I too have seen that photo before, I think in colour, and I think in a 1980’s magazine like Images of War, or War Illustrated. Maybe even in the magazine series The Elite?

As well as A Bridge Too Far, replica gliders have been constrcted for other films like The Longest Day and Saving Private Ryan. You’d think there’d be a fair few of them around.

I’ve often thought if a good replica Horsa or Waco were constructed to airworthy staus it’d make a great airshow piece if towed up by a Dakota, then let go and steered back to earth, to have troops spill out, and then the Dak drop a stick of paras. Probably too dangerous though.

Were the pilots of the gliders also regular troops like the Paras that they carried, and thus once landed (if still alive) would they have joned in the fighting? Or did they get out of the rough stuff and back to base as soon as they could? I guess it’s the former theory as they would be surrounded in most cases. If so, then a glider pilot would have been rather a stressful job – just getting your glider down safely would be bad enough, but that’s only the beginning of your troubles.

Also, did the Dakotas that towed the gliders usually also have paras inside? If so, who went first, the paras jumping or the glider released?

Does anyone know, out of curiosity, were there any New Zealand glider pilots in the RAF?

Dave,
Wasn’t there something about prewar Boeings being locked in a cave down there?

That’s correct. The first ever two Boeing aircraft built, actually Boeing and Westervelt Seaplanes built in 1916, were used by the Walsh Bros. Flying School, flown by the legendary pioneer George Bolt.

Some years later it’s said when they were retired, one may have been taken to North Head, which is a dome-like hill at the entrance of Auckland harbour, a longtime naval base that had miles of cavernous tunnels and gun emplacements built to defend the country against the Russians, then the Germans and Japanese.

Theorists believe one of the Boeings was placed in a dismantled state into the tunnels, and stored for future emergencies. I believe this must have been based on eye-witness accounts because if the military had documentation of this, I don’t believe they’ve ever released it.

Over time most of the tunnels were blocked up and bricked in as it became a park area.In the early 1990’s a party of historians finally gained permission to open some tunnels and have a look. The military has never been keen as they feel a) the tunnels may now be unstable, especially with the continually shifting volcanic platform Auckland sits on. And b) there may be very old explosives still stored down there. So they were given a strict time limit to look and then get out. Something like two days I think. They found nothing.

I dear say if it had been found, and if in good condition, it would be one of the most incredible finds and most valuable old planes in the world, being the first or second in the incredible Boeing lineage.

Boeing built a flying replica in 1966 for their 50th Anniversary by the way.

What was the second NZ aircrew member’s name? I forget it. I know Les Munro was a pilot (the last still alive).

Indeed. I have given it several thoughts today, and especially thinking from my own country’s angle of families who’d been through the First World War and were now to send their boys to the other side of the world for a second time.

At 9.00pm on Sunday 3rd of September 1939 NZ Time, the New Zealand Deputy Prime Minister Peter Fraser declared war upon Germany. This was of course due to time zone difference, simultaneous with Britain – though the two hours difference is odd as Britain was not then on double-daylight savings, so I can only assume we declared war first due to the time to get the message to Germany?

The next day, September 4th, 1939, Prime Minister Michael Joseph Savage broadcast on the wireless across NZ from his sickbed (he was dying from cancer, hence not declaring the paperwork himself) with the speech which was about as brief as Chamberlain’s statement. This is the first paragraph in transcript online (I cannot find the second half, but have it on tape somewhere)

“Both with gratitude for the past and confidence in the future, we range ourselves without fear beside Britain. Where she goes we go, and where she stands we stand.”

When Hitler heard NZ had entered the war, he scoffed and remarked “They’re only a bunch of farmboys, what could they do?”

How wrong he was, over 100,000 soldiers, 60,000 airmen and countless thousands of sailors and merchantmen, plus the thousands of farmers who supplied Britain with food and wool, etc, showed him what a country of just 1 million people and what a few ‘farm boys’ could do. They did this country, the Empire and the Allies very proud.

Lest we forget.

This is probably an obvious question that’s been well researched, but I haven’t had the opportunity of seeing the books or TV programme. I assume the teams have researched whether the tail of Bader’s Spitfire wasn’t blown off as a result of flak?

Or perhaps an extra man on a grassy noll?

I was also wondering, were any other aces on any side of the war ever known to have been shot down by friendly fire (either air to air or by flak or shps, etc?)