Barnes Wallis – World Warbird News https://www.worldwarbirdnews.com The latest in warbirds and historical aviation Tue, 03 May 2011 10:15:53 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://www.worldwarbirdnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/WWN-icon-256-150x150.png Barnes Wallis – World Warbird News https://www.worldwarbirdnews.com 32 32 Dambuster raid reenacted in Canada https://www.worldwarbirdnews.com/2011/05/03/dambuster-raid-reenacted-in-canada/ https://www.worldwarbirdnews.com/2011/05/03/dambuster-raid-reenacted-in-canada/#respond Tue, 03 May 2011 10:15:53 +0000 http://www.worldwarbirdnews.com/?p=95

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An Upkeep bomb, preserved in the Imperial War Museum (Photo Martin Richards (CC BY-SA 3.0))

The bomb that was used to destroy the Ruhr dams during the infamous 1943 Dambuster raids, known as the “Upkeep”, was recreated and tested in Canada. The Upkeep was designed by Barnes Wallis. The raid has been reenacted many times, notably by the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight’s Lancaster but, by a twist of fate, the bomb’s original design and calculations were lost in 1960 in a flood. 

Dr Hugh Hunt, from Cambridge University’s department of engineering, wanted to find out if Wallis’ achievement could be done again and began working on it. Starting with a small-scale model, his team eventually re-created the bomb and dropped it from a Buffalo Airways DC-4 against a dam built for this purpose. The dam was obliterated by the bomb.

Read more about this experiment on the Daily Mail website (with pictures and videos).

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