This aircraft was built by Consolidated Aircraft Corporation at San Diego, California - 1943

It was allocated the Construction Number '182' with the Hull Number '1109'

It was intended for the Royal Air Force under the 'Lend/Lease' program as 'JX575'

First flown at San Diego - January 1943

Departed San Diego on the ferry flight to the United Kingdom - January 12, 1943

This aircraft was not taken-up by the Royal Air Force but reallocated to British Overseas Airways Corporation

Entered onto the British Aircraft Register as G-AGID (CofR 9460/1) - July 05, 1943

Registered to British Overseas Airways Corporation, Clifton, Bristol (BOAC's wartime headquarters)

The Certificate of Airworthiness (CofA No. 7003) issued - July 21, 1943

Ferried Poole - Hythe to undergo modifications prior to transfer to Indian Ocean services with Q.E.A.

Departed Poole on the ferry flight to Australia as DE232 - August 15, 1943

It arrived at Perth on completion of the ferry flight - August 31, 1943

Ferry route: Poole - Foynes - Lisbon - Gibraltar - Malta - Cairo - Bahrain - Karachi - Madras -

Colombo - Cocos Islands - Perth

This aircraft was to be operated by Qantas Empire Airways on the Indian Ocean services from Perth

The aircraft was named 'Rigel Star' and allocated the Fleet Number '3'

Operated its first service with Qantas Empire Airways Perth - Koggala as 2Q8 - September 08 - 09, 1943

Operated its final Qantas Empire Airways service Koggala - Perth as a special flight 1Q135 - July 23 - 24, 1945

It was withdrawn from service and stored at Nedlands, Crawley Bay, Perth - July 24, 1945

Cancelled from the British Aircraft Register - November 28, 1945

Under the Lend / Lease agreement between the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia, this aircraft had to

be returned to the United Kingdom or destroyed once it had been withdrawn from service

The Royal Air Force representatives in Australia at that time deemed that the aircraft must be destroyed

It was intended to scuttle the aircraft off Rottnest Island (near Perth)

As the Perth - Fremantle road bridge had been improved it was not possible to tow the aircraft out of Crawley Bay

The R.A.F. directed that the aircraft be made airworthy and flown to a point some 5 - 18 miles off the coast of

Rottnest Island and then scuttled in approximately 200 metres of water

Test flown at Nedlands - January 29, 1946

Flown to a location near Rottnest Island and scutttled in approximately 200 metres of water - January 30, 1946

After the scuttling, the General Manager of Qantas Empire Airways, Hudson Fysh, was scathing that a decision was

made to scuttle a perfectly good Catalina, that had been used on the Indian Ocean service, when the

airline was critically short of capacity following the end of World War II

To view the Operational Record of this aircraft please click 'HERE'