Tinian Airfield Re-Awakens from a 70-Year Slumber in the Jungle
At the height of World War II in 1945, Tinian Airfield was the busiest airfield in the world as hundreds of B-29s gathered here for the final bombing campaign of Japan. Tinian had been seized from the Japanese in a bloody campaign in late summer of 1944 and now roared with the sounds of thousands of Wright R-3350 Duplex-Cyclones, one of the biggest aircraft piston engines ever made. One time in Cleveland in the 1990s I stepped out of our car and immediately recognized the sound as one of the few remaining B-29s flew overhead. It was exhilarating to hear this roar of American power overhead.
Now Tinian is coming back to life as one of the new dispersal airfields to deter China.
