Heads up "Strategic Air Command" BBC2 Sunday

One thing that puzzles me – if the B-36 was able to fly a holding pattern while they decided where else it could land, why couldn’t the rest of the flight land at Upper Heyford first, and the crippled aircraft last (at Upper Heyford too)?

http://www.raf-upper-heyford.org/Village_Alert_BA.jpg

Ah the wonders of Google……………here’s a link to a contemporary newspaper article.

Another not to be missed film is The Hunters (1958) starring Robert Mitchum, Robert Wagner and Richard Egan..set in Korea in an F86 squadron. Again, excellent footage of Sabres, air to air and ground stuff, good yarn and in colour. Recommended when on the telly. And of course, the Bridges at Toko-Ri, another classic.

And don’t forget the B36 that mixed up Enstone with Upper Heyford..more or less on the same runway heading but a big difference in runway length, hence ending up in a field at Enstone!! Love to heard the pilot talking his way out of that one !! It was written up in Aeroplane Monthly some years ago..can’t remember the date of the article.

What a shame to hear of June’s passing. My wife had dinner with her a few years ago at the home of a mutual friend in Vail and when she was introduced she blurted out “I thought you were dead!” June dryly replied “Everybody thinks I’m dead!”

Are these titles presented in widescreen?

Yes

For some interesting information on the production of A Gathering of Eagles, look at this website for Hudson’s co-star, Aussie Rod Taylor.
It has photos and location details.
Below is a still of the great MITO (minimum interval take off) scene…note the smoke from the engines. Later in the lives of the “G” models the smoke was lessened considerably.

http://www.fanfromfla.net/rodtaylor/gatheringofeagles.shtml

If you goto www.thesmallscreen.org you can purchase SAC & Gathering Of Eagles on DVD. Neither of these films will ever be released officially on DVD according to my source. I purchased both these titles bout 2 weeks ago & they arrived in 4 days.

Are these titles presented in widescreen?

Could also have been Sculthorpe. They were flown from there on secret missions by RAF crews in the 50s. See the link HERE

AF

I think Sculthorpe is a bout 25 miles from Thetford so for aircraft in the circuit, as I posted, I actually favour Lakenheath.

Mark

I do remember the B-45 Tornadoes when with the school Army cadets camping at Thetford, this would be 1954/55 time. I guess they were in the circuit for Lakenheath.

Mark

Could also have been Sculthorpe. They were flown from there on secret missions by RAF crews in the 50s. See the link HERE

If you goto www.thesmallscreen.org you can purchase SAC & Gathering Of Eagles on DVD. Neither of these films will ever be released officially on DVD according to my source. I purchased both these titles bout 2 weeks ago & they arrived in 4 days.

I googled B-36’s and as I thought, the type was originally concieved in 1941 to bomb Germany from the US in the event of the UK being occupied and the States having no immediate bases, brave plan indeed.
Although the bomb load is quoted as 86000lb, which is huge, I gather that with the fuel load for such a long trip, it would have been reduced to 10000lb or half the load of the Lancaster.
Imagine having to fly that thing across the Atlantic to bomb Germany, how long would that have taken at a cruising speed of about 300mph, 15 hours?
Then if the UK and probably Eire, due to it’s strategic position, had been occupied and filled with Me 262 interceptors, they would have been harried all the way into Germany across occupied Europe.
Those that did fullfill their missions would then have to face it all again on the way home and be faced with another gruelling 15 hour return flight back over the Atlantic, some of them damaged, with wolfpacks and surface raiders rampant over the Atlantic and friendly British bases in Africa occupied by the Nazis.
On the other hand, by this time having developed the atomic bomb, one mission and it would have all been over.
Sounds like a good idea for a novel, what do you think.

A few years ago, I saw a couple of visits to Stansted by what I thought was an Antonov Colt with 6 engines instead of 4, I’m absolutley certain of this but my research can’t find a 6 engined variety, however, whatever it was, it’s the only other a/c that I’ve seen that could match the B-36 droning sound, I saw a Tu-Bear in the static at Fairford once but never saw it fly, I would imagine that the noise was very similar.
I was also surprised on watching the film, that the B-36 had 3 bladed props rather than 4, was this something to do with the aerodynamics of backwards facing props.

whose CO was an ex-Coastal Cmmd Anson pilot (later flying PR Mosquitoes) who’d retired and bought a farm there after the war.

Someone who ‘Bought the Farm’ – and lived to tell the tale ??? 😮

Ken

B-36

I saw Strategic Air Command a few months before entering the AF and serving in ADC. Making that movie was one of Jimmy Stewart’s gifts to the USAF. The new book, Jimmy Stewart -bomber pilot, gives some great back ground to the movie and Jimmy’s long career in the AF and AF Reserve ending as a Brigadier General.

For whatever reason my area of the US was an area that one could see B-36 bombers, at altitude, refueling from KC-97s. Several times a day I’d hear ‘that drone’, look up and there they were. A sight to behold, even better with binoculars. Once you hear that sound you’ll never forget it. If the only way you can hear that drone is by watching the movie, do it.

On the same beach as a Ford V8 Pilot?

It is a Ford but it’s not a Pilot…… 😉

A 1940 Ford. 😀

I wonder where it was taken……..Florida would be a guess :confused:

Damn, you spoilsport, Les! Actually like you I have really seen a B-36 flying.
It must have been 1958 or ’59 and was helping my parents sweep up leaves in the back garden when this tremendous drone got nearer and nearer and a B-36 with undercarriage down overflew Swindon inbound to RAF Lyneham. It was a Sunday and whether it landed or just overshot, I do not know(not sure if Lyneham’s runway is long enough for it to get airborne again?)

Not that one that landed short on 06 Boscombe by about half a mile or so?

“You are two miles from touch down, on the centreline”

“I have landed…….My isn’t your field rough”

“Your not on it” 😮

Mark

On the same beach as a Ford V8 Pilot? :rolleyes: Famous pic that Albert. 😉

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Damn, you spoilsport, Les! Actually like you I have really seen a B-36 flying.
It must have been 1958 or ’59 and was helping my parents sweep up leaves in the back garden when this tremendous drone got nearer and nearer and a B-36 with undercarriage down overflew Swindon inbound to RAF Lyneham. It was a Sunday and whether it landed or just overshot, I do not know(not sure if Lyneham’s runway is long enough for it to get airborne again?)

On the same beach as a Ford V8 Pilot? :rolleyes: Famous pic that Albert. 😉

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….I was eight years old and playing on the beach when….. 😮

Big question, can I claim to be the only person on the Forum who has seen a B-36 in flight,

Another here who’s seen the B.36s in flight.

Was brought up in Campbeltown (Argyll) in Scotland. Nearby aerodrome was (and is) Machrihanish. In the mid 50s there were fairly regular overflights by B.36s at Machri, as I recall one a month at least. Maybe the base was a waypoint. At that time was in the local ATC whose CO was an ex-Coastal Cmmd Anson pilot (later flying PR Mosquitoes) who’d retired and bought a farm there after the war. Seems he knew just about everybody in the RAF and had contacts in the USAF as well. He would tell us of an upcoming overflight and we’d cycle out to the base to watch the huge thing trundle past at fairly lo-lvel (~1500). Machrihanish at that time was RNAS with, mostly, Fireflies and a few Ansons and Barracuda (I think), so the B.36s were a welcome diversion from the usual aircraft dodging about.

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B36 and B47 at the USAF Museum, Dayton

Taken in 2003 during a fabulous BAES tour.