Customer Reviews

Roaring Glory Warbirds, Vol. 4: Grumman TBM Avenger

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
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1 star:		(0)

 

 

I had bought an original Roaring Glory VHS several years ago about the P-40 with Jeff Ethell doing a great job on that particular program. So, when I saw these newer Roaring Glory DVD's, I had to try them out. I began with the Grumman Avenger because this was not a fighter plane like all the others. The DVD has great in-flight footage and the extras are nice to have such as the actual WWII training film (excellent!). My only critique is that it's not long enough! The flight sequence with Unlimited racer Steve Hinton is only around 24 minutes. His delivery is matter of fact and I enjoyed Jeff Ethell much more, but at least these programs are getting made! It's neat to see this torpedo bomber put through it's paces, but the whole flight check is just not long enough for my tastes. Overall, though, to see this plane flying is more than enough reason to get these DVD's. They remind us of what truly was the American spirit to come up with these beautiful but deadly warplanes. And at barely $6 a DVD, you can afford to get all of the titles in this series...

I think the best part of these series are the military training video's included. You get the option to watch the actual training film WW2 crews watched before they flew these aircraft. What's interesting about the Grumman Avenger is how big it actually was. Hard to imagine landing this aircraft on an escort carrier! Much larger and heavier than a Hellcat. Steve Hinton does a great ( if boring ) job of doing a walk around and flight in an actual flying Avenger. As usual he points out very interesting aspects of the Avenger...such as built in tie-downs for the folding wings. Such tid-bits make these DVD's so interesting.

We operate a TBM-3 for western region airshows. Always looking for new details on this historical bird!