Here is a new article concerning the glider snatch published in the Joint Forces Quarterly.  It gives you detailed data on all, non-practice, snatches done in all theatres and gives you first hand information from two men who did thousands of snatches during the WWII period.  

http://www.ndu.edu/inss/Press/jfq_pages/editions/i48/29.pdf

Charles L. Day

Silent Ones, WWII Invasion Glider Test & Experiment

Charles,

Very interesting article on a little known aspect of glider operations.

Thanks for the posting.

R. Watkins

Thank you, I wrote the article. 

I'm always looking for more information on snatch pickup.  I suspect there are more than listed in Table 1.

Keith...On a related subject...the Impact series of books consolidating the Impact issues during the war...there is a photo of a similar use of the glider snatch pickup of the recovery of a P-47 fighter by a B-17 tow airplane....the propellor was removed and an engine lifting attachment, replacing the propellor,
 was used to connect the tow rope to the B-17....the B-17 had a modification for towing provision to tow gliders/fighters or whatever.
 
The glider tow provision is shown in the B-17G Illuistrated Parts Breakdown.
 
Jim :-)

James S. Peters Sr. T/Sgt
B-17 Flt Engr, 27 missions
99 BG, 348BS, 5th Wing, 15th AAF
Tortorella, (Foggia#2), Italy
My Tour was from 12/03/44-06/19/45
M/Sgt USAF (Retired)

Jim,

Please tell me more about these Impact books. 

Somewhere I have seen images on the internet, made I think in late 1940's, in the desert(?).  A B-17 is snatching aircraft but it apparntly did not use the winch system that had been developed by All American and tested at CCAAF, Wilmington Ohio.  Early fighter retrieval tests were done at CCAAF in 1943-44 using a B-23 to snatch a Stinson and a BT-13 (currently in the NASM inventory) with the propellors removed.  I don't believe the system was ever used during WWII for snatching fighters.  At least two CG-4A gliders also were converted as flying workshops for doing in-field fighter repairs; also never used to my knowledge.  

Charles Day    

Charles,

The attached image is of the cover of the first edition of
IMPACT published by the USAAF from April 1943 thru
Jan 1945. The entire series was originally re-printed in
1989 by James Parton & Co., Inc. In 1989 the National
Historical Society re-printed this series in a 10 volume
hard cover book set.
The Library of Congress Catalog Card Number of this
series is as follows; 79-91997

Hope this is of some help to you.

Bob

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You got me on this one Jim.  I defer to Gliderman1 as the authority in the unusual.

Since the CG-10A didn't get snatched in the field (just operationally accepted), I've concentrated on the operational snatch pickup experience that was done. 

Taking a stab in the dark here, perhaps the P-47 application was in the Pacific?  Short airstrips with busted aircraft to extract? 

Pacific theater was more creative in snatch pickup than the european theater.  CBI was the poster child for snatch application.  Pending documentation verification, there were CG-4A snatch pickups in the PI after Operation Gypsy Task Force that didn't go into the article.  Search continues...

It may have been an experiment...I will have to find my set first, in order to tell for sure...I recall the tow aircraft was a B-17. The second photo shows the P-47 airborne.
 
Jim :-)

James S. Peters Sr. T/Sgt
B-17 Flt Engr, 27 missions
99 BG, 348BS, 5th Wing, 15th AAF
Tortorella, (Foggia#2), Italy
My Tour was from 12/03/44-06/19/45
M/Sgt USAF (Retired)

As a side note to this discussion, before his wartime death, Richard C. du Pont, Glider program assistant to General Arnold and president of All American Aviation (later Allegheny Airlines), was in the process of putting together numbers in feasibility for a short haul U.S. air transport system based on glider exchanges. He proposed a postwar plan, supported by projections, whereby cargo gliders would be delivered and picked-up at scheduled intervals along established routes by DC-3 class airplanes.
 
Part of the prevailing postwar aviation optimism? Perhaps, but an interesting concept.
-Adrian
 
 

Adrian, can you supply origin of this info.? 

It would complement the fact that Richard tried to get a 1,000 article contract for the Bowlus designed XCG-16 as a purchase made by the Commerce Dept. rather than normal channels of the USAAF.  This was after the glider engineers and test pilots at Wright Field had turned down the design as not meeting military needs.  Despite this, the push was continued by brother Felix after Richard was killed jumping from the civilian model of the XCG-16.

Charles Day

It's in "The Airway to Everywhere, A History of All American Aviation" Lewis & Trimble 1988, pgs 115-116. 

I also saved a screen capture from Hagley library's online summary in their database search engine.  Two sentences allude to CAB's rejection of Richard duPont's passenger vision for commerical neighborhood pickup.  I'll have to email that file to you since it's .pdf and not a picture format that can be posted here.

It's in "The Airway to Everywhere, A History of All American Aviation" Lewis & Trimble 1988, pgs 115-116.

 
I'm not familiar with AN AIRWAY TO EVERYWHERE… . My reference was to a five page article that appeared in the January, 1943, MECHANICAL ENGINEERING tech journal. Du Pont was killed in September, same year. -Adrian

Omega7, any chance of sending or posting that article?  I'd like to read his thinking, he was a successful innovator.

....any chance of sending or posting that article?

 
I no longer have access to the original article. I retained my hand written notes derived from it, taken years ago in the technical library at the firm from which I ultimately retired.
Mechanical Engineering is the organ of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. The referenced article, written by Richard C. du Pont, was entitled: "Cargo Glider Pickup", appeared on pages 35-39 of the January, 1943 issue. This article may be available from the research archives of some tech libraries. –Adrian

Just an aside comment: I have read about the glider snatch pick ups in many books, but when I asked my father about it he said that it was not mentioned in the basic or advanced glider schools he attended in ’43 in Dalhart and Lubbock, TX. So I gather it must have been developed later in the war.
(FYI: His class was "redirected" to various aircrew training schools just days before graduation based on the needs of the service. About half way through radio/gunner training he was offered the opportunity to go back to glider school, but he elected not to do so.)

Nextgen,  what was your father's name?

without getting out research material to establish exact dates, the model 80 in the C-47 was ready summer, to late 1943. Baer Field, Ft. Wayne, IN was a training/jump off for England.  C-47 pilots and crew chiefs received snatch and winch training there, probably beginning middle 1944.

As of April 1944, 108 C-47w/80 were available in England. On arrival 54 winches were ordered removed by an unnamed high ranking TC officer.  Shorlly, 20 of the remaining winches were runied  by untrained crews operating the systems (at this point it was probalby dumb luck that some of the 20 C-47's were not  destroyed  or seriouly damaged).  3 May 1944 an All American factory representative had arrived in England and for a month conducted training on the winch and snatch, attempting to train two crews in each squadron.  For reasons unknown to me, none of the crews in the U.S. (who by that time) were successfully using the system were transferred to England.  By August 6, 1944 TCC traded 12 C-47w/80 to the Brits and ordered all but 10 of the remaining winches removed from the C-47's.

Had this not been a command involved directly in combat, I believe the unnamed TCC officer who ordered  these removals  would have been court martialed.

Charles Day

 

Silent Ones, WWII Invasion Glider Test & Experiment

Somewhere I have seen images on the internet, made I think in late 1940's, in the desert(?). A B-17 is snatching aircraft but it apparntly did not use the winch system that had been developed by All American and tested at CCAAF

 
Pick up tests were carried out by Air Technical Service Command’s Equipment Lab at Muroc Army Air field between Oct. 20 and 28, 1944, apparently using funds from Project MX-548. Tests involved P-47 and P-51 airplanes recovered by C-47s, B-17s & B-25s.
 
Attached is what IMPACT captioned : "Electric winch in this C-47 resembles larger installation in B-17", suggesting the testing of variations. Recoveries were made using fighters with and without propellers. Upon arrival at the destination, normal glider releases were made in cases of prop-less airplanes, whereas those still equipped with props required the pilot to detonate "explosive connector links".
 -Adrian

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Adrian and Charles.....My -4 shows only a simple clamp assy, that was attached to the tail gunner's MG support post, that says it was for towing a target..but does not show a winch that would be necessary and heavy enough to tow another aircraft.
 
My -4 is dated Basic 1 September 1945 with the Revision of 15 March 1955.
 
Jim ;-)

James S. Peters Sr. T/Sgt
B-17 Flt Engr, 27 missions
99 BG, 348BS, 5th Wing, 15th AAF
Tortorella, (Foggia#2), Italy
My Tour was from 12/03/44-06/19/45
M/Sgt USAF (Retired)

Jim,
I used pictures in my book of P-47, B-17 and P-38 at CCAAF rigged with a trailing line which appears to have a stabilzing weight or small windsock and the hook.  I do not have details of the setup, but based on the length of the aircraft, the line appears to have been 30 to 40 feet long.  These were tow taget snatches, no winch. 

The image in Adrian's posting is the model 80 winch as in the C-47. This was 8,000 lb max. capacity snatch.  With C-47/model 80, empty CG-13A and Horsa gliders were snatched.  The model 160 winch was large enough, it's width would have filled the doorway of the C-47.
 
The original disabled figher recovery snatches were done at CCAAF middle of 1943, using B-23 #39-28 with model 40 winch (4,000lb) snatching  BT-13  #41-22124 (NASM collection in storage) and Stinson  XC-81D #43-7280  (purported to be the mail snatch Stinson on display in the U.S. Postal Museum).  The BT-13, sans propellor, also was test towed from the ground using a C-60.

The B-17 used to snatch larger gliders had the model 160 winch installed. I do not have exact measurements of the installation but the snatch cable came through the B-17 fuselage at a point just forward of the center line of the vertical stabliizer. The winch in its frame would have been about eight feet forward of that point.

I don't have infomation on the snatches at Muroc in 1944, but I doubt they were done without a winch. At that time to my knowledge ther was only one B-17 with a winch. I woudl bet that crews form CCAAF flew the C-47, B-17 and B-25 to Muroc for the tests.  If these these tests wer edone without a winch, I would almost bet that the reason the tests were done at Muroc is that CCAAF or Wright were too visible in case they killed someone and/or jerked the fighters apart.

Adrian, does the Muroc information say to what part of the with-propellor-fighter the tow line was attached with the explosive disconnect?
 
Charles Day

Silent Ones, WWII Invasion Glider Test & Experiment

Adrian, does the Muroc information say to what part of the with-propellor-fighter the tow line was attached with the explosive disconnect?

 
Charles – Best that I can do with the photo. The explosive link is the large cylinder on the towline just ahead of the prop hub. Note fully feathered prop lashed to what looks like the main gear.
 
Muroc (now Edwards AFB) was likely selected for flight testing as Rogers Dry Lakebed provided an abundance of emergency landing area. -Adrian

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