World War II
In 1941 No.14 squadron SAAF and its Maryland bombers were moved from Kenya to Egypt, renumbered as No.24 squadron and operated alongside No. 39 Squadron RAF as daytime tactical bomber units carrying out bombing sorties on Mediterranean targets. 24 squadron was later in the year re-equipped with Bostons.
In Dec, 1943 the squadron was relocated to Algeria and re-equipped with the B-26 Marauders and in 1944 flew to a new base at Pescara, Italy, later advancing to Jesi, Italy.
At the end of the war the squadron used its Marauders as transport aircraft, before moving to Egypt in October 1945 and disbanding on 6 November 1945.
The Buccaneer entered SAAF service in 1965. SAAF Buccaneers saw active service during the Border War in South-West Africa, notably at Cassinga in 1978. They flew over Angola and Namibia in the 1970s and 1980s, and attacked SWAPO guerrilla camps with rockets and bombs.
The squadron was disbanded in March 1991.
Read more about this topic: 24 Squadron SAAF
Famous quotes containing the words world and/or war:
“The life of man in this world is like the life of a fly in a room filled with 100 boys, each armed with a fly-swatter.”
—H.L. (Henry Lewis)
“Their bodies are buried in peace; but their name liveth for evermore.”
—Apocrypha. Ecclesiasticus, 44:14.
The line “their name liveth for evermore” was chosen by Rudyard Kipling on behalf of the Imperial War Graves Commission as an epitaph to be used in Commonwealth War Cemeteries. Kipling had himself lost a son in the fighting.