The Catalina is coming! Fly-over on Satuday 25th October at the Rathmines Catalina festival! A tightly packed and spectacular air show will have our festival visitors in awe of breathtaking stunts and flying manoeuvres. The awesome Air Acrobatics will start mid morning and one of the main attractions of the festival, the Catalina Fly-over, will happen early afternoon. The Catalina we will see flying over is a PBY-6A. The Catalina was designed in the mid-1930s by Consolidated Aircraft in San Diego, California, USA as a long range maritime patrol boat. Approximately 4,051 Catalina’s were built between 1936 and 1945 of which 171 were delivered to the RAAF. Most Catalina’s are powered by two Pratt & Whitney R-1830-92 engines producing 1200 HP for take-off. They have a cruise speed of 105 to115 knots and a maximum take-off weight of 34,000 pounds. The Catalina which will fly-over, the HARS Catalina, was built in 1945 for the US Navy and as such, saw only limited combat in the Pacific before the war came to an end. When the US Navy ceased using the Catalina’s in 1957, the aircraft was sold and operated by several civilian operators, and eventually by a Chilean company who converted the aircraft into a water bomber for fighting fires. It ended up in Portugal still owned by the Chilean company, on fire fighting duties to the Portuguese. HARS purchased the aircraft in 2003 and ferried it to Wollongong, where a restoration program commenced, and will continue for as long as HARS can keep the aircraft serviceable.
Posted on: Wed, 15 Oct 2014 03:00:45 +0000
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