Showing posts with label Amiot 143/143M. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Amiot 143/143M. Show all posts

Monday, 18 September 2017

Amiot 143, various foreign users

A little bit later than usual but now it's the turn for the foreign users of this French medium bomber as France wasn't the only one to employ it.
The Air Force of the Independent State of Croatia apparently received one of them and used it, probably, for training purposes. However as we couldn't find any graphical evidence, the drawing should be considered as speculative.
The Vichy French Air Force got some of the bombers that weren't destroyed after the French armistice, and gathered them in Istres, southern France in order to use them as transports to send them to take part in the Syria-Lebanon campaign, which is why they created the G.T. I/15 meaning Groupe de Transport or Transport Group on 14th July 1941 and became the G.T. III/15 in October of that same year. However, as the Syria-Lebanon campaign finished just in July 1941, they were never sent to Syria and were based in the French North Africa, mainly in Algeria and Morocco where most of them were destroyed during Operation Torch with some of them, belonging to the G.T. I/36 (a reformed G.T. III/15) being used during the Tunisian Campaign in January 1943. Anyway, all of them were scrapped in early 1944.
The Polish Air Force in France, employed some Amiot 143M as bomber trainers, mainly in the bomber flying school of Lyon-Bron and Caen. During the last days of the French Campaign in June 1940 they were used to evacuate personnel to Southern France.
Regarding the Spanish Republican Air Force, there were several reports of them being used in the early days of the Spanish Civil War, but they seem to be erroneus, as there aren't any significal evidence of the airplane flying in that conflict. We couldn't however let the oportunity pass and painted one of them with the colours of the FARE (Fuerzas Aéreas Republicanas Españolas - Spanish Republican Air Forces) to see how it could have looked like.













Sources:
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiot_143
2. https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiot_143 (translated)
3. Signal Squadron - Aircraft In action -  French Bombers of World War II in Action
4. http://bioold.science.ku.dk/drnash/model/spain/didnt.html

Saturday, 16 September 2017

Amiot 143/143M - French Users

We have decided to change our system of chosing what airplane to draw next. As the previous system was too strict, now we decide, inside its corresponding letter, which ones to do, which ones will be leave for another moment and which ones to give priority. This way we favour quality over quantity. But let's get started with today's post itself.
The Amiot 143 was a French medium bomber designed to meet a specification from 1928 for a bomber able of performing day and night bombing runs and long range recconnaissance missions.
They entered service with the Armée de l'Air (French Air Force) back in July 1935 with the deliveries being followed during 1936, 1937 and until March 1938 when it was declared outdated and was decided to be replaced by the more modern Bloch M.B.131, however, at the outbreak of the World War II in September 1939, five metropolitan squadrons and an African one were equipped with the Amiot 143. During the Phoney War period (the stage of the war going from September 1939 to May 1940) the Amiot 143 squadrons carried out reconnaissance and leaflet dropping missions over Germany and around 87 143M were still in active role at the frontlines in May 1940, 50 of them in metropolitan squadrons, more exactly G.B. I/34 and II/34 in the north, I/38 and II/38 in the East and 17 of them in service with the African G.B.II/63 that was already in process of transitioning into the Martin 167F . When the Battle of France started in May 1940 as the type was already seriously outdated, it was relegated to night bombing against German airfields and communications hubs with, surprisingly low losses with the exception of a daylight raid when 10 Amiot 143M from the G.B.I/34, II/34 and II/38 commanded by the Commandant de Laubier attacked German brigdeheads in Sedan on 14 May 1940. They were escorted by fighters but two of them were shot down and a third one had to force-land before reaching their base.

Sources:
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amiot_143
2. Signal Squadron - Aircraft In action 189 - French Bombers of World War II in Action