title: Redhead murders

text: Authorities hoped in late April 1985 that they would identify her body through fingerprints but were unsuccessful. Six missing women were ruled out as possible identities of the victim.


title: Redhead murders

text: She was not identified until November 2018, when officials announced that the victim was New Hampshire native Elizabeth Lamotte. She was 17 at the time of her death. Lamotte had disappeared on April 6, 1984. She was identified through a DNA match after a DNA profile was obtained from Lamotte's family by New Hampshire police in 2017. She had been staying at a group home in Manchester, New Hampshire and never returned to her family after gaining furlough. Lamotte's family was initially asked for a DNA profile to compare to the adult woman victim of the Bear Brook murders. An unidentified girlfriend of the suspect — who went by the alias of Robert Evans — was known by the same first name of Elizabeth. "Robert Evans" was later revealed to be a serial killer Terry Peder Rasmussen.


title: Redhead murders

text: Pulaski County Jane Doe was a woman who was found deceased on April 20, 1985 in Wrightsville, Arkansas. She was estimated to be 30 to 40 years old. She was approximately five feet three inches tall. She had blondish-red hair and she had previously fractured her left femur. Her cause of death has either not been released or properly determined. Little information has been made available about her case.


title: Redhead murders

text: Roane County Jane Doe was a woman found on August 29, 1987 in Roane County, Tennessee. She was estimated to be between 35 and 50 years old and five feet or five feet eight inches in height. She had naturally brown hair that was dyed reddish. She had a hysterectomy and a tracheotomy. She had a mole on the left side of her back and she also had breast implants. Additionally, she had an old gunshot wound to her third thoracic vertebrae with a bullet still lodged in her spine. Authorities determined that the body had been burned and suspect that was done deliberately to hinder identification efforts. She is believed to have been murdered.


title: Redhead murders

text: Stacy Lyn Chahorski (1969 - c. September 16, 1988) was a woman who was found strangled to death in Rising Fawn, Georgia in late 1988. Chahorski was officially reported missing in January 1989, four months after she was last contacted. Chahorski had informed her mother, via telephone, that she was planning to hitch rides from her current location in North Carolina to her home state of Michigan, to the cities of Flint and Muskegon. The victim's remains were discovered along the east side of northbound I-59 near Rising Fawn in Dade County, Georgia. Approximately five miles from the Georgia and Alabama state line. It was suspected that the victim may have been a hitchhiker, prior to identification. It was determined she had been sexually assaulted and strangled. The decedent had brownish, strawberry blond, auburn or red, shoulder-length hair with frosted ends. In 2019, her age range was adjusted to 25 and 35. Before this, she was thought to be as young as 16 and a possible runaway. She was identified with assistance from Othram Inc. in late March 2022. On September 6, 2022, Chahorski's killer was identified as Henry Frederick Wise AKA Hoss Wise, who would've been 34 years old at the time of her murder. He was a truck driver for Western Carolina trucking company driving through Chattanooga, Tennessee to Birmingham, Alabama and finally to Nashville Tennessee. Wise was also a stunt driver. He had a criminal history in Florida, Georgia, and North Carolina ranging from theft, assault, to obstruction of a police officer. Wise burned to death in a car accident at Myrtle Beach Speedway in South Carolina in 1999.


title: Redhead murders

text: Benton County Jane Doe was a woman who was found murdered on May 7, 1990 in Rogers, Arkansas. The victim was located eight miles west of Decatur, Arkansas off of Highway 102 in Rogers, Arkansas on May 7, 1990. This area is close to the Oklahoma and Missouri state lines. Several bones were recovered along with what appeared to be shotgun wadding. Buckshot pellets (#4) were found in the ground under the skull. A neighbor reported seeing a fire in the area in February 1990, but never went to investigate. He believed someone was burning trash. Investigators believe the victim or the bones may have been run over with a vehicle to make identification difficult or impossible. After the victim had been shot, she was set on fire. There was not enough remains to provide for a reconstruction. She is estimated to be between 25 and 35 years of age and five feet five inches in height.


title: Redhead murders

text: It is believed that most of the victims remain unidentified due to being estranged or not close to existing family members. They also may not have been native to the states in which they were found. In 1985, not long after the Greene County victim was found, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Arkansas, and Mississippi requested the Federal Bureau of Investigation for assistance with the cases. There were inconsistencies among some of the victims and characteristics of the crime scenes, as some were found with or without clothing, and some had a sexual encounter before their murders. During the conference, it was stated that four victims found in Texas and a victim found in 1981 in Ohio, nicknamed "Buckskin Girl” (later identified as Marcia King), were ruled out in 1985 as possible victims in the Redhead murders.


title: Redhead murders

text: A possible suspect emerged circa 1985, when a 37-year-old trucker, Jerry Leon Johns, attacked and attempted to strangle a woman with reddish hair. He left the victim lying near a highway, presuming she was dead. He was later dismissed in the Redhead murders case but was convicted of the woman's kidnapping in 1987. Despite his exclusion from the case, it was announced that DNA from Johns was matched to Tina Farmer via CODIS in 2016. He died in prison in 2015 at the age of 67. A grand jury decided he would have been indicted for the slaying, had he been alive. Johns was a trucker who resided in Cleveland, Tennessee before his arrest. It has not been specified whether he is considered a suspect in other victims of the Redhead murders.


title: Redhead murders

text: Another suspect was a 32-year-old trucker in Pennsylvania, who was questioned after kidnapping and raping a young woman in Indiana. She managed to escape before more injury. This suspect was also dismissed from this investigation, after being questioned by Tennessee police.


title: Peter Luger Steak House

text: Peter Luger Steak House is a steakhouse located in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn, New York City, with a second location in Great Neck, New York, on Long Island. It was named to the James Beard Foundation's list of "America's Classics" in 2002 and is the third oldest operating steakhouse in New York City, after Keens and Old Homestead Steakhouse.


title: Peter Luger Steak House

text: On January 10 2022, Peter Luger's and Caesar's Palace announced the opening of a third location in Caesar's Palace Las Vegas, in the location formerly occupied by Rao's.


title: Peter Luger Steak House

text: The Brooklyn location is known for its long wooden bar, and the "dining rooms have a Teutonic air, with exposed wooden beams, burnished oak wainscoting, brass chandeliers and weathered beer-hall tables".


title: Peter Luger Steak House

text: In 2019, "New York Times" restaurant critic Pete Wells gave the restaurant a scathing, zero-star review, a decline from Frank Bruni's 2007 two-star review, a three-star review in 1995 by Ruth Reichl, and a four-star review in 1968 by Craig Claiborne.


title: Peter Luger Steak House

text: The Brooklyn location was established in 1887 as "Carl Luger's Café, Billiards and Bowling Alley" in the then-predominantly German neighborhood that would shortly thereafter be in the shadow of the Williamsburg Bridge. German-born Peter Luger (1866–1941) was the owner, and nephew Carl was the chef. When Peter died in 1941, his son Frederick took over and the restaurant declined.


title: Peter Luger Steak House

text: In 1950, Frederick shut the restaurant and put it up for auction. Bernard and Lester Magrill, local auctioneers and frequent patrons, conducted the auction. Sol Forman, and Seymour Sloyer who owned a metal giftware factory across the street, bought it as partners for a "whimsically low" bid. According to Lester Magrill, the purchase price was $35,000, which included the building as well as the restaurant. According to one history, "the neighborhood was declining, filling up with Hasidic Jews, whose kosher rules forbade the eating of Luger's hindquarters. Both Forman and Sloyer had been eating at Luger for twenty-five years, and they needed a place to take their clients. They were the only bidders during the auction. In 1968, Craig Claiborne of "The New York Times" gave a four star review of the steakhouse, under the new ownership.


title: Peter Luger Steak House

text: In 1968, Forman and Sloyer opened a Great Neck, New York, location. It was closed in 1984 after a severe fire, but reopened a year and a half later in 1986.


title: Peter Luger Steak House

text: Seymour Sloyer died in 2001 at the age of 85. Sol Forman died in 2001 at the age of 98. Ownership of the restaurant passed to Forman's daughters and Sloyer's wife and children.


title: Peter Luger Steak House

text: In July 2009, while having dinner at Peter Luger, New York Governor David Paterson had Richard Ravitch secretly sworn in as Lieutenant Governor to oversee the stalemate-stricken State Senate.


title: Peter Luger Steak House

text: The menu at Peter Luger is sparse, with the focal point being a porterhouse steak sized for two to four.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: The Arctic consists of land, internal waters, territorial seas, exclusive economic zones (EEZs) and international waters above the Arctic Circle (66 degrees 33 minutes North latitude). All land, internal waters, territorial seas and EEZs in the Arctic are under the jurisdiction of one of the eight Arctic coastal states: Canada, Denmark (via Greenland), Finland, Iceland, Norway, Russia, Sweden and the United States. International law regulates this area as with other portions of Earth.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: Under international law, the North Pole and the region of the Arctic Ocean surrounding it are not owned by any country. The five surrounding Arctic countries are limited to a territorial sea of and an exclusive economic zone (EEZ) of adjacent to their coasts measured from declared baselines filed with the UN. The waters beyond the territorial seas of the coastal states are considered the "high seas" (i.e. international waters). The waters and sea bottom that is not confirmed to be extended continental shelf beyond the exclusive economic zones are considered to be the "heritage of all mankind." Fisheries in these waters can only be limited by international treaty and exploration and exploitation of mineral resources on and below the seabed in these areas is administered by the UN International Seabed Authority.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: Upon ratification of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), a country has a ten-year period to make claims to an extended continental shelf which, if validated, gives it exclusive rights to resources on or below the seabed of that extended shelf area. Norway, Russia, Canada, and Denmark launched projects to provide a basis for seabed claims on extended continental shelves beyond their exclusive economic zones. The United States has signed, but not yet ratified the UNCLOS.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: The status of certain portions of the Arctic sea region is in dispute for various reasons. Canada, Denmark, Norway, Russia, and the United States all regard parts of the Arctic seas as national waters (territorial waters out to ) or internal waters. There also are disputes regarding what passages constitute international seaways and rights to passage along them. There was one single disputed piece of land in the Arctic—Hans Island—which was disputed until 2022 between Canada and Denmark because of its location in the middle of a strait.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: In 1925, based upon the Sector Principle, Canada became the first country to extend its maritime boundaries northward to the North Pole, at least on paper, between 60°W and 141°W longitude, a claim that is not universally recognized (there are of ocean between the Pole and Canada's northernmost land point). On April 15 the following year, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR declared the territory between two lines (32°04′35″E to 168°49′30″W) drawn from west of Murmansk to the North Pole and from the eastern Chukchi Peninsula to the North Pole to be Soviet territory. Norway (5°E to 35°E) made similar sector claims, as did the United States (170°W to 141°W), but that sector contained only a few islands, so the claim was not pressed. Denmark's sovereignty over all of Greenland was recognized by the United States in 1916 and by an international court in 1933. Denmark could also conceivably claim an Arctic sector (60°W to 10°W).


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: In the context of the Cold War, Canada sent Inuit families to the far north in the High Arctic relocation, partly to establish territoriality. The Canadian monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, accompanied by the Duke of Edinburgh, Prince Charles, and Princess Anne, undertook in 1970 a tour of Northern Canada, in part to demonstrate to an unconvinced American government and the Soviet Union that Canada had certain claim to its Arctic territories, which were strategic during the Cold War. In addition, Canada claims the water within the Canadian Arctic Archipelago as its own internal waters. The United States is one of the countries which does not recognize Canada's, or any other countries', Arctic archipelagic water claims and has allegedly sent nuclear submarines under the ice near Canadian islands without requesting permission.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: Until 1999, the geographic North Pole (a non-dimensional dot) and the major part of the Arctic Ocean had been generally considered to comprise international space, including both the waters and the sea bottom. However, the adoption of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) has prescribed a process which prompted several countries to submit claims or to reinforce pre-existing claims to portions of the seabed of the polar region.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: As defined by the UNCLOS, states have ten years from the date of ratification to make claims to an extended continental shelf. They must present to the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf, a UN body, geological evidence that their shelf effectively extends beyond the 200 nautical miles limit. The Commission does not define borders but merely judges the scientific validity of assertions and it is up to countries with rightful but overlapping claims to come to a settlement. On this basis, four of the five states fronting the Arctic Ocean – Canada, Denmark, Norway, and the Russian Federation – must have made any desired claims by 2013, 2014, 2006, and 2007 respectively. Since the U.S. has yet to ratify the UNCLOS, the date for its submission is undetermined at this time.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: Claims to extended continental shelves, if deemed valid, give the claimant state exclusive rights to the sea bottom and resources below the bottom. Valid extended continental shelf claims do not and cannot extend a state's Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) since the EEZ is determined solely by drawing a line using territorial sea baselines as their starting point. Press reports often confuse the facts and assert that extended continental shelf claims expand a state's EEZ thereby giving a state exclusive rights to resources not only on the sea bottom or below it, but also to those in the water column above it. The Arctic chart prepared by Durham University explicitly illustrates the extent of the uncontested Exclusive Economic Zones of the five states bordering the Arctic Ocean, and also the relatively small expanse of remaining "high seas" or totally international waters at the very North of the planet.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: Canada ratified UNCLOS on 7 November 2003 and had through 2013 to file its claim to an extended continental shelf. , Canada had announced that it would file a claim which includes the North Pole. Canada planned to submit their claim to a portion of the Arctic continental shelf in 2018.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: In response to the Russian Arktika 2007 expedition, Canada's Foreign Affairs Minister, Peter MacKay, said "[t]his is posturing. This is the true North, strong and free, and they're fooling themselves if they think dropping a flag on the ocean floor is going to change anything... This isn't the 14th or 15th century." In response, Sergey Lavrov, the Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs, stated "[w]hen pioneers reach a point hitherto unexplored by anybody, it is customary to leave flags there. Such was the case on the Moon, by the way... [W]e from the outset said that this expedition was part of the big work being carried out under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, within the international authority where Russia's claim to submerged ridges which we believe to be an extension of our shelf is being considered. We know that this has to be proved. The ground samples that were taken will serve the work to prepare that evidence."


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: On 25 September 2007, Prime Minister Stephen Harper said he was assured by Russian President Vladimir Putin that neither offence nor "violation of international understanding or any Canadian sovereignty" was intended. Harper promised to defend Canada's claimed sovereignty by building and operating up to eight Arctic patrol ships, a new army training centre in Resolute Bay, and the refurbishing of an existing deepwater port at a former mining site in Nanisivik.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: Denmark ratified UNCLOS on 16 November 2004 and had through 2014 to file a claim to an extended continental shelf.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: The Kingdom of Denmark simultaneously declared that ratifying UNCLOS did not change Denmark's position that the Danish straits including the Great Belt, the Little Belt, and the Danish part of Øresund, formed on the foundation of the Copenhagen Treaty of 1857 are legally Danish territory, and – as set out in the treaty section of the United Nations Office of Legal Affairs – this should remain so. Consequently, Denmark considers the Copenhagen Convention to apply solely to the waterways through Denmark proper and not the North Atlantic.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: Greenland, an autonomous territory within the Kingdom of Denmark, has the nearest coastline to the North Pole, and Denmark argues that the Lomonosov Ridge is in fact an extension of Greenland. Danish project included LORITA-1 expedition in April–May 2006 and included tectonic research during LOMROG expedition, which were part of the 2007–2008 International Polar Year program. It comprised the Swedish icebreaker "Oden" and Russian nuclear icebreaker NS "50 Let Pobedy". The latter led the expedition through the ice fields to the research location. Further efforts at geological study in the region were carried out by the LOMROG II expedition, which took place in 2009, and the LOMROG III expedition, launched in 2012.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: On 14 December 2014 Denmark claimed an area of extending from Greenland past the North Pole to the limits of the Russian Exclusive Economic Zone. Unlike the Russian claim which is generally limited to the Russia sector of the Arctic, the Danish Claim extends across the North Pole and into Russia's sector.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: Norway ratified the UNCLOS on 24 June 1996 and had through 2006 to file a claim to an extended continental shelf.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: On November 27, 2006, Norway made an official submission into the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf in accordance with the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (article 76, paragraph 8). There are provided arguments to extend the Norwegian seabed claim beyond the EEZ in three areas of the northeastern Atlantic and the Arctic: the "Loop Hole" in the Barents Sea, the Western Nansen Basin in the Arctic Ocean, and the "Banana Hole" in the Norwegian Sea. The submission also states that an additional submission for continental shelf limits in other areas may be posted later.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: Norway and Russia have ratified an agreement on the Barents Sea, ending a 40-year demarcation dispute.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: Russia ratified the UNCLOS in 1997 and had through 2007 to file a claim to an extended continental shelf.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: The Russian Federation is claiming a large extended continental shelf as far as the North Pole based on the Lomonosov Ridge and Mendeleyev Ridges within their Arctic sector. Moscow believes the eastern Lomonosov Ridge and the Mendeleyev Ridge are an extension of the Siberian continental shelf. Until Denmark filed its claim, the Russian claim did not cross the Russia-US Arctic sector demarcation line, nor did it extend into the Arctic sector of any other Arctic coastal state.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: On December 20, 2001, Russia made an official submission into the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf in accordance with the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (article 76, paragraph 8). In the document it is proposed to establish the outer limits of the continental shelf of Russia beyond the Exclusive Economic Zone, but within the Russian Arctic sector. The territory claimed by Russia in the submission is a large portion of the Arctic within its sector, extending to but not beyond the geographic North Pole. One of the arguments was a statement that Lomonosov Ridge, an underwater mountain ridge passing near the Pole, and Mendeleev Ridge on the Russian side of the Pole are extensions of the Eurasian continent. In 2002 the UN Commission neither rejected nor accepted the Russian proposal, recommending additional research.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: On August 2, 2007, a Russian expedition called Arktika 2007, composed of six explorers led by Artur Chilingarov, employing MIR submersibles, for the first time in history descended to the seabed at the North Pole. There they planted a Russian flag and took water and soil samples for analysis, continuing a mission to provide additional evidence related to the Russian extended continental shelf claim including the mineral riches of the Arctic. This was part of the ongoing 2007 Russian North Pole expedition within the program of the 2007–2008 International Polar Year.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: The expedition aimed to establish that the eastern section of seabed passing close to the Pole, known as the Lomonosov and Mendeleyev Ridges, is in fact an extension of Russia's landmass. The expedition came as several countries are trying to extend their rights over sections of the Arctic Ocean floor. Both Norway and Denmark are carrying out surveys to this end. Vladimir Putin made a speech on a nuclear icebreaker on 3 May 2007, urging greater efforts to secure Russia's "strategic, economic, scientific and defense interests" in the Arctic.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: On August 4, 2015, Russia submitted additional data in support of its bid, containing new arguments based on "ample scientific data collected in years of Arctic research", for territories in the Arctic to the United Nations. Through this bid, Russia is claiming 1.2 million square kilometers (over 463,000 square miles) of Arctic sea shelf extending more than 350 nautical miles (about 650 kilometers) from the shore.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: In February 2016 additional data was submitted by Russian Minister of Natural Resources and Environment Sergey Donskoy. After the expedition "Arktika 2007" Russian researchers collected new data reinforcing Russia's claim to part of the sea bottom beyond its uncontested 200-mile Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) within its Arctic sector, the North Pole area included. On August 9, 2016, the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf began its review of the submission.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: , the United States has not ratified the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) and, therefore, is not yet eligible to file an official claim to an extended continental shelf with the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: In August 2007, an American Coast Guard icebreaker, the USCGC "Healy", headed to the Arctic Ocean to map the sea floor off Alaska. Larry Mayer, director of the Center for Coastal and Ocean Mapping at the University of New Hampshire, stated the trip had been planned for months, having nothing to do with the Russians planting their flag. The purpose of the mapping work aboard the "Healy" is to determine the extent of the US continental shelf north of Alaska.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: It was stated by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change on March 25, 2007, that riches are awaiting the shipping industry due to Arctic climate change. This economic sector could be transformed similar to the way the Middle East was by the Suez Canal in the 19th century. There will be a race among nations for oil, fish, diamonds and shipping routes, accelerated by the impact of global warming.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: The potential value of the North Pole and the surrounding area resides not so much in shipping itself but in the possibility that lucrative petroleum and natural gas reserves exist below the sea floor. Such reserves are known to exist under the Barents, Kara, and Beaufort Seas. However, the vast majority of the Arctic known to contain gas and oil resources is already within uncontested EEZs. When these current uncontested Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZ) of the Arctic littoral states are taken into account there is only a small unclaimed area at the very top subject to the International Seabed Treaty potentially available for open gas/oil exploration.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: On September 14, 2007, the European Space Agency reported ice loss had opened up the Northwest Passage "for the first time since records began in 1978", and the extreme loss in 2007 rendered the passage "fully navigable". Further exploration for petroleum reserves elsewhere in the Arctic may now become more feasible, and the passage may become a regular channel of international shipping and commerce if Canada is not able to enforce its claim to it.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: Foreign Ministers and other officials representing Canada, Denmark, Norway, Russia, and the United States met in Ilulissat, Greenland in May 2008, at the Arctic Ocean Conference and announced the Ilulissat Declaration. Among other things the declaration stated that any demarcation issues in the Arctic should be resolved on a bilateral basis between contesting parties.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: Hans Island is situated in the Nares Strait, a waterway that runs between Ellesmere Island (the northernmost part of Nunavut, Canada) and Greenland. The small uninhabited island, sized , was named for Greenlandic Arctic traveller Hans Hendrik.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: In 1973, Canada and Denmark negotiated the geographic coordinates of the continental shelf, and settled on a delimitation treaty that was ratified by the United Nations on December 17, 1973, and has been in force since March 13, 1974. The treaty lists 127 points (by latitude and longitude) from Davis Strait to the end of Robeson Channel, where Nares Strait runs into Lincoln Sea; the border is defined by geodesic lines between these points. The treaty does not, however, draw a line from point 122 () to point 123 ()—a distance of . Hans Island is situated in the centre of this area.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: Danish flags were planted on Hans Island in 1984, 1988, 1995 and 2003. The Canadian government formally protested these actions. In July 2005, former Canadian defence minister Bill Graham made an unannounced stop on Hans Island during a trip to the Arctic; this launched yet another diplomatic quarrel between the governments, and a truce was called that September.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: Canada had claimed Hans Island was clearly in its territory, as topographic maps originally used in 1967 to determine the island's coordinates clearly showed the entire island on Canada's side of the delimitation line. However, federal officials reviewed the latest satellite imagery in July 2007, and conceded that the line went roughly through the middle of the island. This presently leaves ownership of the island disputed, with claims over fishing grounds and future access to the Northwest Passage possibly at stake as well.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: As of April 2012, the governments of both countries are in negotiations which may ultimately result in the island being split almost precisely in half. The negotiations ended in November 2012 and gave a more exact border description, but did not solve the dispute over Hans Island. One possible resolution would be to treat the island as a condominium.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: There is an ongoing dispute involving a wedge-shaped slice on the International Boundary in the Beaufort Sea, between the Canadian territory of Yukon and the American state of Alaska.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: The Canadian position is that the maritime boundary should extend the land boundary in a straight line. The American position is that the maritime boundary should extend along a path equidistant from the coasts of the two nations. The disputed area may hold significant hydrocarbon reserves. The U.S. has already leased eight plots of the terrain below the water to search for and possibly bring to market oil reserves that may exist there. Canada has protested diplomatically in response.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: No settlement has been reached to date because the U.S. has signed but has not ratified the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). If the treaty is ratified, the issue would likely be settled at a bilateral negotiation.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: On August 20, 2009 United States Secretary of Commerce Gary Locke announced a moratorium on fishing the Beaufort Sea north of Alaska, including the disputed waters.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: Randy Boswell, of "Canada.com" wrote that the disputed area covered a section of the Beaufort Sea (smaller than Israel, larger than El Salvador).


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: He wrote that Canada had filed a "diplomatic note" with the United States in April when the US first announced plans for the moratorium.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: The legal status of the Northwest Passage is disputed: Canada considers it to be part of its internal waters according to the UNCLOS. The United States and most maritime nations consider them to be an international strait, which means that foreign vessels have right of "transit passage". In such a regime, Canada would have the right to enact fishing and environmental regulation, and fiscal and smuggling laws, as well as laws intended for the safety of shipping, but not the right to close the passage. In addition, the environmental regulations allowed under the UNCLOS are not as robust as those allowed if the Northwest Passage is part of Canada's internal waters.


title: Territorial claims in the Arctic

text: Russia considers portions of the Northern Sea Route, which encompasses only navigational routes through waters within Russia's Arctic EEZ east from Novaya Zemlya to the Bering Strait, to pass through Russian territorial and internal waters in the Kara, Vilkitskiy, and Sannikov Straits.


title: Olga (name)

text: Olga is an East Slavic female given name, derived from the Old Norse name Helga. It is used in Russia (Ольга), Ukraine (Ольга, transliterated "Olha"), Belarus (Вольга, transliterated "Vol'ha"), Bulgaria (Олга transliterated "Ólga"), the Czech Republic, Greece and Cyprus (Όλγα, "Ólgha"), Georgia (ოლგა (Olga) or more archaic ოლღა (Olgha)), Latvia, Lithuania ("Alge,Algis"), Finland, Poland, Hungary, Romania, the Balkans (Serbian Олга or Оља), Western Europe and Latin America (Olga).


title: Olga (name)

text: Name days (St. Olga of Kiev): Bulgaria, Poland, Czech Republic, Greece and France – July 11, Slovakia – July 23, Ukraine, Russia – July 24, Hungary – July 27.


title: Superior vena cava syndrome

text: Superior vena cava syndrome (SVCS), is a group of symptoms caused by obstruction of the superior vena cava ("SVC"), a short, wide vessel carrying circulating blood into the heart. The majority of cases are caused by malignant tumors within the mediastinum, most commonly lung cancer and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, directly compressing or invading the SVC wall. Non-malignant causes are increasing in prevalence due to expanding use of intravascular devices (such as permanent central venous catheters and leads for pacemakers and defibrillators), which can result in thrombosis. Other non-malignant causes include benign mediastinal tumors, aortic aneurysm, infections, and fibrosing mediastinitis.


title: Superior vena cava syndrome

text: Characteristic features are edema (swelling due to excess fluid) of the face and arms and development of swollen collateral veins on the front of the chest wall. Shortness of breath and coughing are quite common symptoms; difficulty swallowing is reported in 11% of cases, headache in 6% and stridor (a high-pitched wheeze) in 4%. The symptoms are rarely life-threatening, though edema of the epiglottis can make breathing difficult, edema of the brain can cause reduced alertness, and in less than 5% of cases of SVCO, severe neurological symptoms or airway compromise are reported. Resolution of superior vena cava syndrome is directly related to the treatment of the underlying compression.


title: Superior vena cava syndrome

text: Superior vena cava syndrome usually presents more gradually with an increase in symptoms over time as malignancies increase in size or invasiveness.


title: Superior vena cava syndrome

text: Over 80% of cases are caused by malignant tumors compressing the superior vena cava. Lung cancer, usually small cell carcinoma, comprises 75–80% of these cases and non-Hodgkin lymphoma, most commonly diffuse large B-cell lymphoma, comprises 10–15%. Rare malignant causes include Hodgkin's lymphoma, metastatic cancers, leukemia, leiomyosarcoma of the mediastinal vessels, and plasmocytoma. Syphilis and tuberculosis have also been known to cause superior vena cava syndrome. SVCS can be caused by invasion or compression by a pathological process or by a deep vein thrombosis in the vein itself, although this latter is less common (approximately 35% due to the use of intravascular devices).


title: Superior vena cava syndrome

text: The main techniques of diagnosing SVCS are with chest X-rays (CXR), CT scans, transbronchial needle aspiration at bronchoscopy and mediastinoscopy. CXRs often provide the ability to show mediastinal widening and may show the presenting primary cause of SVCS. However, 16% of people with SVC syndrome have a normal chest X-ray. CT scans should be contrast enhanced and be taken on the neck, chest, lower abdomen, and pelvis. They may also show the underlying cause and the extent to which the disease has progressed.


title: Superior vena cava syndrome

text: Several methods of treatment are available, mainly consisting of careful drug therapy and surgery. Glucocorticoids (such as prednisone or methylprednisolone) decrease the inflammatory response to tumor invasion and edema surrounding the tumor. Glucocorticoids are most helpful if the tumor is steroid-responsive, such as lymphomas. In addition, diuretics (such as furosemide) are used to reduce venous return to the heart which relieves the increased pressure.


title: Superior vena cava syndrome

text: In an acute setting, endovascular stenting by an interventional radiologist may provide relief of symptoms in as little as 12–24 hours with minimal risks.


title: Superior vena cava syndrome

text: Should a patient require assistance with respiration whether it be by bag/valve/mask, bilevel positive airway pressure (BiPAP), continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) or mechanical ventilation, extreme care should be taken. Increased airway pressure will tend to further compress an already compromised SVC and reduce venous return and in turn cardiac output and cerebral and coronary blood flow. Spontaneous respiration should be allowed during endotracheal intubation until sedation allows placement of an ET tube and reduced airway pressures should be employed when possible.


title: Superior vena cava syndrome

text: Symptoms are usually relieved with radiation therapy within one month of treatment. However, even with treatment, 99% of patients die within two and a half years. This relates to the cancerous causes of SVC found in 90% of cases. The average age of disease onset is 54 years.


title: Which Side Are You On?

text: "Which Side Are You On?" is a song written in 1931 by activist Florence Reece, who was the wife of Sam Reece, a union organizer for the United Mine Workers in Harlan County, Kentucky.


title: Which Side Are You On?

text: In 1931, the miners and the mine owners in southeastern Kentucky were locked in a bitter and violent struggle called the Harlan County War. In an attempt to intimidate the family of union leader Sam Reece, Sheriff J. H. Blair and his men, hired by the mining company, illegally entered their home in search of Reece. Reece had been warned and escaped but his wife, Florence, and their children were terrorized. That night, after the men had gone, Florence wrote the lyrics to "Which Side Are You On?" on a calendar that hung in their kitchen. She took the melody from a traditional Baptist hymn, "Lay the Lily Low", or the traditional ballad "Jack Munro".


title: Which Side Are You On?

text: Reece supported a second wave of miner strikes circa 1973, as recounted in the documentary "Harlan County USA". She and others performed "Which Side Are You On?" a number of times throughout. Reece recorded the song later in life, and it can be heard on the album "Coal Mining Women".


title: Which Side Are You On?

text: Pete Seeger, collecting labor union songs, learned "Which Side Are You On" in 1940. The following year, it was recorded by the Almanac Singers in a version that gained a wide audience. More recently, Billy Bragg, Dropkick Murphys, Rebel Diaz, Natalie Merchant, Ani DiFranco, Tom Morello, Panopticon, and S.G. Goodman each recorded their own interpretations of the song.


title: Which Side Are You On?

text: The song is referred to by Bob Dylan in the song "Desolation Row". It was also the inspiration for the title of Alessandro Portelli's 2011 book on Harlan County's coal mining community.


title: The Hump

text: The Hump was the name given by Allied pilots in the Second World War to the eastern end of the Himalayan Mountains over which they flew military transport aircraft from India to China to resupply the Chinese war effort of Chiang Kai-shek and the units of the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) based in China. Creating an airlift presented the USAAF a considerable challenge in 1942: it had no units trained or equipped for moving cargo, and no airfields existed in the China Burma India Theater (CBI) for basing the large number of transports that would be needed. Flying over the Himalayas was extremely dangerous and made more difficult by a lack of reliable charts, an absence of radio navigation aids, and a dearth of information about the weather.


title: The Hump

text: The task was initially given to the USAAF's Tenth Air Force, and then to its Air Transport Command (ATC). Because the USAAF had no previous airlift experience as a basis for planning, it assigned commanders who had been key figures in founding the ATC in 1941–1942 to build and direct the operation, which included former civilians with extensive executive experience operating civil air carriers.


title: The Hump

text: Originally referred to as the "India–China Ferry", the successive organizations responsible for carrying out the airlift were the "Assam–Burma–China Command" (April–July 1942) and the "India-China Ferry Command" (July–December 1942) of the Tenth Air Force; and the Air Transport Command's "India-China Wing" (December 1942 – June 1944) and "India-China Division" (July 1944 – November 1945).


title: The Hump

text: The operation began in April 1942, after the Japanese blocked the Burma Road, and continued daily to August 1945, when the effort began to scale down. It procured most of its officers, men, and equipment from the USAAF, augmented by British, British-Indian Army, Commonwealth forces, Burmese labor gangs and an air transport section of the Chinese National Aviation Corporation (CNAC). Final operations were flown in November 1945 to return personnel from China.


title: The Hump

text: The India–China airlift delivered approximately 650,000 tons of materiel to China at great cost in men and aircraft during its 42-month history. For its efforts and sacrifices, the India–China Wing of the ATC was awarded the Presidential Unit Citation on 29 January 1944 at the personal direction of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, the first such award made to a non-combat organization.


title: The Hump

text: Success of the "Europe first" strategy of the Allies entailed keeping China in the war, tying down more than a million Japanese troops who might otherwise threaten the Allied strategic offensive in the Pacific. The Japanese invasion of French Indochina closed all sea and rail access routes for supplying China with materiel except through Turkestan in the Soviet Union. That access ended following the signing of the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact in April 1941, and the Burma Road became the only land route. The rapid success of Japanese military operations in Southeast Asia threatened this lifeline, prompting discussion of an air cargo service route from India as early as January 1942. Chiang's foreign minister, T. V. Soong, estimated that 12,000 tons of materiel could be delivered monthly by air from India if 100 C-47 Skytrain-type transports were committed to an airlift. Chinese Air Force Major General Mao Bangchu was tasked with leading the exploration of suitable air-routes over the dangerous Himalayas in 1941, and CNAC pilot Xia Pu recorded the first flight from Dinjan, India, to Kunming, China, during November of that year in what was to become the route now known as "the "Hump"".


title: The Hump

text: On 25 February 1942, President Roosevelt wrote General George C. Marshall that "it is of the utmost urgency that the pathway to China be kept open", and committed ten C-53 Skytrooper transports for lend-lease delivery to CNAC to build its capability to 25 aircraft. When the newly created Tenth Air Force opened its headquarters in New Delhi under the command of Maj. Gen. Lewis H. Brereton in March 1942, it was assigned the responsibility of developing an "India-China Ferry" using both U.S. and Chinese aircraft. Although he was never given command authority over aircraft or personnel, the officer responsible for the India-China Ferry was Brereton's chief of staff Brig. Gen. Earl L. Naiden, who held that responsibility until mid-August.


title: The Hump

text: From its onset, the air route was predicated on operating two branches, unofficially deemed "commands": a "Trans-India Command" from India's western ports to Calcutta, where cargo would be transshipped by rail to Assam; and the "Assam-Burma-China Command", a route from bases in Assam to southern China. The original scheme envisioned the Allies holding northern Burma and using Myitkyina as an offloading terminal to send supplies by barge downriver to Bhamo and transfer to the Burma Road. However, on 8 May 1942 the Japanese seized Myitkyina and this, coupled with the loss of Rangoon, effectively cut Allied access to the Burma Road. To maintain the uninterrupted supply to China, U.S. and other allied leaders agreed to organize a continual aerial resupply effort directly between Assam and Kunming.


title: The Hump

text: Tenth Air Force was hampered by a constant diversion of men and aircraft to Egypt, where Nazi Germany was threatening to seize the Suez Canal. Its Air Service Command was still en route by ship from the United States, forcing it to get aircraft and personnel for the India-China Ferry from any available source. Ten former Pan American World Airways DC-3s and flight crews were sent from the trans-Africa ferry route to outfit the new operation. 25 other DC-3s requisitioned from American Airlines in the United States could not be moved to India for lack of crews and were later integrated into the complement of the first transport group committed to the airlift.


title: The Hump

text: The command structure of the India-China Ferry was fractured after senior officers in both India and Burma made competing claims for jurisdiction, with part of the authority given to Gen. Joseph Stilwell as CBI theater commander and part remaining with Tenth Air Force, which had also been ordered by Marshall to "co-operate when requested" with the British in defending India. Movement by ground transport of supplies arriving from the United States at the port of Karachi to the airfields, as well as construction of the infrastructure required to support the operation, was the responsibility of the U.S. Army's Services of Supply, commanded in the CBI by Maj. Gen. Raymond A. Wheeler. The airlift was the final leg of a journey of from Los Angeles to China often taking four months.


title: The Hump

text: On 23 April 1942, Colonel Caleb V. Haynes, a prospective bombardment group commander, was assigned to command the Assam-Kunming branch of the India-China Ferry, dubbed the "Assam-Burma-China Ferry Command". Col. Robert L. Scott, a pursuit pilot awaiting an assignment in China, was assigned as his operations officer and a month later as executive officer. Haynes was a fortuitous choice to be the airlift's first commander, as he had just completed an assignment as a key subordinate of Brig. Gen. Robert Olds. Olds and his staff had founded the Air Corps Ferrying Command in June 1941 and pioneered overseas military air transport, including use of the South Atlantic air route by which aircraft, personnel, and cargo would reach India from the United States. However, at the time the India-China Ferry was conceived, the ABC Ferry Command was not prepared to plan, control, or execute such an operation. Its formal organization was minimal, it had no units of its own, and its few aircraft were committed to establishing air transport routes. By June, however, the ABC Ferry Command had begun a greatly expanded wartime restructuring and would become the Air Transport Command on 1 July.


title: The Hump

text: The first mission "over the hump" took place on 8 April 1942. Flying from the Royal Air Force airfield at Dinjan, Lt. Col. William D. Old used a pair of the former Pan Am DC-3s to ferry of aviation fuel intended to resupply the Doolittle Raiders. The collapse of Allied resistance in northern Burma in May 1942 meant further diversion of the already minuscule air effort. The ABC Ferry Command resupplied Stilwell's retreating army and evacuated its wounded, while establishing a regular air service to China using ten borrowed DC-3s, three USAAF C-47s, and 13 CNAC C-53s and C-39s. Only two-thirds of the aircraft were serviceable at any time. Dinjan was within range of Japanese fighters now based at Myitkyina, forcing all-night maintenance operations and pre-dawn takeoffs of the defenseless supply planes. The threat of interception also forced the ABC Ferry Command to fly a difficult 500-mile (800 km) route to China over the Eastern Himalayan Uplift, which came to be known as the "high hump", or more simply, "The Hump".


title: The Hump

text: The point of view of a veteran crewman who flew the Hump was described in a feature story for a local newspaper years after:


title: The Hump

text: Innumerable problems with the Indian railway system meant that aircraft assigned to the airlift often carried their cargo all the way from Karachi to China, while much cargo took as long to reach Assam from Karachi as the two-month journey by ship from the United States. India's highway and river systems were so undeveloped as to be unable to support the mission, leaving air as the only practicable way to supply China in anything resembling a timely fashion.


title: The Hump

text: The first crews and aircraft from the United States went to the 1st Ferrying Group, arriving 17 May at their base at the New Malir Cantonment near Karachi. The group was activated in India in March without personnel or equipment and was assigned to the operational control of the Tenth Air Force over the objections of the commander of ATC, who feared that its planes and crews would be steered into combat units, which did in fact occur at times. Aircraft continued to arrive in small increments through October with flight crews consisting of airline pilots holding Air Corps Reserve commissions who had been called up for active duty specifically for the India-China assignment, and navigators, engineers and radiomen from the USAAF technical training schools. For the remainder of 1942, the 62 C-47s of the 1st Ferrying Group were the backbone of the airlift, flying both branches of the operation from Karachi until August, when it began a three months' relocation to Assam.


title: The Hump

text: In the first two months of the airlift the USAAF delivered only 700 tons of cargo and CNAC only 112 tons, and tonnage fell for both June and July, mostly as a result of the full onset of the summer monsoon. In July, CNAC quadrupled its tonnage to 221 tons, but 10AF C-47s brought only 85 net tons of materiel and personnel into China.


title: The Hump

text: On 17 June 1942, Haynes continued on to China to take up an assignment as bomber commander of the China Air Task Force, Tenth Air Force's eastern appendage commanded by Brig. Gen. Claire L. Chennault. Scott was left in command for several days before he too was ordered to China to command the first U.S. fighter group in the CATF. On 22 June Col. Robert F. Tate (who like Haynes was a bombardment officer) was named to replace Haynes, but he was also in charge of the Trans-India Command in Karachi and remained in that capacity. Lt. Col. Julian M. Joplin, acting at the direction of Naiden, for all practical purposes commanded India-China operations until 18 August. Tate took actual command on 25 August, when Naiden was forced to return to the United States, although like Naiden he delegated direction of airlift operations to Joplin. Effective 15 July 1942, the two branches of the India-China Ferry merged into the "India-China Ferry Command", an organized component of the Tenth Air Force.


title: The Hump

text: Tate was immediately and severely handicapped when the best pilots and 12 aircraft of the airlift went west to Egypt with Brereton on 26 June. Despite the use of the 1st Ferrying Group, the buildup of the airlift grew very slowly during the summer monsoon. Overuse of the small number of aircraft available, spotty maintenance, and a lack of spare parts led to numerous groundings until overhauls could be effected. In particular the lack of replacement tires and spare engines held down operations even after eight of the C-47s sent to the Middle East returned in August. For a short period of time engines intended for P-43 fighters of the Chinese Air Force were adapted for use on C-47s but the supply of those proved small.


title: The Hump

text: Although three bases constructed by the British on tea plantations at Chabua, Mohanbari, and Sookerating were declared operational in August 1942, and construction of a fourth began at Jorhat, none were expected to be ready for all-weather operations before November or December because of problems with unskilled indigenous labor and the failure of promised heavy equipment to arrive from the United States. Throughout the monsoon rains Dinjan remained the chief transport base. The dismal results of the India-China Ferry to this point led to a proposal in Washington to turn over control of the operation entirely to CNAC, which would place U.S. military personnel in a combat area under foreign civilian control. Stilwell vigorously and successfully opposed the plan. He reinforced his position by insisting that CNAC lease its C-53s and crews participating in the airlift to the USAAF to assure that they would carry only essential cargo and not commercial activity. The airlift lost its first aircraft to accident on 23 September 1942, presumably from icing, after which losses of transports increased sharply.


title: The Hump

text: Protection of the aerial supply line became the primary mission of the Tenth Air Force. When the summer monsoon ended, the Japanese were expected to try to sever the last remaining connection to China, and although 10AF's CATF was adequate for the defense of the eastern end, little had been done to create an antiaircraft defense around the four Assam airfields. The 51st Fighter Group was nominally responsible for fighter protection, but two of its three squadrons had been stripped of their aircraft and personnel in July to equip the group's third squadron and round out the newly activated 23rd Fighter Group, both in China with the CATF. The 51st FG remained in Karachi awaiting aircraft and personnel. Requests for more antiaircraft guns, a weather squadron, and radios and landline communications equipment for an early warning system were immediately approved but went unfulfilled for a variety of reasons. The India Air Task Force, the western combat force of the Tenth Air Force, was activated 3 October with nine squadrons, none of which was fully operational. Haynes was promoted to brigadier general and placed in command. The 51st FG had been re-equipped with P-40s but had trained pilots sufficient for only one squadron, which Haynes sent to Dinjan.


title: The Hump

text: The long-anticipated air attack by the Japanese took place late in the afternoon of 25 October. 100 bombers and fighters, bombing from 10,000 feet (3,000 m) and strafing from 100 feet (30 m), achieved complete surprise. The only defense provided came from three P-40s aloft on patrol, and six others which took off and gave pursuit. Dinjan and Chabua were heavily bombed, with nine transports and twenty fighters destroyed or badly damaged by low-level strafing. The next day Sookerating was strafed by 30 fighters, again without warning, but damage was confined to a single storage building containing food and medical supplies. A third raid struck Chabua on 28 October but missed the field entirely. Although the India Air Task Force had flown reconnaissance missions over the captured airfield at Myitkyina all summer, the Japanese had equipped their fighters with external fuel tanks and mounted the raids from Lashio or bases in southern Burma.


title: The Hump

text: Haynes responded by moving the other squadron of the 51st FG to Sookerating, while the China Air Task Force was ordered to launch a series of attacks by B-25s against Lashio. While Chennault complied, he did not believe that the Japanese strikes originated there and the rift between him and Tenth Air Force grew wider. Whatever the case, the Japanese raids were not repeated in 1942. In June 1943, following small, sporadic raids during the dry season, the entire fighter strength of the India Air task Force, amounting to less than 100 P-40s, was organized as the Assam American Air Base Command (later the 5320th Air Defense Wing, Provisional), specifically to protect the Assam airfields.


title: The Hump

text: The airlift was evaluated by the USAAF in October 1942 and the attitudes of Tenth Air Force's commanders regarding the feasibility of the operation were characterized as "defeatist". Living conditions for both airlift flight crews and support personnel, particularly at Dinjan, were described as "by far the worst in the entire theater, with primitive quarters, poor sanitation, bad food and mess facilities, pervasive disease, and lack of recreation. Apathy became widespread and morale dropped to a "dangerous point," with the feeling among the troops that as part of the Tenth Air Force, they were "illegitimate children".


title: The Hump

text: After reviewing the evaluation, the Air Transport Command on 13 October offered to take over the operation. Eight days later it was instructed to do so effective 1 December 1942, and activated the "India-China Wing ATC" (ICWATC), commanded by Col. (later Brig. Gen.) Edward H. Alexander, who was Stilwell's air officer. Like Haynes, Alexander had been a founding member of ATC in 1941 as executive officer of the Ferrying Command. ICW reported directly to ATC's chief of staff in Washington, D.C., Col. (later Maj. Gen. and ATC deputy commander) Cyrus R. Smith (under the supervision of Headquarters USAAF), ending the division of authority under which the India-China Ferry Command had labored. The 1st Ferrying Group was returned to ATC and redesignated the 1st Transport Group. Its 76 C-47s were augmented in January 1943 by the addition of three Consolidated C-87 Liberator Express transports (a derivative of the B-24 Liberator), which increased to 11 in March and a projected total of 50 by the end of the summer.


title: The Hump

text: USAAF Commanding General Henry H. Arnold observed first-hand the hazards of "flying the Hump" in February 1943 when the combat crew flying "Argonaut", the B-17 that transported his party, became lost as they flew to Kunming following the Casablanca Conference. From his experiences, Arnold later wrote:


title: The Hump

text: With the onset of heavy monsoon rains in March the ATC operation was reduced to operating from the only all-weather base at Chabua (the RAF base at Dinjan was now occupied by CNAC and Tenth Air Force's only P-40 group), but with a critical shortage in flight crews, even ATC's modest goal of 4,000 tons a month was impossible to attain. The 308th Bombardment Group reached its base at Kunming on 31 March 1943 and began two months of "reverse Hump" operations, flying round trips to India to acquire the gasoline, bombs, parts and other materiel it needed to stockpile before flying combat missions. Using kits developed by the South India Air Service Command Depot, it converted its B-24 Liberators into fuel transports to accomplish the task. The 308th used Chabua airfield, already crowded with more than 80 ICW transports, and its lightly constructed runway was soon "going to pieces" under the weight of the bombers. Jorhat had stronger runways but its taxiways were still unpaved, making it unsuitable for four-engined aircraft. Both Sookerating and Mohanbari were due to have strong concrete runways capable of handling all aircraft, but neither was yet paved and monsoon rains made them inoperable.


title: The Hump

text: The first of thirty Curtiss C-46 Commandos (an unproven cargo transport whose performance was significantly superior to the C-47's in cargo capacity and ceiling) arrived in India on 21 April 1943. In May the 22nd Ferrying Group began C-46 operations from the still uncompleted base at Jorhat, which had a concrete runway. In June, despite the fact that the British—and later the U.S. Army's Services of Supply—failed to complete construction of all-weather runways at Mohanbari and Sookerating, the activation of the 28th, 29th, and 30th Transport Groups proceeded, an attempt to expand the C-46's role to meet projected levels of tonnage.


title: The Hump

text: The severe shortage of crews led to pleas from Alexander for additional personnel. "Project 7" was set up by ATC at the end of June to fly nearly 2,000 men, 50 transports and 120 tons of materiel from Florida to India. Despite this, July's tonnage was less than half of its goal. The airfields were nowhere near completion, nearly all of the new pilots had been single-engine instructor pilots, specialized maintenance personnel and equipment had been sent by ship, and the complexities of the new C-46 ("see Transport shortcomings below") had become evident. Scorching heat and torrential rains of the summer monsoon completed the undermining of the ambitious goals. The long-delayed work on existing fields resulted in intervention by Marshall in which he ordered Wheeler to have the Services of Supply complete the work by 1 July and issued a deadline of 1 September 1943 to have three additional fields ready for operations, but airfield construction problems were not overcome for several months.


title: The Hump

text: At his meeting with Arnold, Chiang warned that the price of China's cooperation with Stilwell to reconquer Burma was a 500-plane air force and delivery by the airlift of 10,000 tons a month. In May 1943, at the Trident Conference, President Roosevelt ordered ATC to deliver 5,000 tons a month to China by July; 7,500 tons by August; and 10,000 tons by September 1943. This came about as Marshall and Arnold sent Maj. Gen. George E. Stratemeyer, the Chief of Air Staff, on a special mission to India to observe ICWATC operations and report back with recommendations. Similarly, Eddie Rickenbacker flew the Hump in a C-87 to reach China during his fact-finding mission to the Far East and the Soviet Union, and both he and Stratemeyer found ICW's performance seriously deficient. While ICW was carrying more tonnage by virtue of having nearly ten times as many aircraft as CNAC (and half of those with a larger load capacity), the Chinese carrier was far more efficient in tonnage lifted per aircraft, by a factor of 2.5 to 1. The primary cause of ATC's failure was the complete inadequacy of its airfield facilities, but other major factors were unsatisfactory performance by overwhelmed aircraft maintenance personnel that grounded a hundred ATC aircraft per day, a predominance of inexperienced pilots (particularly compared to those of CNAC), and a dearth of radio and navigation aids in ATC transports. Rickenbacker and Tenth Air Force commanding general Clayton L. Bissell recommended return of the operation to theater command, but Stratemeyer disagreed, as did Maj. Gen. Howard C. Davidson, who was about to replace Bissell in command of 10AF and had made an inspection tour of his own in June.


title: The Hump

text: Frustration at the failure of the ICW to meet the Trident goals led Arnold to dispatch another inspection team to India in September 1943, led by ATC commander Maj. Gen. Harold L. George. Accompanying George was Col. Thomas O. Hardin, an aggressive former airline executive who had already been overseas a year as head of ATC's Central African Sector. On 16 September, George immediately reassigned Hardin to command the new Eastern Sector of the ICW, to invigorate India-China operations. Alexander was replaced in command of the ICW by Brig. Gen. Earl S. Hoag on 15 October. In addition to the changes in command, George instituted the "Fireball", a weekly C-87 express flight (see External links for photo essay) by the 26th Transport Group carrying critical spare parts for the transports from the Air Service Command Depot at Fairfield, Ohio, to the ATC service depot at Agra, India.


title: The Hump

text: Japanese fighters based in central Burma began to challenge the transport route near Sumprabum at the end of the summer monsoon. On 13 October 1943, a large number of fighters assisted by ground observers evaded U.S. fighter patrols and shot down a C-46, a C-87, and a CNAC transport while damaging three others. Despite the doubling of U.S. fighter patrols, similar interceptions on 20, 23, and 27 October shot down five more C-46s. Japanese pilots referred to the shooting down of vulnerable transport aircraft as "tsuji-giri" ("cutting down a casually met stranger") or "akago no te wo hineru" ("twisting a baby's arm"). On the last of the interceptions a formation of B-24s on a reverse Hump mission, mistaken for C-87s, claimed eight fighters shot down. Tenth Air Force immediately began attacks on Japanese airfields (Myitkyina was attacked 14 times before the end of the year, mostly by strafers and P-40s using 1000-lb bombs) and ICW moved its route to Kunming even farther north. Only two more C-46s were shot down during the remainder of 1943, both in December.


title: The Hump

text: 20 Japanese bombers escorted by 25 fighters bombed the Assam airfields on 13 December 1943 after several days of probing the early warning system without making an attack. Despite an increase in fighter patrols and an alarm issued, the defenders had only twelve minutes warning. U.S. interceptors were unable to climb to the altitude of the bombers in time to prevent the bombing, but only slight damage resulted. The raiding force was pursued and attacked, then ran head-on into fighter patrols returning from northern Burma. Serious losses to the raiders apparently convinced the Japanese not to repeat the attacks.


title: The Hump

text: Hardin altered operations by introducing night missions and refusing to cancel scheduled flights because of adverse weather or threat of interception. Although losses to accidents and enemy action increased, and replacements for the high number of C-46s lost ceased entirely for two months, tonnage delivered rose sharply. The operation finally surpassed its objective in December with over 12,500 tons delivered to Kunming after new C-46s loaded with much-needed C-46 spare parts began arriving in numbers. By the end of 1943, Hardin had 142 aircraft in operation: 93 C-46, 24 C-87, and 25 C-47.


title: The Hump

text: As a result of these efforts, President Roosevelt directed that the Presidential Unit Citation be awarded to the India-China Wing. Hardin was given a month's leave in the United States, promoted to brigadier general, and as the representative of the wing received the award from General Arnold on 29 January 1944, the first ever awarded to a non-combat unit. Hardin returned to the India China Wing in February 1944, just as the first of a trickle of four-engined Douglas C-54 Skymaster transports arrived in theater ("see Operations on the low hump and in China below"). With a maximum load ceiling of only 12,000 feet the C-54s were unable to hurdle the high Hump. Japanese interceptors blocked use of eastbound routes at lower altitudes and the C-54s were limited for the time being to freight movement within India or flights between the CBI and the continental United States.


title: The Hump

text: Hardin advanced to command of the ICW on 21 March 1944 when Hoag was transferred to head ATC's European Wing. A month later, to give Hardin closer personal contact with his growing number of airbases, ICW changed its headquarters from New Delhi to Rishra, north of Calcutta. There, on the site of the Hastings Jute Mill, Stratemeyer, now a lieutenant general and commander of all USAAF forces in the CBI, established Hastings Army Air Base as the headquarters of the Army Air Forces India-Burma Theater, using a converted mill building to house his headquarters, that of CBI Air Service Command, and ICWATC. Under Hardin, tonnages increased but so did expectations and frustrations; morale and safety concerns continued to plague the operation. In the first 54 days of 1944, 47 transports were lost. One transport was being lost for every 218 flights (an accident rate of 1.968 planes lost per thousand hours). One life was being lost for every 162 trips flown, or 340 tons delivered.


title: The Hump

text: In June 1944, after the capture of the Japanese fighter base at Myitkyina and at the behest of Brig. Gen. William H. Tunner, Col. Andrew B. Cannon was assigned to command the Assam Wing when it was activated the next month. Tunner, slated to become airlift commander following Hardin, anticipated that the end of the fighter threat would see a massive influx of C-54s into the India-China operation. Like Haynes, Alexander, and Tunner, Cannon had been a pioneer in the Air Transport Command, where as a protege of Tunner's he was base commander of Long Beach Army Air Field, where Tunner made his headquarters as commander of ATC's Ferry Division, and commanding officer of the 6th Ferrying Group. On 1 July, ATC reorganized its nine wings worldwide into air divisions, and sectors into wings. The ICW-ATC became the "India China Division ATC" (ICD-ATC), while the Eastern Sector, carrying out the India-China airlift, was re-designated the "Assam Wing", and the Western Sector support organization became the "India Wing". The India China Division also had an operational training unit at Gaya and used the service depots of the China-Burma-India Air Service Command at Panagarh, Agra, and Bangalore.


title: The Hump

text: Systems for identifying units and organizations assigned to the airlift changed several times between 1942 and 1945. The final change occurred on 1 August 1944 when the Air Transport Command discontinued the use of station numbers to identify its units and designated them as numbered "USAAF Base Units" with parenthetical modifiers describing their function. USAAF base units collectively identified all permanent party organizations, including flying units, at any particular non-combat base. The flying units were commonly denoted as lettered squadrons, i.e. "Squadron B", within the Base Unit. To illustrate the various organizational changes affecting the India-China airlift, the unit at Chabua under 10AF deployed overseas as the "1st Ferrying Group". It was redesignated the "1st Transport Group" on 1 December 1942 to denote that it was an ATC unit. Next it became "Station No. 6 (APO 629 New York)" on 1 December 1943 when for flexibility ATC no longer fielded groups or squadrons as units. Finally it became the "1333rd USAAF Base Unit (Foreign Transport Station)" on 1 August 1944 in conformance with USAAF policy service-wide. Similarly, "Headquarters Squadron, Eastern Sector, India-China Wing", established at Chabua on 16 September 1943 to administer the headquarters of the airlift, was redesignated the "Headquarters Squadron, Assam Wing" on 1 July 1944 when ATC reorganized itself into "divisions" and "wings"; and "Squadron A, 1325th USAAF Base Unit (HQ Assam Wing)" on 1 August 1944.


title: The Hump

text: Hardin was brought back to the United States after spending two years overseas and command of the India-China Division went next to Tunner. Tapped in the spring of 1944 to succeed Hardin, he selected his key staff and made a theater inspection trip in June that included piloting a C-46 over the Hump. He took command on 4 September 1944 with orders not just to increase the tonnage delivered, but also to reduce the numbers of lives and aircraft lost in accidents, and to improve morale in the India-China Division. Tunner and his staff, using a "big business" approach, completely turned around the operation, improved morale, and cut the aircraft loss ratio in half while doubling the amount of cargo delivered.


title: The Hump

text: Tunner made extensive use of over 47,000 local laborers and utilized at least one elephant to lift 55-gallon fuel drums into the aircraft. A daily direct flight called the "Trojan", flown by select C-54 crews, carried a minimum of five tons of highest priority materiel or passengers between Calcutta and Kunming, then brought back critically wounded patients or aircraft engines needing overhaul. Each base was assigned both daily and monthly tonnage quotas to move over the Hump based on the type of aircraft it operated and its distance from the "Chinaside" airfields, as the crews referred to their destinations. Tunner immediately reinstituted military standards of dress, decorum (including inspections and parades), and behavior that had become slack in the previous year, for which he earned the nickname "Willie the Whip".


title: The Hump

text: In Tunner's first month of command, although the ICD delivered 22,314 tons to China, it still incurred an accident rate of .682 per thousand hours of flight. By January 1945, Tunner's division had 249 aircraft and 17,000 personnel. It delivered more than 44,000 tons of cargo and passengers to China that month at an aircraft availability rate of 75%, but also incurred 23 fatal crashes with 36 crewmen killed. On 6 January a particularly fierce winter storm blew across the Himalayas from west to east, increasing the time of westbound trips by one hour, and caused 14 CNAC and ATC transports to be lost or written off, with 42 crewmen missing, the highest one-day loss of the operation. The accident toll increased in the two months that followed, with 69 planes lost and 95 crewmen killed.


title: The Hump

text: To reduce losses due to mechanical failure, in February 1945 Tunner introduced a maintenance program termed Production Line Maintenance. PLM consisted of having each aircraft due for 50- or 200-hour maintenance towed through five to seven maintenance stations, depending on whether or not an engine change was required. Each station had a fresh maintenance crew trained for a specific service task, including engine run up, inspections, cleaning, technical repair, and servicing, a process that took nearly a full 24-hour day per aircraft to complete. Each base specialized in only one type of aircraft to simplify the process. Despite initial resistance, PLM was successfully implemented throughout the division.


title: The Hump

text: Tunner also adopted two measures to lower the number of air mishaps due to inexperience and crew fatigue. To accomplish the first, he appointed Lt. Col. Robert D. "Red" Forman as division training officer to oversee both stringent training and a flying safety program led by Capt. Arthur Norden. After 15 March 1945, the program intensified when Major John J. Murdock, Jr., took over the position of division flying safety officer. Tunner also altered the personnel rotation policy of the ICD, which he saw as a major contributor to crew fatigue. Before Tunner took command, a pilot's tour was completed after 650 flight hours over the Hump and he rotated back to the United States. Many pilots took advantage of this by flying daily, accumulating the required hours as little as four months. But these pilots overworked themselves; the division flight surgeon reported that half of all crewmen suffered from operational fatigue. So effective 1 March 1945, Tunner increased the number of flight hours required to 750, and required all personnel to be in theater twelve months to be eligible for rotation, which discouraged over-scheduling.


title: The Hump

text: Under Tunner, the India-China Division expanded to four wings in December 1944. The expansion was necessary to control the multiplicity of USAAF Base Units created as more airfields were opened. In addition to the Assam and India Wings, ICD added the "Bengal Wing", headquartered at Tezgaon, to control C-54 operations, and the "China Wing" at Kunming. Tunner shifted his veteran commanders to provide leadership to the new wings. Cannon switched to the Bengal Wing, while Col. Richard F. Bromiley moved from the India Wing to the China Wing. Col. George D. "Lonnie" Campbell, Jr. succeeded to command of the Assam Wing.


title: The Hump

text: Both the accident rate and the raw number of accidents decreased notably as a result of these measures with the exception of the C-87/C-109 types, which remained 500% higher than on the C-54. Tunner called for their replacement entirely by C-54s and plans were drawn up to increase the Skymaster force to 272 by October 1945 and 540 by April 1946. With a fleet of 410 C-46s augmenting the ICD, the tonnage lift capability over the Hump was predicted to become more than 86,000 tons per month. A shortage of C-54 engines hampered the plan, which was modified to have a quarter of the force always in a pipeline between India and Florida for engine changes, carrying cargo and passengers as they traveled in both directions. The modified plan was approved in April 1945 and Morrison Field, Florida, was chosen for the maintenance but it proved an impediment to success when C-54s sent there remained at the field for periods five times the seven days originally estimated for turnaround.


title: The Hump

text: In July 1945, the last full month of operations, 662 aircraft of the India-China airlift delivered 71,042 tons, ICD's maximum monthly tonnage. Of this fleet, 332 were ICD transports, but 261 were combat aircraft from USAAF units temporarily assigned to the airlift. An average of 332 flights to China was scheduled daily. The India-China Division ATC had 34,000 USAAF personnel assigned, and including indigenous civilians of all nationalities employed in India, Burma, and China, 84,000 persons overall. It boasted an aircraft availability rate of more than 85%. ICD suffered 23 major accidents in July, with 37 crewmen killed, but the Hump accident rate declined to .358 aircraft per thousand hours of flight in July (one-fifth of what it had been in January 1944) and .239 in August.


title: The Hump

text: On 1 August 1945, to celebrate "Air Force Day", ICD laid on its largest mission of the airlift. Tunner wrote that ICD flew 1,118 round-trip sorties, averaging two per aircraft, and one C-54 logged three round trips in 22¼ hours of operations. 5,327 tons were delivered in one day without fatality, and with no major accidents. C-87s and C-109s carried 15% of the tonnage without mishap. Before the month ended, nearly 50,000 more tons were delivered. Eight major accidents resulted in only 11 deaths, at a rate of one death for every 2,925 trips (1/18 of what it had been in January 1944). The major accident rate of only 0.18 aircraft lost per 1000 hours was one-third of what it had been when Tunner took command, and one-eighth of that of January 1944.


title: The Hump

text: He considered ICD's safety record to be his greatest achievement. In his memoir "Over the Hump", Tunner wrote:


title: The Hump

text: Tunner commanded the division until 10 November 1945. The deputy commander of ICD, former bomber commander Brig. Gen. Charles W. Lawrence, briefly commanded the division before it was disbanded on 15 November 1945.


title: The Hump

text: The first significant diversion of India-China Wing resources to operations in the region other than the Hump airlift began in February 1944. The Japanese attack in Arakan, followed by an offensive against Imphal in March and April, resulted in assistance to the British that Hardin estimated reduced hump deliveries by 1,200 tons. The ICW also had a stake in resistance to the offensive because the threat to Imphal imperiled the Assam-Bengal railroad along which not just Hump cargo but fuel for the airlift passed. The crisis occasioned by the Japanese attack on Imphal led Admiral Louis Mountbatten, the commander-in-chief of the Allied South East Asia Command, to request 38 C-47 aircraft to reinforce Imphal. Mountbatten had no authority to divert planes from the Hump, but he was backed up by two of the principal American commanders in the theater: Major General Daniel I. Sultan, the deputy commander of the CBI Theater, and Stratemeyer, who in addition to all his other duties commanded SEAC's Eastern Air Command, which for all practical purposes made him Mountbatten's air commander. After the request was approved, ICW provided 25 C-46s as the equivalent of 38 C-47s. These were attached to the EAC Troop Carrier Command to support the British and were used to fly the personnel and light equipment of the 5th Indian Division to Imphal and Dimapur, where it arrived in time to thwart the Japanese offensive.


title: The Hump

text: The next month, to reinforce Stilwell's planned offensive into Burma, the ICW flew 18,000 Chinese troops west across the Hump to Sookerating, which resulted in a net reduction to the India-China effort of at least 1,500 tons. However, the capture in May 1944 of Myitkyina airfield by American and Chinese troops of Stilwell's command deprived the Japanese of their principal fighter airfield threatening Allied aircraft flying the Hump. The field immediately became an emergency landing strip for Allied aircraft even though fighting continued in Myitkyina town until August 1944. ICD continued its contribution to this success by flying in from southern India a regimental-sized force of combat engineers and their support, including heavy equipment, for airfield construction. The capture of Myitkyina allowed ICD C-54s, which had ceiling limitations that precluded flying "Route Able" (the High Hump), the regular use of a second, more direct route, designated "Route Baker" but unofficially dubbed the "Low Hump".


title: The Hump

text: In October 1944, after Gen. Tunner took command of the India-China Division of Air Transport Command, increased numbers of C-54s, sometimes escorted by Allied fighters based at Myitkyina, greatly increased tonnage levels flown to China from India. The C-54, which could at ten tons carry five times the cargo load of the C-47 and twice that of the C-46, replaced both twin-engined transports as the primary lifter of the operation. The expansion of bases resulted in the formation of eastbound Routes Easy, Fox, Love, Nan, and Oboe, and of westbound Route King.


title: The Hump

text: From April 1944 to January 1945, the India-China Division was also tasked with supporting Operation Matterhorn, the B-29 Superfortress strategic bombing campaign against Japan from forward bases around Chengtu in central China. Arnold originally envisioned Matterhorn units as being self-sustaining, bringing in their own fuel in hundreds of C-109s ("see Transport shortcomings below") and other materiel using B-29s and 20 C-87s as their own "air transport service". The concept proved to be flawed from the outset when the planned 300-bomber force was reduced to a single combat wing of 150 bombers before it left the United States. B-29s of the XX Bomber Command, stripped of guns and other equipment and fitted with four bomb bay tanks, were used as fuel tankers while tactical aircraft hauled other supplies, including bombs, but were unable to bring enough materiel over the Hump from their permanent bases around Calcutta in India to begin missions. XX BC turned to ICD for additional support when its target date for commencement of missions was repeatedly postponed.


title: The Hump

text: ATC's North African Wing had already provided stopgap support by transporting 250 spare B-29 engines to the CBI in April and May 1944, using 25 C-54s over a shuttle route from the port of Casablanca to Calcutta that came to be called the "Crescent Blend" until three special mission C-46 squadrons—created in early 1944 under the code name "Moby Dick"—were ready to carry out supply operations for XX Bomber Command. Designated the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Air Transport Squadrons (Mobile), each was intended to be a self-contained unit of twenty C-46s, flight crews, maintenance and engineering specialists, and a full complement of station operation personnel, although when first committed the service elements had not yet been integrated. They arrived in the CBI in June 1944, with the 1st and 2nd MATS based at Kalaikunda, West Bengal, taking over the "Crescent Blend" shuttle and bringing in over 100 spare engines per month, while the 3rd MATS was sent forward to the ICD base at Kunming to augment the India-China airlift.


title: The Hump

text: Of 42,000 tons of materiel delivered before XX BC abandoned its China bases and returned to India, the ICD moved almost two-thirds. During the last three months of bombing operations from China, XX BC quickly phased out use of its B-29s to haul cargo, and ICD supplied all of XX Bomber Command's materiel except bombs, which B-29s toted over the mountains in "reverse Hump" missions. Lt.Col. Robert S. McNamara created a statistical control section to create adjustable schedules that tracked the variable.


title: The Hump

text: XX BC had the unfortunate coincidence of arriving in the theater just as the Japanese started a major offensive in East China to open a corridor for lines of communication to its forces in Indochina, seize the airfields of Chennault's Fourteenth Air Force situated in that corridor, and possibly knock China out of the war. The load allocations that ICD had to commit to XX BC early on caused "mutual recriminations" between XX BC, ICD and Chennault, from whom most of the altered allocation tonnage was taken, with each blaming the other for problems that ensued. The Japanese offensive continued inexorably all summer and into the fall, threatening the efficacy if not the very existence of 14AF. Relations were never entirely smoothed with Chennault, but workable compromises were eventually fashioned by Stratemeyer, Hardin and Tunner to accomplish the tasks necessary to keep 14AF in the fight. Supplying Matterhorn during the concurrent crisis did have the positive effect of increasing the resources and effort committed to the airlift, and recognition by all involved that ICD was the only agency that could efficiently handle the logistics.


title: The Hump

text: When ATC reorganized on 1 August, the MATS squadrons maintained a separate identity from the newly created USAAF Base Units, but each flew hundreds of Hump missions, delivering aviation fuel and engines. Because India-China operations were of extraordinary length from Kalaikunda—requiring an intermediate stop at Jorhat—its two squadrons were transferred to ICD when XX Bomber Command began planning the reduction of its operations in November 1944. On 30 October the 2nd MATS moved to Dergaon, East Bengal, and later to Luliang, China, where it was disbanded in June 1945 and became Squadron B, 1343rd USAAF Base Unit.


title: The Hump

text: Because C-47s and C-46s which landed in China were temporarily beyond ATC control, they were constantly being diverted for local emergencies by Chennault's and China Theater commander Lt. Gen. Albert C. Wedemeyer's forces, disrupting the flight crew rest and aircraft maintenance schedules necessary to maintain tonnage. To alleviate the situation and also provide the additional support needed by the combat forces, 50 C-47s and 20 C46s were permanently based in China after October 1944 for internal movement of cargo and to assist the India-China airlift when gaps in local scheduling permitted. Most of the remaining C-47s were eventually sent to bases in Burma and continued India-China missions over the lower routes. They proved their continuing usefulness by playing prominent roles in various support missions within China in 1944 and 1945.


title: The Hump

text: Between 5 December 1944 and 5 January 1945, C-46s and crews were attached to the Tenth Air Force to augment "Operation Grubworm". This was the relocation of the 14th and 22nd Chinese Divisions, located in reserve on the Stilwell Road near Myitkyina, to bases around Kunming. Chiang and Wedemeyer proposed to the Combined Chiefs of Staff, over the objections of Mountbatten, to relocate the divisions to counter a Japanese offensive seeking to capture the Kunming airfields. The operation was approved with the proviso that it not strain Tenth Air Force's extensive air transport system supplying Allied ground operations in Burma. IDC provided the C-46s of the mobile air transport squadrons and all of its China Wing C-47s to provide the necessary augmentation.


title: The Hump

text: The 2nd MATS moved in entirety from its base at Dergaon to Luliang Field, China, completing the deployment by December 13. The 1st MATS operated from Ledo, and ICD's 1348th USAAF Base Unit at Myitkyina South airfield coordinated the entire operation and provided the staging base for refueling all transports. The C-46s moved the 14th Division from five airfields in Burma, including a field at Nansin whose construction was completed December 4. Takeoffs there were subject to artillery and sniper fire. The 1348th Base Unit scheduled operations 24 hours a day and in bad weather, although the operation was suspended between 16 and 22 December when the situation in China seemed improved. Of the six pick-up fields, only Myitkyina South was capable of night operations, and troop carrier C-47s were used to shuttle troops there during the day for ICD aircraft to fly over the Hump at night.


title: The Hump

text: The mobile air transport squadrons were familiar with the Burma airfields and so were selected to fly the operation. Showing unusual flexibility in planning, the 1348th Base Unit quartered incoming troops near airfields, supplied them, monitored the availability of aircraft and crews, divided the troops into planeloads, and kept Chinese units and their materiel intact. Briefings and fuelings were conducted at Myitkyina South, the planes flew to their pickup fields and loaded, and then flew back to Myitkyina South for a final refueling before flying on to China. The 1348th Base Unit control tower performed all air traffic control of aircraft to and from China.


title: The Hump

text: Grubworm lifted 25,009 Chinese troops, 396 Americans, 1,596 draft animals, 42 jeeps and 144 pieces of artillery in 24 days of flying. ICD crews provided 597 of the 1328 sorties of the operation and moved more than 14,000 of the troops involved. Although three C-47s were lost during the operation, ICD had no losses. When the Japanese offensive shifted to seize the Fourteenth Air Force bases at Suichwan and Kanchow, the 2nd ATS evacuated the bases in a single day on 22 January.


title: The Hump

text: Between March and May 1945, the ICD carried the first American combat troops into China when it redeployed the two American regiments of the MARS Task Force from Burma. In April, 50 C-47s and 30 C-46s of the ICD conducted "Operation Rooster", transporting both divisions of the Chinese 6th Army from Kunming, where they had been delivered by "Grubworm", to Chihkiang in the western Hsiang valley to reinforce the defense of the 14th AF base there. ICD flew 1,648 sorties, delivering 25,136 troops; 2,178 horses; and 1,565 tons of materiel; for a total of 5,523 tons. 369 tons of aviation gasoline was also carried to Chihkiang for 14th AF use


title: The Hump

text: The task facing the Tenth Air Force of creating an airlift was daunting at minimum, emphasizing all that the Army Air Forces lacked in April 1942: no units tasked for moving cargo, no experience in organized airlift by the USAAF or its predecessor Air Corps, and no airfields for basing units. In addition, flying in the region was made more difficult by a lack of reliable charts, an absence of radio navigation aids, and a dearth of weather data.


title: The Hump

text: In 1942 Chiang Kai-shek insisted that at least 7,500 tons per month were needed to keep his field divisions in operation, but this figure proved unattainable for the first fifteen months of the India-China airlift. The 7,500 total was first exceeded in August 1943, by which time objectives had been increased to 10,000 tons a month. Ultimately monthly requirements surpassed 50,000 tons.


title: The Hump

text: Slowly, however, an airlift of unprecedented scale began to take shape. Construction of four new bases was begun in 1942, and by 1944 the operation flew from six all-weather airfields in Assam. By July 1945 the air corridor from India began at thirteen airfields strung out along the North-east Indian Railways in the Brahmaputra valley, with seven in Assam , four in the Bengal valley, and two near Calcutta, and terminated at six Chinaside airfields around Kunming.


title: The Hump

text: Through July 1944 the flight corridor for the India-China airlift was fifty miles wide with a highly restrictive vertical clearance. As bases expanded and the Low Hump route came into use, the corridor widened to and 25 charted routes, with a vertical clearance of 10,000–25,000 MSL in the south, permitting highly congested but controlled operations at all hours.


title: The Hump

text: A critical problem proved to be finding a cargo aircraft capable of carrying heavy payloads at the high altitudes required, and three types were tried before the opening of a low Hump route permitted the use of C-54s: C-47 and variants, C-46, and C-87/C-109.


title: The Hump

text: Initially, the India-China airlift was flown with the Douglas DC-3 and its military versions, the C-47, C-53 and C-39. However, the DC-3 design's fuselage was so high off the ground that loading from most truck beds was difficult, and its narrow door and weak floor could not sustain heavy cargo. Although C-47s had reinforced flooring and a wider door, they still required specialized loading equipment for much of the cargo needed in China and had a limited payload capacity. Also, performance specifications of the Douglas transports were not suited to high-altitude operation with heavy payloads, and could not normally reach an altitude sufficient to clear the mountainous terrain, forcing the planes to attempt a highly dangerous route through the maze-like Himalayan passes.


title: The Hump

text: The introduction in January 1943 of the Consolidated C-87 Liberator Express, a design modification of the B-24D heavy bomber, boosted tonnage figures. Its high-altitude capability enabled it to surmount the lower mountains (15,000–16000 feet MSL) without resorting to the passes, but the type had a high accident rate and was unsuited to the airfields then in use. Despite having four engines, the C-87 climbed poorly with heavy loads, as did its bomber counterparts, and often crashed on takeoff if an engine was lost. Its poor cockpit illumination was inadequate for bad weather flying and often failed during instrument takeoffs, its electrical and hydraulic systems frequently froze at high altitude and malfunctioned, and its flight deck heating system was prone to produce either stifling heat or none at all. Attributed by its pilots to its slim Davis wing, the C-87 also had a tendency to spin out of control when encountering even mild icing conditions over the mountains. One Hump pilot called the variant "an evil, bastard contraption" and a "ground-loving bitch" that "could not carry enough ice to chill a highball".


title: The Hump

text: Despite its shortcomings, the C-87 was valued for the reliability of its engines, speed that enabled it to reduce significantly the effect of head and cross winds, a service ceiling that allowed it to surmount most weather fronts, and range that permitted its crews to fly "pressure-front" patterns that chased favorable winds.


title: The Hump

text: Another Liberator transport variant, the C-109, carried gasoline in converted B-24Js or B-24Ls. All combat equipment was removed and eight flexible bag fuel tanks were installed inside the fuselage with a 2,900 U.S. gallon capacity. 70 were initially planned to fly the Hump with XX Bomber Command, beginning in September 1944, but most of the 218 C-109 conversions eventually served in the CBI under ATC after B-29 operations were shifted from China back to India. At least 80 were involved in major accidents between September 1944 and August 1945. Like the C-87, they were not popular with their crews, since they were very difficult to land when fully loaded, particularly at airfields such as Kunming's above in elevation, and often demonstrated unstable flight characteristics when all eight cargo tanks were full. A crash landing of a loaded C-109 inevitably resulted in an explosion and crew fatalities, earning it the nickname "C-One-Oh-Boom".


title: The Hump

text: The Curtiss C-46 Commando began to fly India-China missions in May 1943. The C-46 was a large twin-engine aircraft capable of flying faster and higher than any previous medium-range cargo aircraft, and could carry heavier loads than either the C-47 or the C-87, albeit at two and one half times the unit cost for a C-47. With the C-46, airlift tonnage increased significantly, surpassing objectives with 12,594 tons in December 1943. Loads continued to increase throughout 1944 and 1945, reaching an all-time maximum tonnage in July 1945. Performance of the Commando was enhanced when camouflage paint, standard on all USAAF aircraft until February 1944, was removed to reduce weight and provide five extra knots of speed.


title: The Hump

text: While becoming the medium-range workhorse of the Hump airlift, the C-46 throughout its service experienced frequent mechanical failures (in particular, a tendency to engine failure and fuel leaks that puddled at the wing root to become an explosion hazard) that led to such unflattering sobriquets Air Force-wide as "Dumbo" and "Plumber's Nightmare", and among ATC crews as the "flying coffin". In its first five months of operations, 20% of the C-46s assigned to the airlift crashed. When it first arrived in theater, in addition to being accompanied by technical orders that required 50 field modifications before it could be flown operationally, the C-46 also required additional training for inexperienced crews, and a transition school was established that drained the airlift of ten aircraft and crews. Worse, spare parts were in such scarce supply until the fall of 1943 that 26 of the first 68 C-46s sent were out of commission.


title: The Hump

text: Flying over the Hump proved to be an extremely hazardous undertaking for Allied flight crews. The air route wound its way into the high mountains and deep gorges between north Burma and west China, where violent turbulence, 125 to winds, icing, and inclement weather conditions were a regular occurrence. Lack of suitable navigational equipment, radio beacons, and inadequate numbers of trained personnel (there were never enough navigators for all the groups) continually affected airlift operations.