Of the 52 AC-119 conversions (26 each of AC-119G and ‘K), five were lost by the USAF, with most of the remainder being passed to the VNAF around 1972/73. Most of these were captured in April 1975, although two or three escaped this fate, being flown to Thailand. I seem to recall that the innards of one of the captured AC-119’s was shipped to the Soviet Union. (More on this operation can be found in Istvan Toperczer’s book on the VPAF, Air War over North Vietnam.

I do not believe any original AC-119’s are in existence.

Regards,

Jan

Sea Hawk, The Windsock Datafile, which, incidentally is No. 103, and not as I originally stated, provides the following information on South African DH 6’s

“Two DH6’s were taken to South Africa by F H Solomon, who traded as Cape Coast Resorts Aviation, but crashes brought an end to the company in 1921.” (p. 25)

An appendix on p. 33 identifies the DH 6’s as
G-EAMK, former C9448 “Crashed in South Africa 1921.”
G-EAML, former C9449 “Crashed in South Africa. Now in SAAF Museum.”

Incidentally, the appendix gives the owner’s name as F H Soloman.

As for other surviving DH 6 relics, one propeller was advertised in 2006 as being for sale for £ 1 750.

Regards,

Jan

Ja, JohnWoo, flex297 et al,

I wrote the Burma/Myanmar pages for Aeroflight.co.uk. Although the pages most certainly contain a fair amount of errors and omissions, I do believe they constitute the most comprehensive information currently available on the UBAF/MAF. Incidentally, I am working on an up-date.

The UB-prefix means Union of Burma, and was applied to all aircraft of the UBAF (i.e. Union of Burma Air Force). By 1988, the UBAF was renamed as the Myanmar Air Force (MAF). From 1948, civilian aircraft registered in Burma all carried the XY-prefix. The national Airline Union of Burma Airways began operations during the 1950s. Presumably, some of their fleet may have been operated on an ad hoc basis by the UBAF, but I’ve not seen any evidence of any of the Union of Burma Airways aircraft belonging to the UBAF proper.

Union of Burma Airways was renamed as Myanmar Airways International in 1988: http://www.maiair.com/pages/comp_profile.asp

Re the G-4 Super Galebs, it would appear that most, if not all are inoperative due to the delivery of Chinese-built K-8s. The most recent sighting of G-4s was in May 2006, when s/ns 3704 and 3705 were noted at Yangon, along with MiG-29s s/n 2702, 2705, 2708 and 2709.

As for further MiG-29 Fulcrums, the following may be of some interest:

http://www.milavia.net/news/news.php?2006046

In a report published on April 4th, Russian daily Kommersant revealed that the high-level delegation from Myanmar has visited Russia in order to discuss purchase of a wide variety of Russian arms and other military equipment. According Kommersant, listed on Myanmar wish-list among others were MiG-29 fighters as well as short range Tor-M1 and medium-range Buk-1M mobile air defense systems.

The Chinese government has so far been Myanmar’s closest ally, biggest trading partner and principal source of military hardware and training since the 1988 coup. Other significant suppliers have, in the past, included Singapore, India, Israel, Germany and Pakistan.

However, Myanmar’s first major purchase of Russian weapons was initiated in 2001 after a number of border incidents with Thailand, and included ten MiG-29 fighters. Some sources suggest that all ten airframes have been delivered to Myanmar Air Force (Tamdaw Lay) in 2002 and were in fact a package of eight single-seat MiG-29 (9-12B) and two two-seat MiG-29UB fighters that have been built for but never delivered to the Iraqi Air Force.

According to Kommersant, it is quite real to expect that in exchange for further deliveries of new quantities of modern weapons, Russia will request Myanmar to secure easy access for those Russian companies that are interested in on-shore and off-shore exploring of Myanmar’s oil and gas fields.

Regards,

Jan

The F-84G Thunderjet is a former Royal Norwegian AF aircraft, s/n 52-2978, while the pair of F-86D Sabres are both former Royal Danish AF aircraft, s/ns 51-5977 and 51-5984. Both of the Sabres were previously used at Kjevik AFB as battle damage repair airframes.

Regards,

Jan

Mark12,

I based the “overall-black” colour scheme on the memory of a profile in an old issue of Air International. I’ll see if I can find the issue when I get back home. However, if you say overall dark green, I do not disagree. From memory, there’s a photo of a Russian Spitfire IX twin-seat conversion in one of Carl-Fredrik Geust’s books on Soviet aircraft. Can’t remember which, though.

As for frustrated Spitfire customers, Sweden was offered Tr. IX trainers, but declined.

Regards,

Jan

The Yale and Wirraway combined to produce the Sk 14 were RCAF 3359 and RAAF A20-233 respectively. The restoration was also helped by the discovery of a large cache of NA-16 drawings found in, of all places, Japan. The Imperial Japanese Navy found the NA-16 design a sound one, and it was produced by Kyushu as the K10W1 intermediate trainer. The Allies nicknamed the K10W1 Oak. More on the K10W1 can be found here: http://www.combinedfleet.com/ijna/k10w.htm

More on the Sk 14 can be found here: http://www.avrosys.nu/aircraft/Skol/413Sk14.htm

Regards,

Jan

According to http://www.worldairforces.com, Iran operated 30 T-33As from 1956 to 1999, and 16 RT-33As from 1956 to 1979. No mention of any AT-33As, though.

I made a quick check on http://www.acig.org, but found nothing about Iranian T-33As/RT-33A/AT-33As. But, five T-33As were reportedly still in service in 2003: http://www.usenet.com/newsgroups/rec.aviation.military/msg15746.html

Regards,

Jan

2 – Laos (Erawan)

Regards,

Jan