The NB Avenger Project

This is a picture of the TBM Avenger on display at the Woodmen's Museum in Boiestown, NB. Avengers are medium-sized torpedo bombers (hence the name TBM) that operated from aircraft carriers during the last years of WWII. The name Avenger comes from the US response to the bombing of Pearl Harbour. After the war, many surviving TBMs were converted to fire bombers and spray planes. Many were contracted from all over the US and Canada by Forest Protection Limited of Fredericton for spraying forests to fight the spruce budworm and other species of defoliating insects from the late 1950s to the mid 1980s. FPL once owned the largest fleet of Avengers in the world, but has only three left, which are used now as fire bombers.

I am compiling a history of the Avengers that came through New Brunswick during that period, which will lead eventually into a history of FPL.