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Re: A Few For The B-17G Mickey Radar Gurus

Fri Nov 08, 2013 6:19 pm

I'll have to try to find my notes, but after quickly looking through David Osbourne's B-17 listings it appears that many of the PFF B-17s seem to have spent a week or two at Langley after leaving the regular modification centers and immediately prior to heading out on their overseas assignments.
Standard B-17s from either side of them on the production lines seem to have gone overseas straight after leaving the modification centers without passing through Langley.

Regards the PFF School at Langley, I came across an intriguing footnote in one of the 8AF Pathfinder School class final reports from April 1944:
Attention is directed to the comparison between men who have had an average of 50 to 80 hours previous training at Langley and men from Divisions who have had no previous training. As shown in this report, the training necessary to prepare a man for combat Mickey operations is a ratio of 25 to 100 - showing that the Langley training is of no value in preperation for this theater.
In addition it has been found that men newly arriving from the States are very weak in DR radio and pilotage navigation and require considerable extra training to be brought up to standard.


All the best,
PB

Re: A Few For The B-17G Mickey Radar Gurus

Thu Jul 10, 2014 3:36 pm

Just picked up this photo of 44-9789 (KY-A) when serving with the 366th BS, 305th BG during photomapping Project Casey Jones. Prior she had been a pathfinder with the 545th BS, 384th (JD-X). Photo taken at A-92 (St. Trond, Belgium), likely in the summer of 1945. According to available records she was scrapped in November 1947 - later than most Casey Jones aircraft.

Image
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