Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Bat Bird Lives

My sincerest thanks to Chris Rios for his beautiful artwork depicting 62-4334, the "Bat Bird" and me, over North Vietnam. Received my signed artist proof this week and it is beautiful.


The completed prints are 16" x 22" and feature a recreation of the 421st TFS Fighting Cavaliers patch on the lower left and the Bat Bird nose-art on the lower right. A brief statement about the jet, the mission and the young man in the cockpit describes it. 

If you've got a blank wall that needs a neat airplane picture, drop Chris a line. Limited edition, numbered prints are offered. 

8 comments:

chris parker said...

No blank walls, but asked for the price inc shipping to Europe anyway - I'll find space!

drjim said...

Stunning!

nzgarry said...

Hi Mr R,
It looks great!.
Um.. I'm curious to know what input you had to the image
1. Mission/Configuration
2. Aircraft attitude
3. Other
Also, why the centreline external bombload when it had a bomb-bay?

Ed Rasimus said...

nzgarry, The collaboration started when Chris asked about photos, etc. of the Bat Bird nose art. Unfortunately few exist because of the transitory nature of its existence. It only lasted about two weeks before it was ordered removed. The drawing was initially planned as a two-ship with a two-seat Weasel ahead of me. Chris then decided to go with the single jet and we discussed things like tail-code (none during my tenure), weapons load for a Weasel mission, helmet color, etc.

The F-105 bomb-bay was strictly for a B28-RE nuclear weapon (1.1 MT yield). Conventional bombs were not carried internally. The bomb-bay held a supplemental 365 gallon fuel tank.

For those interested, Chris is willing to send purchased lithos to me for signature and them forwarding to the purchaser, if desired.

Mike said...

I realize this is a little late, but I hadn't yet read "When Thunder Rolled" in Oct. 2011 when you posted this :-)

I've started building a model of an F-105 that I want to either make into "Bat Bird" or the plane you flew on your 100th mission...do you have a record of the tail markings for that plane?

After seeing Chris's image of "Bat Bird", I can't decide which one I want to build now! I enjoyed your book immensely and I'm set on building an F-105 from it - but you told so many compelling stories, it's hard to choose a plane to honor your book.

Thanks!

Mike

Ed Rasimus said...

Mike, I flew F-105D 61-0126 on 2 Nov 66 for my 100th mission. The jet was lost on Oct 27, 1967 over Hanoi, flown by Capt Russ Temberley who was POW until March of '73. Load was 6xMk-82 centerline and two 450 gallon inboard tanks, no outboard stores.

Mike said...

Thank you for the reply - I appreciate it!

If I remember correctly, in the book you say your helmet was white with a red visor cover, correct?

If you're interested, I'm going to set up a Flickr page to show images of the model's progress. In the meantime, here's an image I made to show my display idea for the model:

Image of model display idea

Thank you again for your reply!

Mike

Mike said...

I'll be putting up pictures of the model's progress at...

F-105D Model

Feel free to leave comments if it appears I'm doing something incorrectly.

Mike