Kolkata :
On Saturday, a unique memorial service was organized at the Rasgovindpur Airstrip (also known as the Amarda Road Airfield) in Odisha to honour 14 airmen of the Royal Air Force (RAF) who were killed in a mid-air collision between two B-24 Liberator bombers on July 26, 1945. It was Bhubaneswar-based war historian Anil Dhir who dug up this historical fact. He along with Aditya Patnaik of the Gandhi Eye Hospital and school children were among those who laid wreaths in memory of the dead airmen.
“Very few people are aware that 69 years ago two Liberators (EW225 and EW247) collided at low altitude during a practice flight. They were part of a six-aircraft contingent from the Air Fighting Training Unit engaged in a formation flying exercise. The Rasgovindpur Airstrip had the longest runway in Asia (more than 3.5 km). The total length of the runway, taxiways and aprons was more than 60 km. Part of the runway (nearly 11,000 feet) still remains but there is no activity save for the grazing of cattle. This airfield played a very crucial role in the defence of India during World War II. It was a forward airbase against the Japanese and was used for ‘Over the Hump’ operations as well as training pilots for special bombing raids. Unfortunately, there aren’t any details available of the activities that took place here between 1943 and 1945, even in military archives,” Dhir says.
It was during a visit to the Madras military cemetery that Dhir came across the graves of 14 airmen who were killed at the Amarda Road Airstrip crash. It took a lot of doing on his part to find out that the 900 acre airstrip was built at a cost of Rs 3 crore in the 1940’s. During his research, Dhir received assistance from Matthew J Poole from the USA who has studied the crash and prepared a report. With Poole’s assistance, Dhir was able to locate the relatives of none of those killed in the air crash. One of them is 101 years old now.
“The two aircrafts took off from the airfield in Odisha but the crash took place over West Bengal. The debris was strewn across flooded paddy fields in Bengal. I have requested both the Odisha and Bengal governments to erect small memorials at the airfield and the crash site to honour the brave souls who gave up their lives for the defence of our motherland,” Dhir added.
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> City> Kolkata / by Jayanta Gupta, TNN / July 29th, 2014