India Bases

1944

Extracts from Email

Ok, for what it's worth, this is the information I have stumbled on, from the personal account of a navigator. There were four B-29 bases in India, one for each Bomb Group, just like the forward bases in China:

40th BG was at Chakulia 
462nd BG was at Piardoba
444th BG was at Dudkhundi
468th BG was at Kharagpur

also refer: http://www.acepilots.com/planes/b29.html  under Bombing Japan

According to the account I have, the Kharagpur airbase was actually called Camp Salua, or sometimes B-1...and was 5-7 miles south of Kharagpur...and Kharagpur was 75 miles west of Calcutta, (my world atlas program says Kharagpur is 67.5 miles west of Calcutta).

Camp Salua consisted of one 10,000 ft runway with a connecting taxiway; off which were the herringbone parking "slots". 

Chakulia is in the atlas as 40 miles NW of Kharagpur. I can't find Piardoba, or Dudkhundi on the map, but I know they are all in the vicinity in West Bengal. I'll keep looking as time permits...

jim...zzz

(--Jim Crosby)

“I took this picture at the NEAM, 58th Bomb Wing Memorial. Flash got in the
way but a great map of the bases in India and China.”

Photo Courtesy Sparkey Corradina