

EAW high resolution North American B-25D Mitchell medium bomber - flyable strafer version for the P38J slot.

Working at the USAAF maintenance depot in Australia in 1942, Capt. "Pappy Gunn" conducted a number of experiments with B-25's and A-20's to get more firepower and destructive capability from the types. His most successful project was to convert medium level bombers into ground attack aircraft by packing the nose full of .50 Caliber machine guns and painting over the glazed nose panels. All the medium bomb squadrons in the SW Pacific, whose ground crews did all the conversion work in the field, rapidly adopted the idea. It became common Practice to completely cover the nose with a painting of the head of the squadron "mascot" which quickly became standardized as squadron markings. There were falcons, bats, tigers, black panthers, dragons etc.


Red Wrath - B-25D-1 serial number 41-30024 - was one of the most famous 498th Bomb Squadron, 345th BG aircraft. This is how she appeared in February 1944 based at Nadzab, New Guinea. She completed some 90 missions, but her ending is a sad story. After its crew finished their tour - some 68 missions - it was passed to the 500th BS who painted out the falcon's head and added a bathing beauty to the left nose. Its new crew named it "Pannel Job" after the pilot, Lt. Ray Pannel. After a period in combat, Lt. Pannel became depressed and began acting erratic. Then on June 11, 1944, while on an operational training flight near Nadzab to break in a new co-pilot, this aircraft inexplicably entered a steep dive from 5000 feet straight into the ocean, taking the pilot, copilot and crew chief with it. Some members of the squadron believed that Lt. Pannel had committed suicide without any regard for his crewmates. Officially they were reported as killed in a flying accident (KIFA).


The original Red Wrath crew members were:

Pilot - 1st Lt. Robert W. Judd
Copilot - 2nd Lt. Lloyd W.Casselman
Navigator / bombadier - 1st Lt. Henry R. Treece
Flight engineer - S/Sgt. William F. Lauer
Top turret gunner - S/Sgt. Melvin C. Malcolm
Radioman / gunner - T/Sgt. Lafred J. Hawkes
Ground Crew Chief - T/Sgt. Edwin L. Bowen


New 3DZ model by Captain Kurt
Skin by DeanH 

To load into your game, drop all files into your EAW folder. Use the included Flt. file to have the flight profile of the plane. Do not use with ECAPanel, because if you open this .exe, it will overwrite the Flt. file with the P38J flight model.

If you want decode te .tpc files into the original .pcx graphics files, simply click on the tpc-pcx exe file included in the folder.

We hope you like her.

Cheers 

Captain Kurt
October 2, 2005


