Re: [IRCA] Mystery tone at 1610, 1020 and WWII

["Gil Stacy" <gilstacy@xxxxxxxxx>]

My mother's brother Tom flew with the 500th Sqdn, 345th Bombardment Group,
the "Air Apachees", of the 5th Air Force.  According to Lawrence Hickey's
book, *Warpath Across the Pacific*, the 345th's B-25 Mitchells were deployed
from San Francisco to Hawaii in May of 1943. "No attempt was made to fly in
formation and each plane traveled the route separately....the crews were
alone with 2400 miles of the vast Pacific ahead....the flights were always
begun at night for weather and navigation purposes....if all went well, a
plane would make landfall in 13 hours, just after sunrise...strong head
winds could cause a plane to run out of fuel...only one plane failed to
reach its destination...no trace of it was ever found."


While the Group's deployment was after the implementation of the Hawaiian
Adcock DF antennas coupled with Hallicrafters SX-28 receivers, the above
illustrates what these pilots were up against.  This coupled with, as
Maxwell put it, "dozens of green flight teams just out of flight
school...anxious to get aboard and proceed to the South Pacific area as soon
as possible" and, according to Maxwell's article,  reliance on the plane's
DF loop had some bad consequences in the beginning.  Bear in mind that these
were not the experienced commercial flight crews flying Pan Am China Clipper
Flying Boats from the Mainland to the Hawaiian Islands.  Considering the
vagaries of propagation, "green" air crews, the RDF issues, and the enormous
distance involved with no landmarks scattered along the way, Maxwell's
article certainly has more than just the ring of truth to me, but each is
entitled to his opinion.
73, Gil NN4CW
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