B-26 Marauder Bombing Raids

9th Air Force combat footage showing flying operations by B-26 Marauder bombers at an airfield in East Anglia and bombing missions over northern France including the Cotentin peninsula on D Day 6th June 1944 and in the period immediately afterwards Note: all the aircraft seen here have had invasion stripes painted on to the wings and fuselage as aircraft recognition aids for Allied anti-aircraft gunners. 01:00:03 A stick of 500-pound bombs is dropped by a B-26 Marauder during a mission over northern France, some wobbly camerawork as the cameraman tries to follow the bombs as they fall earthwards: the target near a small French town far below is obscured by big billowing clouds of dust and smoke as more bombs burst: air-to-air shot of several B-26s in flight: an aerial view of an unidentified part of the French coast. 01:00:51 A very brief shot of a B-26 bomber coming into land at an East Anglian airfield. 01:00:53 Various good shots of B-26 bombers (mostly in a drab paint scheme but a few in bare metal finish) as they taxi to the airfield runway and take off 01:01:42 Shots showing three B-26 bombers coming in to land at the end of a bombing mission and a fourth coming in rather high. 01:02:13 The runway controller in a Perspex bubble on the top of his caravan close to the runway as a B-26 bomber takes off. 01:02:18 Shots showing B-26 bombers being rolled back and towed to their dispersal aprons by towing tractors and two fliers and two ground mechanics examining the front undercarriage wheel for flak damage after returning from a raid and examining a piece of shrapnel: the cover for the front undercarriage wheel has been holed by flak. 01:02:46 Aerial views of the invasion fleet in the Bay of the Seine and three B-26 Marauders flying over the French coast at an unidentified location. 01:02:58 Aerial view of a French town: air-to-air shots of B-26s in flight and dropping sticks of 500-pound bombs on to the target far below and  puffs of smoke from bursting flak close to two B-26s: aerial views of an enemy airfield below covered in bomb craters and passing sections of the French countryside.including a river valley. 01:03:40 Views of three B-26s flying over the D Day invasion fleet, six concrete Phoenix caissons for one of the Mulberry harbours being towed across the English Channel; an airstrip somewhere in the Allied beaches in Normandy. 01:03:52 Aerial shots showing a formation of B-26s flying through puffs of exploding flak shells: bombs bursting in and around a French cross-roads town about 5,000 feet below: approaching the French coast on the way back to England. 01:04:44 Murky aerial views of another B-26 in flight alongside the cameraman’s aircraft and invasion shipping in the English Channel. 01:05:11 A formation of B-26 Marauders flying through foggy skies over the invasion fleet. 01:05:30 Aerial views of a mist-covered Bay of the Seine crowded with invasion shipping as the camera aircraft flies in a westerly direction towards the Cotentin Peninsula alongside another B-26 bomber: the countryside divided up into innumerable fields lined with hedgerows and dotted with villages and hamlets: abandoned US  troop-carrying gliders in several fields used by the Americans as landing zones on D Day visible through the low clouds, starting at 01:06:21 and ending at 01:06:44). 01:06:44 Looking back over a section of UTAH Beach with many vessels offshore as the camera aircraft flies in a northerly direction. 01:07:08 Aerial view of a convoy of tank landing ships: looking back at the Bay of the Seine and the Cotentin Peninsula as the cameraman’s aircraft starts its flight across the Channel back to England . 01:07:37 END