WONZ 228 – Alistair Marshall and Rod Dahlberg

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Guests: Alistair Marshall, and Rodney Dahlberg

Host: Dave Homewood

Recorded: Al recorded 10th of September 2020, Rod recorded 13th of August 2018

Released: 24th of September 2020

Duration: 1 hour 39 minutes 15 seconds

In this “MOSQUITO SPECIAL” episode Dave Homewood talks again with Al Marshall, the team leader of the exciting current move of the world famous Mapua de Havilland Mosquito NZ2336. The aircraft was saved and stored for six decades by John Smith. Following John’s death in August 2019, his family have decided the Mosquito should go on public display in the Omaka Aviation Heritage Centre, Blenheim. Al has been put in charge of the team of volunteers who will be moving the precious Mosquito from Mapua, west of Nelson, the 180 km trek east to Omaka Aerodrome in coming weeks. He is also running the programme to clean up and repaint the aircraft to prepare it for public display. He talks about the project and also about their Omaka Warbird Rescue Givealittle fundraiser to help make this happen, and the new Facebook group where you can follow the events. Links to both are below on this page. This has different content from the last episode, though a little of the information is repeated.

Following the brief chat with Al, Dave then presents an interview with former RNZAF pilot Rod Dahlberg. Rod joined the Royal New Zealand Air Force in January 1949, and learned to fly Tiger Moths and then Harvards at No. 1 Flying Training School at RNZAF Station Wigram. During this period he experienced his first crash during night flying in Harvard NZ1064, writing it off on the 12th of September 1949.

He was then posted to No. 14 Squadron at Ohakea for multi-engine conversion in Airspeed Oxfords, and then returned to Wigram for the final phase of his training at the Instrument Weather School, flying Oxfords and Harvards.

On the 26th of July 1950 Rod was posted to No. 75 Squadron at Ohakea. An operational squadron, they were flying the de Havilland Mosquito fighter-bomber. During his almost two years on the squadron Rod had a couple more very dangerous incidents, including putting Mosquito NZ2329 on it’s belly, losing a gear door, and somehow recovering from a deadly spin from the top of a loop.

On the 1st of April 1952 Rod moved to No. 14 Squadron, who were now flying de Havilland Vampires. He served with the squadron at Ohakea and on deployment to Cyprus for a Middle East peacekeeping in the canal zone. In Cyprus he also converted to and flew the squadron’s Gloster Meteors, and spent a good amount of time flying to and from Egypt.

Returning to New Zealand in April 1953, Rod decided to leave the RNZAF and by September that year he was flying Tiger Moths with Airspread Ltd. or Tauranga. He continued to fly as a topdressing pilots for several decades till his bad back forced him to give up flying. Rod also co-owned an ex-RNZAF Harvard for many years, NZ1096.

Please note: Currently this site is experiencing issues with the photo layout. I am hoping this can be rectified soon, and when it is, I’ll add a lot more of Rod’s photos.

Quick Links:

•  Omaka Warbird Rescue Givealittle

•  Omaka John Smith Mosquito Project Facebook Group

•  The Omaka Aviation Heritage Centre

NB: The interlude music is 05 January by Kai Engel, and the music at the end of this episode is Wild Flower by Joakim Karud