Picture of the day. (47 Viewers)

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Kai Stemm said:
Is it real?
Makes no sense put a wheel chair on the already weighed down MG man
Also no helmet and is it just me or are they a bit close
Click to expand...
Those are collapsable bicycles, called the "BSA Folding Para-Bike".

They have a pivot at the center and are either held collapsed or fully extended by a wingnut.

 
Paras are far too close, the parachutes and harnesses are weird, a weapon such as that would not be carried slung on the harness at the front, and the bike, a British item, shown in Post #3652 with what appears to be a British re-enactor, albeit with a mix of 1940s and 1950s> uniform, certainly would no be carried whilst jumping - or at least I certainly wouldn't want that thing hanging on my back, ready to crack my spine as I roll on landing - that's if I got to do a roll on landing, as the darned thing would probably foul the canopy and lines as they deployed, resulting in me whistling in at a rate of knots, to make a nice depression in the soft soil of the Low Countries !
I thought at first that the drawing was showing German Fallschirmjager, dropping in Holland in 1940, but the mg looks like a Browning .30 cal, the uniforms are unidentifiable, but the men have an 'American look' about them, and the whole thing is a fanciful representation I would guess !
 
Hell's Teeth !
That's a British Para, possibly just post war. I knew the bikes were used by glider borne troops during WW2, but I hadn't heard of them actually being used when parachuting, and I used to know a lot of WW2 and 1950s Paras.
The method of carrying is similar to that used when jumping with a normal weapons container, so, once clear of the aircraft, and under canopy, the bike would be released, to hang beneath the Para on it's suspension line, unlike the drawing, showing it on the man's back.
I wouldn't like to bet on the survival of the bloke's teeth on exit of the aircraft though!
Maybe it'S one of those things which was trialled, but never actually used ?
 
I'm not exactly sure of the time-period those photos (fig.1 and fig.3) were published, but I noticed that in fig.3, the Paratrooper is inside of a Stirling. Now if memory serves right, the RAF used the Stirling Mk.IV from '43 through the end of the war for deploying Para's - I don't think they were used operationally after that time period.
 
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