Sikorsky YR4B (Serial # 42107237) helicopter arrives by C54 at North Strip, Myitkyina ??*, Burma (Myanmar), and is shown going on a couple of missions. The first is to mark a downed B25 and recover usable parts. The second mission shown was to evacuate a wounded man from a weather station atop a mountain. The film has the order/timing of these missions, and possibly the arrival date wrong as this second mission actually did take place on January 2223, 1945. Additionally, this mission was a little more complicated than the narrator leads us to believe. According to the article on Wikipedia on the Sikorsky YR4B, this mission " involved several legs for refueling and navigating through passes between mountains nearly 10,000 feet (3,000 m) tall, to reach a weather station located at an elevation of 4,700 feet (1,400 m). The higher than normal altitude required a downhill run of 20 ft (6.1 m) to get airborne."
Other designations for these VoughtSikorsky helicopters include the VS316, R4 and HNS1. This particular aircraft shown in the video (42107237) was flown to Burma from Wright Field in Dayton, Ohio by order of General Henry "Hap" Arnold to rescue the crew of a downed B25. It later crashed in Burma on July 26, 1945.
I am not sure, but I believe this is the same helicopter shown in this footage of another jungle rescue mission that I have posted here: • Sikorsky YR4B ( R4 ) Helicopter Res...
*Not sure if I have the correct city here. It sounds like the narrator says, "Michinaw" and from what I have found I believe that is close to the pronunciation of "Myitkyina".
Public domain footage from Staff Film Reports #46 produced by the US Army Signal Corps' Army Pictorial Service.
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