B-26 Marauder Picture

coastdef · **Posted:** Sat Jul 10, 2010 12:36 pm

Recently picked up this official photograph of B-26C-25-MO 41-35319 taken at Frederick Army Air Field, OK in July of 1945.

Regards,

Andy

Mgawa · **Posted:** Sat Jul 10, 2010 2:25 pm

Very good image

Please tell me what the nose code mean?

Cheers

Second Air Force · **Posted:** Sat Jul 10, 2010 5:23 pm

Those are codes used by Stateside training establishments, Mgawa. There is a lot of variety of codes that a few of us have been working on "decoding" over the years, often without much success.

I wonder why that airplane ended up way out there so far from the apron? Surely not just for a portrait!

Scott

The Inspector · **Posted:** Sat Jul 10, 2010 6:31 pm

The only thing Baughers site shows is it was sent to Altus on 12/5/45. Any idea of it's combat record? 'cause it sure must have suffered @ the hands of students to be that bedraggled looking from just training. So this photo would have been taken about 5 months before it went to the smelters.

coastdef · **Posted:** Sat Jul 10, 2010 7:24 pm

Good question! The Aviation Archeology accident database show the aircraft being involved in a takeoff accident the day the picture was taken, so that explains the pictures of a well worn trainer sitting out in the grass! Database also shows another accident involving this aircraft at Great Bends, KS in August of 1943.

Regards,

Andy

Second Air Force wrote:

I wonder why that airplane ended up way out there so far from the apron? Surely not just for a portrait!

Scott

Mgawa · **Posted:** Sat Jul 10, 2010 7:41 pm

Thank you

Second Air Force · **Posted:** Sat Jul 10, 2010 9:25 pm

coastdef wrote:

Good question! The Aviation Archeology accident database show the aircraft being involved in a takeoff accident the day the picture was taken, so that explains the pictures of a well worn trainer sitting out in the grass! Database also shows another accident involving this aircraft at Great Bends, KS in August of 1943.

Yep, that makes good sense. It might just be accumulated nastiness, but the right nacelle appears to be pretty oiled-down--maybe they lost the engine and aborted early, ending up in the photo pose........

Thanks for sharing that view of the field.
Scott

bilwor · **Posted:** Sat Jul 10, 2010 11:01 pm

I wonder why the photo lists two Marauders but only shows one? And how do we know which one this is?
bill word

tom d. friedman · **Posted:** Sun Jul 11, 2010 12:43 am

definetely looks war weary!!

coastdef · **Posted:** Sun Jul 11, 2010 7:44 am

On the original print (and the full resolution scan I made), you can read the tail number

. Don't know about the other one, this was just a single photo I picked up with some other ephemera from Frederick AAF on ebay.

Andy

bilwor wrote:

I wonder why the photo lists two Marauders but only shows one? And how do we know which one this is?
bill word

coastdef · **Posted:** Sun Jul 11, 2010 7:54 am

Just looked at the accident database for the other serial number listed; it shows an accident with on the same day as a parked aircraft (not pilot listed). I think the accident report is going to be required to figure this one out; the ramp is on the opposite side of the runway from where the aircraft in the picture ended up...

bilwor wrote:

I wonder why the photo lists two Marauders but only shows one? And how do we know which one this is?
bill word

TonyM · **Posted:** Sun Jul 11, 2010 9:36 pm

It was a non-fatal take-off accident. B-26C # 41-35319 collided with the parked B-26C # 41-35773 after aborting the take-off.
Dont have the full report here in front of me, but that what the code on AAIR tells me. It is a non fatal minor accident.

TonyM.

Second Air Force · **Posted:** Sun Jul 11, 2010 10:17 pm

Using the information that Tony posted, it might be possible that aircraft were being stored/parked on the crosswind taxiway out on the southeast side of the field, hence the location where the photo was taken. I will defer to Andy as to whether Frederick followed this practice. It was not uncommon at the 2AF Heavy and Very Heavy Phase stations to park excess aircraft on the least used taxiways and even on crosswind runways from time-to-time.

Scott

Second Air Force · **Posted:** Mon Jul 12, 2010 1:33 pm

I took the liberty of enlarging the photo a bit and have a new theory:

It looks like the airplane in the photo was taking off from the north/south runway heading south. There are wheel tracks that seem to indicate this. Since the north/south runway parallels the apron, maybe the crew ended up off the runway to the apron side (that's probably when they had the run-in with the other machine) and then aborted and ended up here, facing southeast. I'd originally thought the airplane was sitting further east than it is.

Regardless, that's a nice photo of the Sub-Depot hangar and you can just make out the machine shop also.

Scott

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B-26 Marauder Picture

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