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The Dragon and his Tail by Stan Stokes.
The only flyable B-24 Liberator aircraft in the world, serial no. 44-44052 is the aircraft owned and operated by the Collings Foundation, and named after The Dragon and His Tail, a lavishly decorated B-24 that flew in the Pacific during WW II. The B-24 did not get the attention or fame of the B-17 either during or after the War. With longer range and bigger bomb loads than the B-17 the B-24s were generally based far from London. As a result, most war correspondents looked for stories at the B-17 fields and avoided the long treks to the B-24 fields. The B-17 also looked more modern and more powerful, although this was not an accurate assessment. The B-24 that has been restored by the Collings Foundation was built in August 1944 by Consolidated Aircraft at the companys huge Ft. Worth assembly plant. Originally delivered to the USAAF the aircraft was shortly transferred to the Royal Air Force. Under British Flag the plane saw combat service in the Pacific in operations ranging from anti-shipping to bombing, to re-supply. At Wars end she was abandoned to an aircraft graveyard in Khanpur, India. In 1948 the aircraft was restored by the Indian Air Force and it saw service until 1968. She sat abandoned in India until 1981 when famed British aircraft collector, Doug Arnold, purchased her and had her disassembled for shipment back to England. She was sold in 1984 in as is condition to the Collings Foundation and was returned to America in 1984. Restoration commenced in 1985 with General Dynamics acting as a major sponsor of the restoration. More than 420,000 rivets were replaced during the restoration that involved rebuilding more than 80% of the aircraft's parts. The completed B-24 was originally named All American in honor of an Army Air Force B-24 of the same name. The original All American shot down fourteen enemy fighters in a raid over Germany on July 25, 1944. That aircraft was lost on a combat mission when it was shot down over Yugoslavia in October of 1944. In 1998 the Collings Foundation renamed its B-24 The Dragon and its Tail to honor an aircraft than served with the 64th Bomb Squadron of the 43rd Bomb Group in the Pacific. The original Dragon survived the War, and was the last B-24 scrapped in Arizona. In Stan Stokes marvelous painting the original Dragon is depicted during a typical anti-shipping mission. |
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