Fujimi A5M2a "Kansen" by Fabio Balzano

Here are photos of my latest Japanese plane:
Mitsubishi A5M2a "Kansen"
IJNAF, 13th Kokutai
PO 1st Class Mori Mitsugo
China, Nanjing, February 1938

This is the old Fujimi kit # C-19/72040 first issued in 1996.
It's still useful for building a good A5M2a, but I found it necessary to make these improvements: pilot seat belts, drilling the exhaust pipes, reshaping the cockpit opening, and reducing the thickness of the wing trailing edges. Other small additions, the ignition cables on the engine cylinders and the pilot's climbing bracket.
Even the decal sheet, rich and well printed, still includes a hinomaru with a too light red and a slightly oversized "4-122" tail code. Two more sets of additional correctly sized numbers are provided, "0" and "1" through "9", but a pair of "2s" is still missing to reconstruct it.

- Fabio Balzano, Italy -

Kawanishi E7K2 "Alf", Nakajima E8N "Dave", Heavy Cruiser "Nachi" 九四式水上偵察機, 重巡洋艦 那智 - video

An amazing but undated video today, spotted in NARA by our friend Patrice Fresnel, featuring the seaplanes operated, under heavy seas, by the Heavy Cruiser "Nachi".

We were able to identify the ship by the tail marking of the "Alf"; "WI-1", visible in this still.

According to Akimoto, the seaplanes of the ship adopted the "WI-" tail marking in July 1942 when she was assigned to the 5th Fleet. 

Wiki mentions: "After a refit at Yokosuka Naval Arsenal from 14–30 July, Nachi was reassigned to the IJN 5th Fleet with Kiso and Tama."

Combinedfleet is more specific: 

"14 July 1942: Arrives at Yokosuka. Refit. That day, NACHI is reassigned to the Fifth Fleet's CruDiv 21 with KISO and TAMA.

24-30 July 1942: Drydocked at Yokosuka Navy Yard."

Akimoto mentions that "Nachi" changed her Nakajima E8N "Dave" and Kawanishi E7K2 "Alf" floatplanes to Mitsubishi F1M "Pete" and Aichi E13A "Jake" in 1943, no specific date given. 

Wiki says: "She continued patrols of the Kurile Islands though March 1943"

But combinedfleet is more detailed regarding the ship's movent during that period and mentions that "Nachi" was traveling between Ominato in Honshu, Paramushir and Otaru in Hokkaido, from August 2, 1942, until January 29, 1943. 

Between February 5 and 27, 1943, the ship is undergoing refit in Sasebo. I believe this is when she changed her seaplanes.

So, taking into concideration the above information, we can conclude that the video was shot some time between August 2, 1942, and January 29, 1943, while the ship was in the seas north of Japan, patroling the Chishima (Kurile) Islands.

Did you notice that the "Alf" has no yellow IFF stripes?

Merci beacoup Patrice for the fantastic video!

Kawanishi H6K "Mavis", "Bouquet of the South Seas" 川西 H6K 九七式飛行艇, 南海の花束 - video

A short clip from the movie "Nankai no Hanataba" (Bouquet of the South Seas), features a majestic Kawanishi H6K "Mavis" taking off and alighting.

The particular aircraft, c/n52, was nicknamed "Sazanami" (rippling waves) and had the civilian registration J-BFOY. 

It belonged to the fleet of the Dai Nippon Koku and had a rather short career operating from Palau Islands. On February 1, 1941, after taking off from Saipan had engine trouble and was forced to make an emergency alighting at Chichijima Island. 

On March 8, 1942, a repetition of the previous incident found the flying boat having to make an emergency alighting at Chichijima Island. After fixing the plane, the crew tried to take off but the waves were strong and the plane was seriously damaged.

"Nankai no Hanataba" (Bouquet of the South Seas) is a Japanese film produced by Toho Film in 1942. Based on Ryuichiro Yagi's play "The Equator," the film depicts the branch chief and pilots who develop a civil air route across the equator in the South Seas Islands, which were under Japanese mandate at the time. With the support of Dai Nippon Airways, the film features actual aircraft such as the Type 97 flying boat (Mavis) that was actually in service on the South Pacific route, and the film also uses footage of the actual aircraft in the maintenance scenes and takeoffs and landings.

According to assistant director Kon Ichikawa, filming took place in Palau, which was under Japanese mandate just before the Pacific War began. They left Yokohama in August 1941 on a large Kawanishi four-engine seaplane, but Abe did not like the script, and filming did not progress even in November. Ichikawa, fed up with the staff's anxiety over the outbreak of war between Japan and the United States, urged Abe to quit, and filming finally began. Filming was completed on December 8, just one week before the war, on a cargo ship. Ichikawa later testified, "If filming had been delayed even a little longer, we might not have returned alive. We were lucky to escape with our lives."