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Aviation History
1942
1942 - 2226.PDF
vV 0' T„A P< *^M?? \*\ ¥ j^ 45! \ c \o<\ US? V^> F LI G H AIRCRAFT FOR T MIDDLE E 942 Fighters Shipped to West Africa and Flown Across the Continent to Reinforce the Desert Air Strength A VITAL link in the supply of aircraft to Africa and the Middle East is an airfield on the British West African coast. It is here that crated machines, which have been shipped from Britain, are unpacked, erected and tested before being flown across Africa by the pilots who will later use them on opera tions. Making an airfield in this area was no small task because it meant clearing a vast area of virgin The Hurricane fuselage is unpacked by West African labourers and wheeled to the erection shed. A crated Hurricane arriving at the assembly point. The road appears to be a track through the forest. The»contents of the crate—fuselage, wings, tail units, long- range fuel tanks, etc.—on their way to the erection hangar. Above and on the right are two photographs taken during the initial stages of clearing the airfield from virgin forest. The trees which are being felled are Rumn palms. These supply the local timber for rough building. tropical forest before runways of sufficient strength to support modem aircraft could be built. However, with much hard work, ingenuity, enterprise and the cheerful co-operation of the West African workpeople, it was finally finished and equipped. It is obvious that this arrangement has clipped many days—even weeks— off the time taken to deliver aircraft by ship to Suez.
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