Taxiway lights on USAAF combat airbases.

[jmfabio]

Hi All. It is me again with a question for those who are more knowledgeable than I am.

Were taxiway lights used on forward combat strips? If not did they use taxiway signs? Did the crews get around ok using landing/taxi lights? How did they find their way to the hardstands in the dark?

I do know from reading that the runway lights in some cases were just a string of lights on wire that were laid on the ground and that wires were easily severed by being run over.

I am currently make Pitoe Drome on Morotai (PTO) and that was a bomber base with 2 parallel runways and around 100 or so hardstands.

From what I have read from pilot accounts of their service at this base most missions were scheduled so that they took of in daylight and landed in daylight. The only night operations were the Snooper radar anti-shipping missions which were dark to dark.

Any thoughts or suggestions are welcome because I am in the dark on this. (Pun intended)

Thanks,

Joe

 

[MrZippy]

I would bet that they used "Follow me" jeeps that led them to the runway.

 

[docjohnson]

If you taxi around one of the bases in the UK during WWII, you will see the layout of it pretty much instantly. And bomber aircrews always had information passed on to them on arrival where the parking spots were. They didn't really need follow me jeeps to get them to the runway. Just to deliver them to the aircraft. In that time I have seen in the histories that they used jeeps, trucks, and bicycles all worked. In the modern day, it was a bus or bread truck that took us to our bomber and they were there waiting for us when we got back. All we had to do was tell them what parking slot our plane was located and they took care of the rest. Now that I think of it, there was one exception to the modern world, bombers on alert were usually reached by aircrews who had a dedicated vehicle (with lights and sirens) to get them to the aircraft in a scramble. Sorry, memories...<laughing>.

 

[pletheron]

By mid 1944, most class-A airfields of the 8th and 9th AF had AFL Mk.II (Drem) as standard at the bare minimum. Some bomber stations also had Contact Lighting (AFL Mk.IV), and from the summer of 1944 most stations were updated with American HILV runway lighting (Hi-Lighting).

Cheers,
Terry

 

[jmfabio]

Thanks for answering,

I understand that bases in England had lighting as USAAF sometimes moved into already built RAF bases.

But to clarify what I am asking:

This is the complex I am modeling. It is from the official publication USAAF's Airdrome Guide Southwest Pacific Area for 5th and 13th Air Forces.

This base was carved out of jungle September 1944 to support the invasion of the Phillipines and invasion of Borneo.
It had low level runway lighting. And as I have modelled the layout scrupulously, you can judge pretty well IN DAYLIGHT where the taxiways are.

But here is the rub: Night operations were conducted from both Pitoe (B-24 anti-shipping) and from Wama (Night Fighters). So, what would be the method of finding your way to and from the runway at night?

Taxiway lights? Taxi/landing lights?

If you were modelling what would you do?

I probably should have posed the question this way right of the bat, because my question was specific in nature and asking it in a general way may have confuse the issue. My apologies.

Thanks,
Joe