English translation

In May 1949, the largest air transport operation in history, the Berlin Airlift, was concluded, a gigantic operation that began in June 1948 to bring supplies to the city, to which Soviet troops had closed the land access routes. At the end of the war Berlin had been divided into an American, a French and an English sector, surrounded by the G.D.R. under Soviet control and connected to the Western world only by railway and a motorway, the famous Korridor Autobahn. When the Soviets decided to take possession of the previous German capital, they laid siege to it by simply blocking access and disconnecting the electricity supply from 24 June 1948, hoping for a rapid capitulation of the two million inhabitants of the western part of Berlin. The next day the airlift began, a monumental operation that ended with 278,228 flights, carrying 2,326,406 tons of food and other supplies, and 1,500,000 tons of coal. Given the small size of aircraft such as the C-47s and C-54s that carried out the bulk of the operations, at the peak of the operation, at the airports of Tempelhof, Gatow and on Lake Havel, there was a movement every 45 seconds, an incredible operation that gave rise to linear programming of operations, the basis of many current IT activities. The Bridge was a success, as the Soviet Union lifted the blockade on May 12, 1949; included in the enormous cost of the operation were also 101 airmen who lost their lives in 17 accidents. The memory of this activity is still alive in the German and American communities and in June 2024 the anniversary was celebrated at the American military airport in Wiesbaden, one of the departure points of the aircraft that went to supply Berlin 75 years earlier. The event was organized by the American Garrison of the Clay Kaserne of Wiesbaden, named after General Lucius Clay, who was one of the organizers of the Bridge; the fact that some C-47 / DC-3s were already in Europe for the celebrations of the Normandy landings was exploited and it was decided to have them arrive in Wiesbaden for a weekend of celebrations.
Not everything went as desired, of the nine twin-engined planes present in Normandy, only five arrived in Germany, mechanical and bureaucratic problems stopped half the fleet, in Wiesbaden there were however three DC-3s that took part in the flight operations and two on static display:
• ‘Placid Lassie’ – C-47 from the Tunison Foundation, founding unit of D-Day Squadron
• ‘That’s all … Brother’ – C-47 from Commemorative Air Force
• ‘Western Air Lines’ - DC-3 owned by Tim Savage
• ‘Chalair’ - DC-3C from the Battisti family in Paris
• ‘Daisy’ - C-47 from the swedish Flyegende Veteraner, painted in SAS color scheme
Some private T-6s completed the event, to which the USAF provided the remaining transport aircrafts, a C-17, an MC-130, an AH-64D Apache, a UC-35, a C-12 and a C-130J adorned with a livery that it was reminiscent of the invasion stripes of the Normandy landings.
The heart of the event were the various DC-3 flights, which alternately carried 25 parachutists each in flight, together with the C-130J and then carried out the flights by launching the famous chocolates hanging from the tiny parachutes which earned them the nickname 'Rosinen Bomber', Bombers of the dried grapes. The tradition of throwing sweets to the children who crowded the end of the Berlin airports was started by Gail Halvorsen, an applauded participant in previous editions of the anniversary and recently deceased, replaced this year by her daughter, proud to participate in the training sessions for the American and German students, invited in large numbers to the event. The American Garrison counted over 50,000 people in attendance, with a strong presence of students invited to the education sessions; these are surprising numbers that show how important this event is still considered and that do honor to those who organized it, in the end a good way to keep alive the memory of an historic feat.