Air Supply in Burma in WWII
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Hi
Interesting article. My father was 'attached' to the 3rd Combat Cargo Group to fly as an Air Despatcher for six months at the end of 1944 and beginning of 1945 over Burma. The 9th and 12th Squadrons of this Group were supporting the 36th British Division in their advanced through Burma, this Division was part of the NCAC (they had replaced the Chindits). I have added some of his air dropping examples from his 'memoirs' for your interest below
2. Of all cargos one of the most difficult and dangerous was petrol. On one occasion we had an urgent demand from a unit for a re-supply of petrol, so we had to load the aircraft with 40-gallon drums fitted with three parachutes each. When handling it we wore plimsolls and were not allowed to carry matches, cigarettes or anything that could cause a spark. The smell of the petrol was very strong and there was no way we could last the trip if we stayed amongst the fumes so the pilot told us all to come into the cockpit area until we reached the drop zone. When we reached the target area we could see lots of trucks stretching back into the trees. We had to be very careful when moving the drums, one at a time, towards the door to push out as any chance of a spark had to be avoided. At the door we tied on the three parachute lines, heard the buzzer and pushed the drum out, we then saw it hurtle to the ground as each chute split. Usually each parachute would take a 160lb load, each drum weighed about 400lb so in theory the three chutes could carry that load with a margin of safety. We got the second drum ready and pushed it out, the same thing happened, the 'theory' appeared not to be working! Troops on the ground were clearing the drums away so they may have been saving some of the petrol from each. The drop continued until all the drums were gone, not one of them landed safely. When we returned to Moran we had to report the failure of the parachutes and that it all seemed to have been a bad idea to use that method.
3. We often had to drop rice, this was dropped without parachutes, the rice was contained within three sacks and usually they would not all burst. The sacks would be stacked up and pushed out; this was the quickest way to get food to isolated places. On one rice delivery flight we headed for a place that had only recently been captured and when we reached the 'drop zone' we started to kick out the load. Unfortunately one of the sacks got caught around the tail-plane hindering movement of the elevator, which caused some control problems. The pilot tried to shake it off by rocking the aircraft but to no avail. One of the pilots then came to the rear along with the radio operator, the pilot told us that he was going to shoot holes in the rice sack to get the rice out. He braced himself against the door and leant out with us holding on to him, he said, "Don't you limey's let go!" The pilot kept shooting until the rice started to trickle out, after a while enough rice leaked out for the sack to come loose and fall away. After this we did not stack the piles so high and continued kicking it out, there were no more problems.
4. One of the pilots requested our team in particular to go on a drop with him. When we arrived at the Moran strip we saw half a dozen flyers there, we saw that we had flown with this pilot before. A truck then drove up carrying a metal roller ramp on the back, we all mucked in and fitted the ramp into the aircraft. The ramp was the width of the door and was raised at the back by about 18 inches and with about one foot clearance from the fuselage. Sacks of rice had already been loaded into the aircraft along with rush mats. The pilot explained that he had designed the ramp so aircraft could drop the loads much more quickly on operations and this was to be a demonstration of the system. We took-off, the actual drop zone was a large area so we could have a long run. The ramp was loaded with the rice sacks, this load was what we would normally drop in four normal runs. When the buzzer sounded we pushed, even with the help of the others on board we only got a few of the top layer away, the rest of the load was stuck fast. We unloaded the rice sacks from the ramp, the reason the load did not shift was obvious, due to the weight the bottom sacks had dug in between the rollers and therefore jamming them. The rush mats were then laid on the rollers and loaded the rice sacks on, but not so high this time, obviously it must have been expected that the rice sacks would cause problems. We all pushed and this time we got all the sacks away, however the sacks slid on the matting rather than the rollers. It was apparent that the rollers would work best on rather more solid loads like our canvas bags or ammo boxes, but that may have been what this demonstration was meant to prove? The aircraft then flew back to Moran and landed, the officer in charge thanked us for our efforts and we returned to camp after playing our small role in improving airdropping techniques.
Mike
Interesting article. My father was 'attached' to the 3rd Combat Cargo Group to fly as an Air Despatcher for six months at the end of 1944 and beginning of 1945 over Burma. The 9th and 12th Squadrons of this Group were supporting the 36th British Division in their advanced through Burma, this Division was part of the NCAC (they had replaced the Chindits). I have added some of his air dropping examples from his 'memoirs' for your interest below
Air Dropping in Burma Examples
1. One day we were selected to go on a special mission with the 12th Squadron, which was to do a re-supply drop to a Weather Station in the mountains to the north. Stores and medical supplies had to be dropped there every six months. For this trip there were the three of us air dispatchers plus the four-man flight crew, pilot, co-pilot, wireless operator and engineer. On the way to the aircraft we had to go into the Dispatch Office and collect a roll of maps from one of the officers there and then give them to the pilots. They studied the maps intently as it was an awkward place to get to. Basically they decided that they would have to find a certain ravine, fly up it until it branched into two and then take the left hand fork that would take us straight to the dropping zone. The maps were spread out on the cargo and were looked at quite often while on the flight. The pilots found the first ravine and things then got quite interesting for us as we had never flown so high in the mountains. One of the pilots came back into the cabin with what I think was a movie camera and started filming out of the door. When he wanted better shots we had to hang onto his legs and body while he leaned out. The scenery was magnificent, a river appeared to be miles below, trees were growing out of the side of the ravine amongst the snow, the ravine appeared not to be wide enough for the Dakota and the wingtips were very close to the sides in places but we got through with some very skilful flying by the pilots. When we reached the target we saw a group of huts with a radio mast on a small flat-topped mountain with steep sides, we could not see any paths up to the top but I presume there must have been. Higher mountains covered in snow surrounded the station but the sun was shining and it felt quite warm. The pilots circled round while trying to decide how to make the drop without losing any of the cargo, if any of the cargo missed there would be no chance of recovering it. One of the pilots came back to explain what they intended to do, this was to go up one side, dive down on the target and then bank to the right and climb at the same time. To get us used to it we done a couple of dummy runs with us in our 'kicking' positions, we passed the test but it was a bit scary seeing the mountain sides passing close by. The pilots saw that the manoeuvre was possible decided that we should start dropping, also they told us not to drop the cargo if we couldn't get it away first time, there was no time constraint so we could always go round again. The aircraft circled while we set up the load for the drop, the pilot then asked if we were ready and on our affirmative reply the aircraft dived down for the drop. We got the first load away but we could not see where it landed as we were too busy grabbing hold of the aircraft to stop us falling to the tail end of the aircraft as the aircraft climbed and done it's quick right turn. The aircraft then circled round while we set up for the next drop, we could also now see the target and that our first drop had hit it, however we never saw any people on the ground. We soon got used to this dropping technique and we continued until we had dropped all of our cargo. The pilots then took a look and could see the parachutes amongst the bashas on the target, one came back to see us and said, "It looks good, we can go home now." With that we flew back the way we came. On reaching Moran the pilot gave us the maps to take back to the Dispatch Office and tell them it was a good drop, this we did although they already had a radio message from the Weather Station that the drop had been successful. We were then told we had finished for the day and could go back to camp and a truck was available to take us back there, we had been in the air for four and a half hours on what was a quite interesting trip.2. Of all cargos one of the most difficult and dangerous was petrol. On one occasion we had an urgent demand from a unit for a re-supply of petrol, so we had to load the aircraft with 40-gallon drums fitted with three parachutes each. When handling it we wore plimsolls and were not allowed to carry matches, cigarettes or anything that could cause a spark. The smell of the petrol was very strong and there was no way we could last the trip if we stayed amongst the fumes so the pilot told us all to come into the cockpit area until we reached the drop zone. When we reached the target area we could see lots of trucks stretching back into the trees. We had to be very careful when moving the drums, one at a time, towards the door to push out as any chance of a spark had to be avoided. At the door we tied on the three parachute lines, heard the buzzer and pushed the drum out, we then saw it hurtle to the ground as each chute split. Usually each parachute would take a 160lb load, each drum weighed about 400lb so in theory the three chutes could carry that load with a margin of safety. We got the second drum ready and pushed it out, the same thing happened, the 'theory' appeared not to be working! Troops on the ground were clearing the drums away so they may have been saving some of the petrol from each. The drop continued until all the drums were gone, not one of them landed safely. When we returned to Moran we had to report the failure of the parachutes and that it all seemed to have been a bad idea to use that method.
3. We often had to drop rice, this was dropped without parachutes, the rice was contained within three sacks and usually they would not all burst. The sacks would be stacked up and pushed out; this was the quickest way to get food to isolated places. On one rice delivery flight we headed for a place that had only recently been captured and when we reached the 'drop zone' we started to kick out the load. Unfortunately one of the sacks got caught around the tail-plane hindering movement of the elevator, which caused some control problems. The pilot tried to shake it off by rocking the aircraft but to no avail. One of the pilots then came to the rear along with the radio operator, the pilot told us that he was going to shoot holes in the rice sack to get the rice out. He braced himself against the door and leant out with us holding on to him, he said, "Don't you limey's let go!" The pilot kept shooting until the rice started to trickle out, after a while enough rice leaked out for the sack to come loose and fall away. After this we did not stack the piles so high and continued kicking it out, there were no more problems.
4. One of the pilots requested our team in particular to go on a drop with him. When we arrived at the Moran strip we saw half a dozen flyers there, we saw that we had flown with this pilot before. A truck then drove up carrying a metal roller ramp on the back, we all mucked in and fitted the ramp into the aircraft. The ramp was the width of the door and was raised at the back by about 18 inches and with about one foot clearance from the fuselage. Sacks of rice had already been loaded into the aircraft along with rush mats. The pilot explained that he had designed the ramp so aircraft could drop the loads much more quickly on operations and this was to be a demonstration of the system. We took-off, the actual drop zone was a large area so we could have a long run. The ramp was loaded with the rice sacks, this load was what we would normally drop in four normal runs. When the buzzer sounded we pushed, even with the help of the others on board we only got a few of the top layer away, the rest of the load was stuck fast. We unloaded the rice sacks from the ramp, the reason the load did not shift was obvious, due to the weight the bottom sacks had dug in between the rollers and therefore jamming them. The rush mats were then laid on the rollers and loaded the rice sacks on, but not so high this time, obviously it must have been expected that the rice sacks would cause problems. We all pushed and this time we got all the sacks away, however the sacks slid on the matting rather than the rollers. It was apparent that the rollers would work best on rather more solid loads like our canvas bags or ammo boxes, but that may have been what this demonstration was meant to prove? The aircraft then flew back to Moran and landed, the officer in charge thanked us for our efforts and we returned to camp after playing our small role in improving airdropping techniques.
Mike
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MIflyer
1st Lieutenant
There is a book about a guy who did the first "pararescue" operations in Burma. He apparently did it because he was in the USAAF, did not know how to fly an airplane, and was crazy enough to parachute into the jungle to try to help downed aircrew. I think it is called "Green Hell" or something like that. In one case he found the pilot he had to rescue was badly injured and they had to drop a whole surgical team to fix him up enough so he could be moved. The book described the only cases I have ever heard of where someone used a BC-611 handi-talkie to talk to an airplane. The BC-611 had very limited range and the airplane crew had to know exactly where you were and what frequency you were on in order to be able to have a conversation; it was just about useless for trying to hail passing aircraft.
But they also found out that the natives had discovered that if they took a parachute and spread it out on the ground where it could be seen that an airplane would fly over and drop them all kinds of neat stuff.
But they also found out that the natives had discovered that if they took a parachute and spread it out on the ground where it could be seen that an airplane would fly over and drop them all kinds of neat stuff.
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P-39 Expert
Non-Expert
Dad served in Burma.
