Berlin Airlift

21 June 1948/23 September 1949

by
Arthur Pearcy Jr AMRAeS

The humanitarian Berlin Airlift began on 21 June 1948. It was initiated to defeat the blockade which had been gradually imposed by the USSR upon the three Western sectors of the city. For political purposes, the Russians had suspended all traffic by road, rail and inland waterway between Berlin and the Western Zone of Germany, which was controlled by France, the United Kingdom and the USA.

First signs that the Western Sector of Berlin might have to rely entirely upon an air freight service for its existence were noticed in the Spring of 1948, and it was in April that stockpiling of supplies for occupation forces in Berlin started under "Operation Counterpunch" by the US

.

The Royal Air Force put "Operation Knicker" into operation on the morning of 24 June 1948 when six Dakotas flew between Wunstorf and Gatow in the British sector of Berlin. They carried between them a daily load of 60 tons of food and other essential supplies, and most people accepted the service as a supplementary one to the normal road, rail and canal supply routes, which would last perhaps a few days - until repairs which the Russians said they were carrying out to the railway line, were completed. But hardly had "Knicker" begun when the situation worsened, and a more elaborate freight service took its place, and four days later "Knicker" became "Carter Paterson," and three weeks later "Plainfare." It was 26 June when 32 C-47 Skytrain flights from the USAF base at Wiesbaden hauled 80 tons of supplies into the airfield at Templehof in the heart of the city.

The USAF (Europe) had fewer than 100 C-47s based at various locations, many belonging to the European Air Transport Service (EATS) which flew an airline type logistic service in Europe. Within three weeks the 60th Troop Carrier Group had mustered 105 C-47s, but the C-54 Skymaster was available and found more suitable and so bore the brunt of the US effort in the airlift. By 1 October 1948 the USAF Skytrain was withdrawn, leaving the RAF and civil operators to fly the Dakota in Gatow and the new airfield in the French zone, Tegel. By this time the US operated their task under Operation "Vittles."

In mid-September 1948 the RAF Dakota force based at Lubeck was augmented by the arrival of 12 Dakota crews from the Royal Australian Air Force. In October 10 crews from the South African Air Force followed, and finally 3 Dakota crews from the Royal

New Zealand Air Force arrived in November. All the Commonwealth crews flew many sorties and operated continuously until the end of the airlift, making an extremely valuable contribution to the success of Operation "Plainfare."

As the daily airlift tonnage requirement grew, it was soon realized that sufficient military transports could not be spared to provide the necessary lifting capacity. For this reason, civilian aircraft were chartered commencing 4 August 1948 to bridge the gap. Nearly 20 civil Dakotas were utilized. Payloads of individual Dakotas varied, the problem being solved by 16 August 1948 when all civilian Dakotas began operating with uniform 7,480 lb payloads.

Operation "Plainfare" and "Vittles" was the greatest air transport operation of all time, and keeping it going was an extremely complicated business. So many aircraft were flying along the three narrow corridors that special flight rules had to be devised to prevent collisions. The utmost accuracy was required by aircrews to keep the aircraft in their correct positions in the streams that flowed day and night into Berlin. Pilots were required to exercise great skill, particularly when making their final approaches to the three Berlin airfields - Gatow, Templehof and Tegel. If for some reason they could not land at the first attempt, they had to return to their parent base, for there was no way aircraft could be held orbiting in the circuits which had become the busiest in the world. At times the weather was below the pilot's minimum. On the night of 2 July 1948 it rained so hard at Wunstorf that 26 Dakotas were put out of service by electrical faults. Landing aids in use at the airfields in Berlin included Ground Control Approach (GCA) and Blind Approach Beam Systems (BABS).

The overall statistics were encouraging and by the end of December 1948 the airlift had been operating into Gatow for 187 days, and an average of 278 landings had been made every 24 hours. Gatow had become the busiest airfield in the world, handling 321,620 metric tons of freight. The GCA radar had assisted 3,654 aircraft, and only a small percentage had been forced to overshoot. Due to fog, landings at Gatow on 22, 23 and 24 December were curtailed. By 9 March 1949 the 50,000th passenger was back-loaded from Gatow to Lubeck in an RAF Dakota. It was a small girl.

The Douglas Dakota was available in large numbers, many not in service but in storage at maintenance units located at Silloth and Kirkbride in Cumberland, and Little Rissington in Gloucestershire

crashed inside the Russian Zone, these being:

KP223 c/n 33440 on 17 November 1948
KN491c/n 33009 on 24 January 1949 and
KJ970 c/n 26264 on 22 March 1949.

There were 14 accidents involving RAF

Dakotas when the transport was required to be salvaged. At 1922 hours local time on 23 September 1949, Dakota KN652 c/n 33346 touched down on the 6,000 ft runway at Gatow. Some 52 minutes earlier it had taken off from Lubeck. On the Dakota's nose there was an inscription which read: "Positively the last load from Lubeck, 73,705 tons. Psalm 21, Verse 11.~' The first part of the message was clear enough but the Biblical reference was somewhat puzzling to the personnel who unloaded the cargo. Later, however some of the more curious took the trouble to look it up. It read: "For they intended evil against thee; they imagined a mischievous device, which they are not able to perform." An assortment of Allied aircraft were involved in the airlift but it was six RAF Dakotas which commenced the operation on 24 June 1948, followed two days later by 32 flights by USAF C-47 Skytrains. Within weeks the Allies created a bridge across the sky that won the battle for the hearts - and bellies - of 2.5 million Berliners.

Post Script ~ This article was published in the DC-3/Dakota Journal prior to Arthur Pearcy passing away in Feb. 1998.

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