For defence against enemy aircraft, PBYs carried four machine guns: two. (Image source: WikiMedia Commons) Although lightly armed, it carried the latest technologyĪ polyvalent warrior, the PBY could be armed with four 1,000-pound bombs, eight depth charges, or two torpedoes attached at drop points beneath the wings. A critical asset in the Pacific, Caribbean, Atlantic, Mediterranean and Arctic theatres of operation, the aircraft’s mission set included dropping anti-shipping mines, aerial reconnaissance, intelligence gathering, search and rescue, anti-submarine patrol, bombing, transport and even troop insertion. (Image source: WikiMedia Commons) It was a true multitasker An Allied Catalina engages the German submarine U-199. The airplane had an operating ceiling of over 15,000 feet, (4,400 metres) and under the right conditions, could stay in the air for up to 20 hours. (200 km/h), with a maximum speed of 180 m.p.h. The PBY’s two Pratt & Whitney 1,200 horse power radial engines were maximized for range and endurance, and could cruise a distance of over 2,500 miles (4,000 km) at 125 m.p.h. She was 63 feet (20 metres) long, 19 feet (six metres) high, with a 104-foot (31 metre) wingspan. (Image source: WikiMedia Commons) It was big and slow, but had amazing endurance A PBY on a long-range patrol over Greenland. Amphibious variants with retractable landing gear were appended by the suffix A, as in PBY-A. ![]() “PB” stands for Patrol Bomber, with “Y” being Consolidated Aircraft Corporation’s manufacturer identification. The prototype first flew from Lake Erie in 1935 and by 1936 the aircraft was in service with the U.S. It was originally designed as a long-range patrol bomber, intended for use to sink shipping and disrupt enemy sea lines of communication. The PBY line of flying boats was conceived in 1933 in Buffalo, New York. (Image source: WikiMedia Commons) It entered service before WW2 Here are seven amazing facts about the Catalina PBY, an aircraft that patrolled the vast reaches of the world’s oceans, looking for an enemy to track, report, or destroy. ![]() It would serve in every maritime theatre of the war while performing an array of missions, from reconnaissance and search-and-rescue to sub-hunting and anti-shipping. THE CONSOLIDATED PBY was not one of the Second World War’s more glamorous warplanes it was a slow and ungainly, twin-engine “ flying boat.” Yet despite its odd appearance, it would go on to become the most numerous and successful amphibious float plane in history. (Image source: WikiMedia Commons) “ It would serve in every maritime theatre of the war while performing an array of missions, from reconnaissance and search-and-rescue to sub-hunting and anti-shipping.” ![]() The Consolidated PBY Catalina: The plane’s boat-shaped fuselage along with its wide ‘parasol-style’ wings mounted above the canopy on a sturdy goose-neck pylon made it instantly recognizable to friend and foe alike.
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