British Forces

Baltimore in flames

The fire destroying a Lend-Lease Martin Baltimore for Royal Air Force likely at Takoradi, at that time British Gold Coast Colony, today Ghana, on 21 December 1942. Ramp accident occurred for unknown reason during a stop of the ferry flight from USA to Egypt. The air ferry route over South Atlantic had as point of departure Nassau, Bahamas, for the West Coast of Africa’s bases build by the British at Bathurst, Gambia, Freetown, Sierra Leone, and at Takoradi and Accra in the Gold Coast. From the Western Africa the route went go to Cairo via Khartoum along a way below the Desert occupied by the Axis forces. Obviously only the multi-engines multi-crew planes flew over the Atlantic. The single-seat and the single engine aircrafts arrived to Western Africa disassembled in crates on board of merchant ships and here reassembled for the transfer to Egypt. Victor Sierra