reunion of some of the members who are left. JR

Hard to see, but this is what is left of the back half of the fuselage. The wings were not attached, but were laying in the field next to it. They were also blown out thru the fence into the same area with the fuselage. Will try to get better shots in the daytime tomorrow. JR

Aww man.

That's heartbreaking.

Sorry to hear about "Billie". I've heard reports that the microburst was putting out winds over 90mph, so there was probably little that could be done. Tie downs would've probably made it worse. I hope something can be recovered even if the plane as a whole is a loss.

After all that work, it sickens me to see that plane wiped out. I saw that a C47 was torn in two on the news, but I thought it was the parts bucket C47 that was on the property until now. darn.

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The nose art/aviation artist and general lunatic from Houston, Texas http://www.jasonbarnettartist.com

This is the nose section of the C47 Billie. Jason, the parts bucket 47 you mentioned didn't get a scratch. It was laying on the ground facing into the wind. Didn't budge even though it was not tied down. Billie was sitting next to the west side fence on the dolly and the wind ripped off the attach fittings from the dolly. The bolts are still on the fuselage. It was tied down as well. We have security video showing the gusts blasting it and then a momentary blip as the power surges. When it comes back on, the fuselage is gone. It didn't capture the fuselage or the 3 wings that went bye bye also. Unfortunately, to add insult to injury, those wings for the parts bucket and the other C47 that belongs to Seth that is in the hangar, were sent over the east fence, too. So this messes up his nearly finished project as well and this C47 is a veteran of D Day and all those battles that followed in Europe. It even has original Vargas girl posters still rubber cemented to the inside fuselage about where the stretchers were located during WWII. When I was trying to track the "Billie" fuselage down in the dark, I couldn't find any tracks or pieces for nearly 100 yards. It bounced a couple of times and started shedding pieces then right before it knocked down the security fence and took out the power line. Then is when the fuselage was twisted in half. Unbelievable forces at work there.

That is sickening

Here is one of the wings that blew out of the lot. Note the downed power line right beside it. Billie took that out so this is between Billie and the fence line. You can also see the parts bucket fuselage which didn't move. I don't know how Billie didn't hit it. Had to have come over the tail. Microbursts can produce some really strange winds for sure. Our damage though is not nearly as bad as up on the north end of Meacham. Lots of corporate airplanes damaged and one hangar completely collapsed with several others damaged. Not a pretty scene on the news. JR

The VFM hangar took a hit near the roof. It appears that the roof was lifted just enough to let the door fall off the upper tracks. We are incredibly lucky that the door went outward because the A-26 is parked right beside this section of door. The manlift and one of our parts bins with our new glass for the doghouse were both within 6 ft of this door and they didn't even get touched. We were very nervous today about the crew and crane that came to lift it out for repairs because of the way the wind was blowing and making it difficult to control. After one near heart attack last night when I saw the damage, I couldn't stand to be around to watch this effort today!! With more weather predicted later in the week, it sure would be good to get everything covered up again. We can't move the airplane since it is still missing one leg and is up on jacks. Too close for comfort! JR

Inside view shows just how close we came to disaster. Note to self, move airplane away from door as soon as that doggone last gear piece comes in and we can get it off the jacks. Sheeesh... JR

Wow, talk about mixed emotions. Sorry about the loss of the C-47, yet thankful that Special K weathered the storm.Got to be a real kick in the gut to have spent so many hours on something like that only to have it al wiped out in seconds.

On another note, I met an elderly gentleman here at the campground we're staying at that was a P-47 pilot during WWII. Got to spend about a half hour with him. He had some very interesting stories about his flying. He shot down one FW-190, and said he was about to get shot down himself during a dogfight, but one of his buddies shot down the German plane before he could draw a bead on him. Great hearing those stories!
Y'all take care down in Ft. Worth.
Randy

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Randy Ryman
Project Big Eagle
NKP Thailand 1966
http://www.coastcomp.com/av/florence/florandy.htm