Hiding Lockheed During WWII

[CrewDawg]

I recieved this in an email today and figured the world of WIX would find it interesting. This is the story that was in the email.

Lockheed during W.W.II (unbelievable 1940s pictures). This is a version of special effects during the 1940's. I have never seen these pictures or knew that we had gone this far to protect ourselves....
During World War II the Army Corps of Engineers needed to hide the Lockheed Burbank Aircraft Plant to protect it from a possible Japanese air attack They covered it with camouflage netting to make it look like a rural subdivision from the air.

The person who sent this said she got back an interesting story about someone's mother who worked at Lockheed, and she as a younger child, remembers all this. And to this day, it is the first pictures of it she's seen. Another person who lived in the area talked about being there as a boy, watching it all being set up like a movie studio production. They had fake houses, trees, etc. and moved parked cars around so it looked like a residential area from the skies overhead.

















Enjoy!

[pontiac58]

wow that is just so cool. Amazing what they did during ww2. I just wonder what we could do today.

[Cubs]

wow that is just so cool. Amazing what they did during ww2. I just wonder what we could do today.

Not nearly as much. Too much bureaucracy. Besides we would have to farm the work out to the Chinese.

There are two large aircraft in the first picture. The one on the right appears to be a B-23 Dragon. What is the other aircraft? Don't tell me that Capelis showed up again.

[Second Air Force]

There are two large aircraft in the first picture. The one on the right appears to be a B-23 Dragon. What is the other aircraft? Don't tell me that Capelis showed up again.

The second airplane looks a lot like a C-46 or maybe the CW-20?

The AAF attempted, with some success, to camouflage an entire airfield during the war. Scribner Army Air Base in eastern Nebraska had all the buildings and runways camouflaged for a time. The methods were not unlike what Lockheed used, but on a LOT smaller scale!

Scott

[andyman64]

there are pictures of boeing plant two in seatle with similar camo treatment in world war two in the book "legend and legacy" the history of the boeing company.

[Django]

Amazing isn't it? There's a couple in there I haven't seen before.

[Holedigger]

Of course, having the "Farm" or the "Residential Neighborhood" right next to the runway in the middle of an industrial area looked a bit odd! It would make it hard to target "High Value" parts of the plant.

[The Inspector]

At least with Boeing Field, the Army painted false intersections and secondary roads on the taxiways and across the runways and it worked pretty well until someone decided that they should also put out barrage balloons, a shot taken from the air showed they made the field stick out like a sore thumb so away went the balloons-now Boeing is going to tear down Plant 2 like they did in Long Beach and will most likely do in Renton because the dirt is worth more than the facility on it-

[k5083]

To me it looks as if the first pic in this thread was taken after the camo was taken down, and you can see the remnants of the painted roads and buildings from pic #2, which then apparently covered the runway as well, on the taxiway in pic #1. It could be that at the time the camo was put up, the surrounding area wasn't as developed as it was by the time of pic #1, so the camouflaged area didn't stand out as decidedly more rural/suburban than the surroundings as might appear.

If you Google Earth the Burbank airport, this site (approach end of 33) is still easy to find. It is now a group of parking lots that still reflect the shape of the plant. The street at the right edge of the first pic is Empire Ave. Some of the service roads are still recognizable. The planes at the upper left edge of pic #1 appear to be where the Budget Rent-a-car is now.

August

[Chris Brame]

About thirty years ago I taped a documentary from TV called "Hollywood and the Home Front" - it has some good newsreel footage of the Lockheed plant camouflage, as well as scenes of miniature houses and outbuildings in the hills around L.A. that slid apart to reveal antiaircraft guns!

[Second Air Force]

I found one of the aerial photos I have of the Scribner AAF facility. This field has the standard triangular layout of three 7,000 foot runways and a small cantonment area. Scribner was initially a Satellite Bombardment Field and later served as the home station of the 36th Fighter Group during the latter phase of the Group's training.


Notice that the runways have been painted to blend in with the surrounding crop patterns. The hangar had a red barn and silo painted on the doors and the other buildings were camouflaged accordingly. I've spoken with a couple of aviators who said it was really well done and more than one transient crew missed the field the first time they flew over. The camouflage detachment changed the colors of the camo to suit the seasons.

Scott