wendovertom wrote:
YEARS ago when I talked to the Whittington Bros (representative?) about the plane I was told the wings came from somewhere else and were in a "much better" state than the rest of the fuselage.
Thanks, Tom, for this new piece of info. It sure would help in understanding why the underside of the wing had American markings.
My guess is that AL557 would be more popular in the UK than the US, since its wartime service was with the British. However, the airframe has been through conversion rebuilds over its years in service. To take it back to a wartime configuration would involve considerable guesswork.
I’ve never seen a photo of AL557 when on 159 Sqn, even though it was with this unit in India for ten and a half months. I know it never flew on bombing ops (missions), but does that mean it contained no bomb bay? I’ve today discovered one more copy of a flight logbook having a 159 Squadron and AL557 link), and the airman (pilot) flew six times on AL557, all during practice out of Salbani, India. What is interesting is that two of these flights were listed in the logbook as “BOMBING PRACTICE”.
Two of the other logbooks I have also record “BOMBING PRACTICE” for one of these same flights. In other words, three of the seven airmen whose logbooks have an AL557 link were in the air together on this training flight.
It seems unlikely that AL557 would have been used for this specific bombing practice without a working or semi-functional bomb bay.
On the other hand, clearly AL557 never was flown on actual bombing ops. However, this could be explained by the fact that AL557 only arrived on 159 Squadron at Salbani, India on July 10, 1943 -- during the monsoon season, when 159 Sqn bombing ops were scarce. Only two bombing ops were flown from Salbani from this date until
two weeks later, July 24, when the Liberator II (the early-model Lib on 159 Sqn; AL557 would have been designated a Liberator II) flew its final 159 Sqn op.
After July 24, 159 Sqn flew Mk III Libs (B-24D equivalents) on ops through 1943. So, then, AL557 was sort of late to the party. It would then have been used for training – pilots, navigators, and wireless operators, at the very least, and apparently it was used for general duties.
Of the seven logbook copies I have with a link to AL557, three belonged to pilots, one to a navigator, and three to wireless operator/air gunners whose duties aboard AL557 were wireless operator, not air gunner tasks. I have no idea whether AL557 carried a single gun.
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