Evening star., 1948-07-18
'War-Tried Methods
Used by RAF in Short
Hops 10 Supply Berlin
By E. c. Shepherd
North American Newspaper Allion,


LONDON, July 1.-THE Royal Air
Force transport commands S share in
carrying necessities to blockaded
Berlin has been organized on lines
similar to the big air transport
operations which served the ad-
vances of the British Army through
Belgium and Southwest Germany in
the later stages of the war. Thus,
it has been based on a tried system
of air control on relatively short
hauls and on quick turn-round at
both ends. The more than 200 Brit
lsh planes taking part in the great
"alrlift" have flown thousands of air
loads to the former German capital
Taking the fleet of transport air.
craft as it stood at the end of the
first week, the rate of turn-round was
remarkably good. The distance from
the airfleld at Wunstorf, near Han
over, to the Gatow Airfield in Berlin
is just $50 miles. The two-engine
Dakotas fully loaded flew that
journey, were unloaded and back at
Wunstorf within "a hours. The
faster, four-engine Yorks, with
nearly twice the cargo to be un-
loaded, made the same double
journey in 2 hours and 10 minutes.
Russians Check Numbers.
The Russians, apparently distrust-
ing the reports of the high intensity
operation, had observers noting the
identification numbers of all air.
craft using the air corridor to Ber-
lin. However. they must have salts
fled themselves early in the second
week that the same aircraft were
in fact passing to and fro over theis
observation point at intervals of
about liz hours.
If they had been in Belgium early
in 1945 they would have seen an
equal intensity of transport opera
ton for the benefit of the army.
Then the loads were largely fuel
and ammunition for the mechanical
units. I often saw 60 transport
aircraft on an airfield at one time
and the business of bringing in fresh
arrivals and sending out the empties
being conducted in orderly fashion
while trucks, backed up to every
transport, swiftly cleared the loads.
The one boon these operations
needed was reasonably dry weather.
That is even more essential in Ger
many.
German Oversight Corrected.
10 hv
the Germans up to the end OF the
war to make their airfleldS weather.
proof. RunWays were comparatively
few and there were not many peri
meter tracks. Finding good stand
ing ground for fleets of sircraft in
wet weather is still difficult at many
Germaa airfelds.
That trouble was met at Wun-
storf during the first week of the
air service to Berlin. The runway
served we'll for the takeof and land I
ing but for loading and fueling the
aircraft had to be trundled onto the
grass, and flooding soon made this
boggy. Similar trouble would have
been met if the Raj had tried to
use it's normal transport base at
Buckeburg near Minden.
To supplement the stream of land
planes, the British added Sunder-
land fying-boats from the Elbe Es-
tuary near Hamburg. Naturally,
however, the technique of control
ling converging lines of traffic was
worked out on much bigger scale
in the course of wartime ariborne
operations, particularly at Arnhem
and at the crossing of the Rhine.
Experienced Officers on Job.
On some of those operations, about !,
600 aircraft were engaged and were
brought to the rendezvous in three
converging streams. Several air
ffSlds were used for the takeoff and
the rate of departure was one trans
port every half minute. We have
not reached so high a rate in the
Berlin operation and, through the
lack of landing grounds in Berlin,
we could not put such large numbers
into service unless arrangements
we're made to parachute some of
the supplies. Transport command
handled the big wartime lifts and
acquired a measure of skill and ex-
perience in the course OF them.
Many of the officers who organized
and controlled those airborne oper-
ations have lately been engaged in
Germany.
BY comparison the Berlin air lift
was at first a small task and that
explains why it could be put into
effect so quickly and why there was
no immediate attempt to enlarge its
scope.
The mounting of big air trans
port operation directed on one par
ticular objective takes a long time.
The organizing of the departure
points, the working out of time
schedules, the arrangement of re-
turn routes and schedules, the brief
ing of individual pilots and the es-
tablishment of efficient air controls
make the process complicated and
prolonged. In fact. Lord Tedder,
chief of Britain's air staff, has said
that during the advance on Ger