Warbird Information Exchange

While driving back from CO, I saw the A-26.

It's there because B-26s flew in Dodge during WWII. (If I understand it correctly, it was B-26 Marauders in Dodge, not A-26 Invaders).
They put it there in 1972 (I think) to honor those who trained there. One problem (if my previous understanding is correct), They've confused the two.

Anyways, the craft is in really bad shape. The metal on the cowlings/nacelles is really weak and there are two wires hanging on the ground. I think its been painted in the last couple years. The blue area where the glass (cockpit) should be is smashed really bad. I imagine its in bad shape, but not quite at the Beijing P-61 (or P-47) stage yet.

Too bad that these old aircraft haven't got some kind of roof over their heads! If it hasn't been removed there is also an A-26 sitting on a hill near El Reno, OK. This is/was owned by the local VFW group.

If anbody passes through Grand Junction, CO and has got some time to spare, could you be on the lookout for an A-26 supposedly sitting in a park? The plane was at Grand Junction airport I believe, several years ago!

T J

I remember when this airplane flew into DDC. I was flying as an FO for a commuter that served the city then and quite a crowd had come out to see it the next day. This was when anyone could walk out on the ramp to look at the planes when they wanted to. We, the Captain and I, climbed up into the cockpit while people were milling about and I wondered aloud if the battery had been disconnected. The Capttain said " Oh, surely they must have!" and reached up and turned on the master switch on the over head. All the lights and electrical instruments promptly came to life!!

A few years later, well after it was mounted on the pole by the airport entrance, the facility chief of the FAA Flight Service Station noticed someting familiar about the tail number while driving to work one day and later discovered that an Airforce airplane matching that tail number had been logged as having been given a weather briefing nearly every day for the past year (GS levels at the facility were then deternined by the amount of activity logged)