AP 118 · No. 10 Section II · Aircraft Plate 107 / 247

Plate 107 of 247 · Second World War · Attack bomber

Douglas A-20G Havoc

A-20G-45-DO Havoc, 43-22200, painted as 43-22200, a Douglas A-20G-45-DO Havoc built at Santa Monica and shown at the National Museum of the United States Air Force in Dayton, Ohio, painted as A-20G 43-21475 ‘Little Joe’, tail letter T, of the 389th Bomb Squadron, 312th Bomb Group, after its 150th mission: Douglas’s fast twin-engined attack bomber, a shoulder-wing monoplane with two Wright R-2600 Cyclone radials, a solid gun nose with six .50 calibre machine guns, a single-seat pilot’s cockpit, a Martin power turret behind the wing and a tricycle undercarriage, shown standing on its three wheels: Olive Drab over Neutral Gray with Medium Green blotches on the wings, tail and nacelles, a white skull and crossbones on the nose with the guns in the eye sockets, a black mission scoreboard and ‘Little Joe’ on both sides of the nose, the star and bar on both fuselage sides, above the port wing and below the starboard wing, a yellow ‘321475’ and white ‘T’ on the fin over a white band, an ace of spades on the port rear fuselage and black propellers with yellow tips (shape from a published A-20 three-view, nose and turret checked against photographs of 43-22200); the gazetteer’s only near-complete A-20, 41-19393 at the Wings Aviation Museum, survives as an unrestored tail section.

3D model

Turn it over

A procedural model built in Blender from published dimensions, drawings and photographs, painted as 43-22200, a Douglas A-20G-45-DO Havoc built at Santa Monica and shown at the National Museum of the United States Air Force in Dayton, Ohio, painted as A-20G 43-21475 ‘Little Joe’, tail letter T, of the 389th Bomb Squadron, 312th Bomb Group, after its 150th mission: Douglas’s fast twin-engined attack bomber, a shoulder-wing monoplane with two Wright R-2600 Cyclone radials, a solid gun nose with six .50 calibre machine guns, a single-seat pilot’s cockpit, a Martin power turret behind the wing and a tricycle undercarriage, shown standing on its three wheels: Olive Drab over Neutral Gray with Medium Green blotches on the wings, tail and nacelles, a white skull and crossbones on the nose with the guns in the eye sockets, a black mission scoreboard and ‘Little Joe’ on both sides of the nose, the star and bar on both fuselage sides, above the port wing and below the starboard wing, a yellow ‘321475’ and white ‘T’ on the fin over a white band, an ace of spades on the port rear fuselage and black propellers with yellow tips (shape from a published A-20 three-view, nose and turret checked against photographs of 43-22200); the gazetteer’s only near-complete A-20, 41-19393 at the Wings Aviation Museum, survives as an unrestored tail section. Drag to orbit, scroll or pinch to zoom · download .glb (1.6 MB)

Data plate

Specification

First flight, number built and top speed are for the whole family (Havoc/Boston, Invader, Marauder); engine, crew and dimensions are for the A-20G-45-DO Havoc, 43-22200 modelled here.

History

The A-20G Havoc

In 1936 Douglas began a private-venture design for a fast twin-engined attack bomber. A team led by Donald Douglas, Jack Northrop and Ed Heinemann worked on the first proposal, and Heinemann’s team turned it into the Model 7B, a slim shoulder-winged monoplane with a tricycle undercarriage that first flew on 26 October 1938. The US Army was slow to order it, but France was looking for modern bombers, and a larger, more powerful development, the DB-7, was ordered in quantity. French DB-7s were in action against the German advance in May and June 1940, and the aircraft still on order when France fell were taken over by Britain.

The RAF named its bombers Boston and its night fighters and intruders Havoc. Bostons of No. 2 Group flew daylight raids over France and the Low Countries from 1941, and later served in North Africa and Italy. The US Army Air Forces adopted the type as the A-20 Havoc. In the South West Pacific, Fifth Air Force crews found the A-20 ideal for low-level strafing and parachute-bomb attacks on Japanese airfields and shipping, and many were fitted with extra guns in the nose. The Soviet Union was the biggest user of all: 2,771 Lend-Lease A-20s went to the Soviet Air Force.

The A-20G was the most numerous version, with 2,850 built. It replaced the glazed bombardier’s nose with a solid gun nose. The first 250 carried four 20 mm cannon and two machine guns, and later aircraft had six .50 in machine guns. From the A-20G-20 it also had a Martin power turret with two .50 in guns in place of the open rear gun position, and a wider rear fuselage. The 312th and 417th Bomb Groups took their A-20Gs to New Guinea in early 1944 and flew mostly low-level attacks. Production ended in September 1944 after 7,478 aircraft. The US Air Force retired its last A-20s in 1949, and Brazil flew the type until the late 1950s.

This airframe

A-20G-45-DO 43-22200, painted as 43-21475 “Little Joe”

43-22200The airframe modelled

43-22200 is an A-20G-45 built by Douglas at Santa Monica. Bankers Life and Casualty Co. of Chicago gave it to the US Air Force Museum in 1961. Restored by the museum, it is shown in the World War II Gallery of the National Museum of the United States Air Force in Dayton, Ohio, painted as A-20G 43-21475 “Little Joe”, tail letter T, of the 389th Bomb Squadron, 312th Bomb Group, Fifth Air Force, after its 150th mission. The model shows it as displayed: Olive Drab over Neutral Gray with Medium Green blotches on the wings, tail and nacelles, a white skull and crossbones on the nose with the guns in its eye sockets, a black mission scoreboard and “Little Joe” on both sides of the nose, the star and bar on the fuselage, above the port wing and below the starboard wing, a yellow “321475” and white “T” on the fin over a white band, an ace of spades on the port rear fuselage, and black propellers with yellow tips. The museum shows the port cowling panels removed; the model has both cowlings closed, and the green blotches are approximated from photographs. The only A-20 in a gazetteer museum is 41-19393 at the Wings Aviation Museum, an A-20C shot down near Murmansk in April 1944 and recovered from a lake in 2003, which survives as an unrestored tail section.

Where to see one

In the gazetteer

The gazetteer records the A-20G Havoc in 2 UK collections.

Every airframe and serial All 247 plates

Profiles and models are procedural interpretations built in Blender from published dimensions, three-view drawings and photographs of each airframe. Treat the museum aircraft as the reference.