Plane ID

[scubastan]

Picture was taking during the 1950's. Need help IDing this aircraft.

Thanks

Stan

[Gregory]

Douglas A-26B (or C) Invader

[Garandomatic]

In WWII, they were called A-26 Invaders, but between WWII and Vietnam until they were phased out, they were redubbed the B26 with no relation to the previous WWII B-26 Marauder. I heard they flew them for ground attack through Korea and into Vietnam until they literally ran out of parts.

[scubastan]

Thanks for the information it helps me alot. I was my Dad's plane that he was a mechanic on during the Korean War. He was stationed in Japan. Never got alot of information from him.

Stan

[gwb123]

The aircraft behind it and to the right is a B-29.

[claymore]

Yep,,,, a hot rod, talked to a pilot who flew one in Korea and loved the thing. Said was a gas to fly (his words), fast, nimble, They used some of them as fire planes too.

 

claymore

[Third Herd]

The first time I saw a B-26, I was walking home from Junior High on a very cold day. It was flying low and the exhaust condensed coming out, like vapor trails.

[Johnny Signor]

The USAF Special Operations boys usede them in Viet Nam for a lot of work ,the Air National Guard units had quite a few of them too ,as did quite a few foriegn air forces, they were a hot ship and well liked by the pilots , you can also see a few of them flying as "fire fighter" types in the movie titled "Always " , a good aircraft flick , has a Catalina also in it !

Johnny

[Hawk914]

After looking through A-26 serials, I'm fairly sure that this ship was manufactured as A-26B-15-DT, serial number 43-22343.

 

She was later converted to a TB-26C, served in Japan, and was destroyed in a crash on October 9th, 1955 near Tachikawa.

 

She had also been involved in another incident the previous year... more info here:

 

http://www.aviationarchaeology.com/src/dba...&Submit4=Go

 

 

Fade to Black...

[InvaderHistoricalFoundatio]

This plane is, as Hawk914 points out, 43-22343. She was the 92nd plane built at the Douglas Tulsa, OK plant and was an A-26B-15-DT model.

She served with the 386th Bomb Group in England during WWII, then was re-allocated to Japan after the war and attached the 13th Bomb Squadron. She was called "The Point" by the squadron due to the emblem on her tail. She had her hard-nose swapped for a glass one, and her older flat-top canopy swapped for a clamshell type. She was eventually stripped of all weapons and used primarily as a transport plane for the unit, carrying supplies and personnel back and forth between bases until she was assigned to a training role after the Korean War ended. I have 4 other pictures of this same aircraft throughout her career. I can tell you that your photo is dated probably from 1950 or very early in 1951. By mid-1951 she had an exclamation point painted on the tail.

[Vahe Demirjian]

The use of the A-26 Invader by the Congolese military against the Marxist Simba rebellion in the eastern provinces of the Democratic Republic of Congo in 1964-1965 is one of the lesser known combat uses of this aircraft in the developing world during the Cold War. More importantly, Cuban exile veterans of the April 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion were trained to fly the Invaders which would take on the Simba rebels because they knew that those guerrillas were being backed by the Soviet Union and Cuba (in the latter case, Cuban volunteers trained by Argentine-born Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara).

 

Link:

https://www.joebaugher.com/usattack/a26_30.html

[yokota57]

On 8/16/2012 at 11:03 PM, gwb123 said:

The aircraft behind it and to the right is a B-29.

It is actually a B-50 (B/RB/WB). Check those R-4360 nacelles.