Warbird Information Exchange

Here is the article and photo from the March 1951 National Geographic of the Biak boneyard:



There is a bit of a difference between the Biak "storage area" and the photos posted on this thread in that the Biak airplanes were all ferried there for disposal while airmanual's photos show aircraft damaged operationally and picked over for parts during the shooting war. Seeing airplanes so stripped of parts is evidence of the ingenuity of engineering and maintenance men in making use of all the spare pieces they could lay hands on.

Scott

and a mere 59 years later.., nothing left!!!!

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S.

That's about 10 times longer than the war lasted though!

Not only are the tails "crunched" from the fuselage but all appear to be lacking propellors. Why do I have the distinct feeling that the props were not neatly removed but were most probably removed via a cut off torch. Quick, efficient and making it all worthless.

A personal trip to Biak in 1992 revealed that there was not a single hint of any aircraft ever being on any of the three contiguous airfields (Sorido, Boroke & Mokmer).

I can imagine that every residence within 500 miles of that island contains lots of shiny aluminum pots, pans, doors, roofs and misc!!!!!! lol

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S.

Yes, lack of correct repair facilities and parts looks to be a very logical & understandable reason.

As it was not "always" B-24, just a few non Lib scrap photos.

Laurent

1. Place & date unknown



2. Leyte



3. Came from a CBI album, so must be there

Another photo from Biak circa 1948. Note scads of A-20's, P-38's, C-47's and a few P-61's. Like the Natl Geo photo in the posting above all propellors have been removed. Note the aggessive jungle growth after a mere three years. The photo is from Life Magazine Februry 9, 1948, pg. 40

TAIGH,
I spotted the open life raft compartment on the airframe in this thread. What I was referring to was the odd, square patch on top of the fuselage just ahead of and to the left of the turret opening plug in the color factory shot of the BM D model rolling out that was the leadoff photo in the thread about B-25's back around Xmas that isn't the life raft hatch.

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Don't make me go get my flying monkeys-

I am so glad I ran across this post and I too was delighted to see the photo with the Snooper tail in the boneyard.

Reno, I would love to know if you would be able to provide me with your FIL's crew names. For many years I have been working on this units crew manifest and it has been hard scratchin' because most documents are pilot only info. I have sent you a Private Message and included my email. Thank you so much -- I hope you check back here and find it or this post. I will be checking back.

Romeo