VH-MMF Douglas
DC-3CS1C3G
(c/n 12540)
Above is a rare shot (by Phil
McCulloch via Geoff Goodall) of a DC-3 in MacRobertson Miller
Aviation
Co Ltd titling at Wyndham, WA in July 1949. Built as a
C-47A-10-DK Skytrain for the
USAAF
with serial 42-92709 it was
immediately seconded to the RAAF
as A65-41 (call sign
VHCUK). Civilianized in February 1949 from RAAF Tocumwal
stocks, it went
to MMA as an
air
freighter for the Air Beef scheme and was named 'Durack'.
Note the windows
still have their
military
gun holes. The epic Air Beef operation
carried freshly killed beef from cattle
stations in the
far north
Kimberley district of WA to the meatworks at
Wyndham, and was
operated for many
years by
MMA DC-3s and ANA Bristol Freighters in
arduous hot weather
conditions year round.
VH-MMF
was later converted to 25
passenger configuration and renamed 'RMA
Fortesque'.
My shot below (#
2) showing it with that latter name was obtained from MacRobertson
Miller
Airlines in the
1960s, while Nigel Daw's photo (# 3), taken a decade later illustrates
it in identical
pose at Adelaide
on 14 March 1970 whilst it was on its ferry flight from Perth to Ansett
Airlines
of Papua New
Guinea, still in full MMA metallic scheme. (MMA never did utilize
white cabin top-
ping, even up until
the time of
their take-over by Ansett). It had been retired with the
other MMA
DC-3s in
late 1968
and stored pending disposal, but was pressed back into MMA service in
Nov
1969 on freight
work out of Port Hedland, then on the Perth-Kalgoorlie passenger
service in Dec
1969 for 3 months
before its sale to Ansett Airlines of PNG on 9 March 1970.
It remained in
New Guinea
until 1973, and in 1974 was leased to the short-lived Air Tasmania who
later purchased
it.
Image # 4 below (from the Geoff Goodall collection) saw it
at Essendon in August 1974 whilst
freighting for Air
Trasmania, albeit still in basic Ansett Airlines of Papua/NewGuinea
livery. .After
that (September
1977) it was sold to the Melbourne night freight operator Forrestair
Pty Ltd.
Following a
relocation to Camden, NSW, in the
1980s the aircraft was involved
in some film work
on the movie
"Sky Pirates". It was later
(around 2002) moved to Bankstown where it is now the
subject of a
restoration project,
although just what the status of this is,
I have no idea.
Footnote: The ex ANA DC-3 VH-ANW (c/n 13624) became part
of a
McDonalds restaurant
attraction at Midland, Perth in the late 1980s and was displayed in
fictitious MMA markings as
VH-MMF. No relation to the above aircraft whatsoever.
2.
3.
4.
