C-53 D-Day Doll Inland Empire Wing
Description:
Base:
Riverside Municipal Airport, Riverside, CA
Website:
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It was built at the Douglas factory in Santa Monica, California. It is one of 159 C-53Ds and was delivered to AAF on July 7, 1943. It was assigned to the 434th Troop Carrier Group and was stationed at various locations (Alliance Field, NE, Baer Field, IN, Fullbeck, UK, and Welford Park, UK) before arriving at Royal Air Force (RAF) Aldermaston, UK in march 1944.
The 434th TCG consisted of HQ and the 71st to 74th Squadrons. Aircraft 830 was assigned to the 72nd Squadron (CU).
The group's D-Day mission was to tow gliders carrying reinforcements to 101st Division troops who had been dropped earlier in the night near Utah Beach.
At 0119, June 6, 1944, 52 of the Group's airplanes, each towing a Waco glider, took off from RAF Aldermaston Airfield for Normandy. Aircraft 830 flew three missions on D-Day and the next day.
While in the ETO it participated in the D-Day invasion, Operation Market Garden in Holland, the re-supply of Bastogne, and the crossing of the Rhine.
It also flew various support missions and wounded evacuations to England.
