Stranraer Print

[Sharps '63]

I have a 24" X 20" colour print of a "Stranraer" biplane flying boat by Graham Wragg.

The aircraft is wearing RCN/RCAF (?) roundels and is depicted banking over the inner harbour of Vancouver with the Lions Gate Bridge in the background, directly over the mudflats (salt chuck) of the North Shore. It was published by the Canadian Museum Of Flight And Transportation, circa ..... ?

The aircraft is carrying bombs under the bottom wing and the pilot and a goggled observer are clearing shown. The aircraft is numbered: FY and B, flanking the fuselage roundel, with 915 under the stabilizer. There is a slight tear on the left edge which could be covered by proper framing.

Free to a good home that will appreciate it, in the interest of preserving the memory of an old war horse.

 

[john@]

I'd be interested, where are you located?

 

[Sharps '63]

Sorry - gone to a man whose father flew in the type.

 

[smellie]

Good home for it!

When my Dad was terminally ill, I was able to talk the CATP Museum out of their last copy of a photo of the CWHM Hurricane in flight. Dad worked on that exact airplane every day while it was stationed at Boundary Bay, then at Tofino. Dad spent HOURS staring at his beloved Hurricane......

Just pictures, but they can mean so much.

 

[Rule 303]

FY*B Stranraer was in 4 Sqn from Aug 39 to May 1942.

 

[Sharps '63]

Thanks! Stationed where?

FY*B Stranraer was in 4 Sqn from Aug 39 to May 1942.

 

[Da Moose]

Thanks again Sharps '63.

I just checked the above comments and my father's log book. He never flew in Stranraer 915 but did fly in many others. The crews referred to them as the "Whistling Birdcage" due to the sound made by the wires bracing the wings on this bi-plane flying boat. Unfortunately I've never figured out how to post pictures on Gunnutz. Maybe someone else can do the honours.

He was a Wireless Operator/Air Gunner with No. 4 Bombing and Reconnaissance Squadron flying out of RCAF Station Ucluelet from December 1941 until May 1943. He had about 600 hours in Stranraers before they switched over to Canso A's in early 1943. When the threat of attack by Japanese submarines lessened many of the 4BR airmen were moved to 160 BR at Sea Island for May and June then sent to Yarmouth, Nova Scotia for eventual transition overseas. After seven months at RCAF Yarmouth he was sent to RAF Alness in Scotland where they flew anti u-boat patrols over the North Sea.

He and ten other Canadian airmen were killed on November 26, 1944 soon after Sunderland DD851 lost an engine after take off then crashed and burned on the railway tracks two miles northeast of the Invergordon Railway Station. They are all buried at the Air Force Cemetery at Harrogate, Yorkshire.

 

[diopter]

http://www.internetmodeler.com/2004/december/galleria/supermarine_boats.php

http://www.airliners.net/search/pho...order=photo_id+desc&page_limit=15&thumbnails=