The Aviation Historian — January 2018

Issue No 22 THE AVIATION HISTORIAN 63

the planned date. Skirmishes began at Zouar and
the Skyraiders were called in.
Ground-attack missions were undertaken with
four Skyraiders (two Gabonese and two Chadian)
each equipped with two 250kg (550lb) bombs,
ten rocket projectiles (RPs) and 400 machine-
gun rounds. The Skyraiders frequently returned
with damage from groundfire, so it was decided
to change tactics and to fly very low, to make
accurate aiming difficult for the ground troops.
Low-level strafing runs with the machine-guns
were adopted and the RPs were also launched in
low-level passes at 1,500ft (450m) down to 500ft
(150m). The bombs were dropped in what would
usually have been RP passes, starting at 3,500ft
(1,050m), dropping to 700ft (200m). The objective
was to hit the target directly to maximise damage,
but the Skyraiders often flew so low that they
passed through the blast caused by their own
bombs. Thus Jacques Borne’s Skyraider came
back on one occasion with two holes in his canopy
and other damage from his own bombs.
On July 3 René Gras’s Skyraider, coded “19”,
was hit in the engine by groundfire, necessitating
a forced landing on the Zouar runway, recently
abandoned by the Chadians. His wingman,
Borne, landed and retrieved Gras, who climbed
into the aircraft’s fuselage compartment, the
Skyraider then taking off to return to Faya-
Largeau. The next day the aircraft was repaired by
a team of mechanics flown into Zouar in a C-47,
with top cover provided by three Skyraiders.
Three days later the runway and remaining
facilities at Zouar were bombed and destroyed.
The GPG Skyraiders returned to Gabon at the
end of July 1977, the unit’s two pilots having
despatched 64 x 500lb bombs, 480 RPs and 24,000
machine-gun rounds against FROLINAT forces.
The pair returned to Chad on February 20, 1978,
to participate in the French military’s Opération

Tacaud, launched in support of Chadian govern-

ment troops to protect N’Djamena against

FROLINAT forces, but completed only two

missions before their return to Gabon on March

10. A month later their erstwhile ENT colleague,
    Lt Jean-Louis Latour, was shot down and killed in
    his AD-4N by an SA-7 surface-to-air-missile near
    Salal in central Chad.

Increasing Skyraider Strength

In July 1978 four more AD-4Ns were donated to

Gabon by France. These were coded “14”, “38”,

“61” and “68”. The delivery flight, accompanied

by a Gabonese C-130, was completed during

July 8–15 from Châteaudun, where there was

a degree of concern about the flight controls of

Skyraider “38”, which was ferried by the highly

experienced Pierre Grosjean. The delivery flight

was not without its troubles.

First batch delivered during February 9–18, 1976

Reg’n    SFERMA BuAer    c/n     Pilot

No*  No

TR-KMM 19 126924 7724 Laforêt

TR-KMN 41 126912 7712 Borne

TR-KMO 42 126922 7722 Gras

TR-KMP 45 126956 7756 Gardessen

Second batch delivered during July 8–15, 1978

TR-KFP 14 124143 7449 Gras

TR-KFQ 68 127894 7909 Borne

TR-KFR 38 126996 7796 Grosjean

TR-KFS 61 127002 7802 Lapeyre

*SFERMA — Société Française d’Entretien et de

Réparation de Matériel Aéronautique

Gabonese Presidential Guard DOUGLAS

AD-4N Skyraider deliveries

Former Armée de l’Air pilot Jacques Borne joined the GPG in September

1975, and is seen here at the controls of Skyraider “45”/TR-KMP. Note the

“ship’s door” in the fuselage, into which René Gras clambered after having

forced-landed his own Skyraider at Zouar in July 1977.