A4 173 Vietnam Operations Update Tery McDonnell

Terry McDonnell A4-!73A4-173-Vietnam-1970 A4-173-Vietnam-1971 A4-173-Vietnam-1972 A4-173-Vietnam-Notes A4-173-Vietnam-1964 A4-173-Vietnam-1965 A4-173-Vietnam-1966 A4-173-Vietnam-1967-Jan-Mar A4-173-Vietnam-1967-Sep-Dec A4-173-Vietnam-1968 A4-173-Vietnam-196

Morning Griff on miserable non-flying day,

Hope you enjoyed the 100th celebrations in Canberra last Wednesday. Looked good on TV. Did you go to Government House?

Ron Cuskelly, whom you may know, is the historian for QAM.  As a project and using various sources including myself, decided to have a close look at A4-173 operations during its time in Vietnam.

He has given his permission for it to be passed on to 35SQN Association and to 35 Squadron at Amberley if deemed suitable. I have told him I would send them on. Could you please circulate as you see fit.

There is a lot of info so I will send in a couple of emails. NOTE the file “Vietnam Locations”. He would like further input to that file to fill in blanks. These are the airfields where 173 operated from. If updates can be forwarded to me I will send them to Ron.

A4-173 is a very, very sad sight at the moment. The wings were removed and it was taken down to the back fence near the cadets compound. Not long after the move, a strong wind swirl came though that area and caused a lot of damage to the tailplane, ripping the rudder off and one of the elevators and blowing them on to the nearby Gannet, causing further damage. The control surfaces were not chocked@@##$$
There is mould pretty much all over the paint work. Supposedly, it will be repainted and have new wings fitted but not sure about spares to fix the tailplane area. If I won lotto (small chance of that) I would allocate funds to its restoration and have it moved back to where it was before.

Regards

Jake