FRANKFURT, May 12, 1949 (UP) -- With 1,583,721 tons and 194,531 flights behind them, the airlift boys kept them flying today.
The hundreds of American and British planes which supplied blockaded Berlin with food and fuel for 320 days will remain on the job, at least temporarily, despite the lifting of the land blockade today.
Lieut. Gen. John K. (Uncle Joe) Cannon, U. S. Air Force commander in Europe, said the lift would go full force until Western Berlin has a stockpile of 200,000 tons of supplies.
"Only the future can determine the exact date the air lift will end," Cannon said.
Two Flying Fortresses and a handful of pilots started the lift on June 26, 1948. Since then it has grown steadily into a mighty operation that kept 2,500,000 Western Berliners supplied by air despite the blockade.
The lift hit the 1,000 ton-a-day mark on July 17. On Sept. 17, the flyers celebrated Air Force Day by bringing in 6,978 tons. On Feb. 18, they flew the millionth ton into Berlin. And on April 16 they set an all-time mark with a record lift of 12,940 tons in 24 hours.
Fifty-seven crewmen and passengers have been killed on airlift runs.
One minute after midnight this morning, when the blockade ended officially, the lift had brought into Berlin 1,583,721.5 tons in 194,531 flights. Its pilots had been in the air 413,000 hours and flown 87,500,000 miles.
Despite the hazards of flying night and day in all kinds of weather, the fliers remembered the German children and their privations. They set up a "Little Vittles" operation through which candy was parachuted to the youngsters.
Among the airlift flyers are many veterans of another historic airlift - the wartime Hump over the mountains from India to China.
Maj. William H. Turner, who directed flights over the Hump, took command of the Berlin airlift last July 28.
