Warbird Information Exchange

Visited the Flying Tankers operation on Sproat Lake last year, and took some photos of the Mars flying boats there. The neat part about it was that my father worked for Martin at the time the Mars were produced, and has said he climbed all through them while they were being made.

When I stepped aboard the Hawaii Mars on the lake, it felt odd to be walking somewhere my now deceased father had walked nearly 60 years before.

Here's a link to the photos I took:

http://community.webshots.com/myphotos?action=viewAllPhotos&albumID=480403249

The folks at Flying Tankers were most kind in taking me out to the planes moored in the lake and spending over an hour with me in the Hawaii Mars talking about the plane and doing some hangar (or in this case, lake) flying. A fantastic experience that I will never forget.

Walt

My uncle told me last year that his brother was a flight engineer on the Mars and gave him several photos in the 1950's. I hope to get them soon as they may show some operational uses of the Mars that haven't been seen before. It's such a neat beast.

The link isn't currently working. There is an error message indicating there is currently high volume, but the address doesn't look like the address of a public album. You may have copied the address from the address bar when you were in your own view and not the community view. Or maybe you have the album set as private rather than public. Are you "rarebear14" in Webshots?

Mike

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Mike R. Henniger
Aviation Enthusiast & Photographer
http://www.AerialVisuals.ca
http://www.facebook.com/AerialVisuals

Do you want to find locations of displayed, stored or active aircraft? Then start with the The Locator.
Do you want to find or contribute to the documented history of an aircraft? If so then start with the Airframes Database.

Let's try this link business again.

http://community.webshots.com/user/mckinney001

Select the "Hawaii Mars" album.

Walt

a mars wreck was recently photographed on the ocean bottom near hawaii. it was in the last issue of air & space smithsonian magazine, showed the nose & forward fuselage. it succumbed to fire.

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tom d. friedman - hey!!! those fokkers were messerschmitts!! * without ammunition, the usaf would be just another flying club!!! * better to have piece of mind than piece of tail!!

First color shots I had seen. BUT - what I want to know - is who has a MARS center cap for that control wheel!



Derek

First time I've never seen a close-up shot of one of the engines on a Mars. Do they have a fan like on a FW-190 to help engine cooling?

Thanks for posting the pictures. Those are great!

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www.tailhookstudio.com

Great shots of a pair of great planes. Thanks goodness they're still alive and well. Thanks for posting the link. Tom