1941 to 1945
Places and Faces Photo Album - Page 21
A Special Tribute to the Margolies Crew - Photos and research by Walt Webb
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1941 to 1945
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From Walt Webb
I've been researching a 9th Squadron crew, four of whom were killed in a March 24, 1945, air accident en route to Thailand. Three of those men still are missing in the Ganges Delta region along with their B-24. One of them was a cousin I never really knew (Lt. Edwin E. Scranton). These photos are about this crew, the last two photos are of the Arlington ceremony that I arranged for the families of the three MIAs.
I was able to download
Google Earth and use it in an unusual way--to simulate the Margolies B-24 final descent route across the Ganges
Delta (Mar. 24, 1945) and to visualize what the pilots saw as they crossed these islands at altitudes of 1,000
feet and below. Google Earth allows you to "fly" to any point on a 3D globe, drop to any altitude, tilt
to get an oblique view, and even rotate around the target! The earth coverage comes from satellite imagery. The
detail varies; major cities have the highest resolution. Since I saved the entire descent path, all I have to do
to revisit is to press the "Tour" button and then watch as the path automatically runs!
The 12th and 13th photos are two sample scenes from the simulation, both overviews in tilt mode. I also have views
from the lower heights actually flown by the crippled aircraft along its final path.
The first scene(12th photo) looks S to N across the bailout island where 6 of the crew jumped. Scranton and Cunningham
(chutes didn't open) fell under the plane's path, while the 4 on chutes probably drifted a bit to the NNE, thus
shown displaced slightly in that direction. Cunningham delayed his jump and so is separated from the rest. (A British
air-sea rescue eyewitness recalled seeing the parachutes hanging in the trees "in a perfectly straight line.")
Thirteen miles to the N, the 3 distant targets represent the general area where I believe the plane actually may
have ditched with 4 on board. (Margolies and Reed perished; only Reed was recovered.)
The second scene (13th photo) shows approximately where the 3 crew MIAs may be located. Although the B-24 may have
ditched somewhere along that stretch of the river, it's uncertain whether the submerged wreckage still is there,
lodged in the mud (the B-24 broke into 3 sections), or has drifted farther downstream.
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