The morning after, the years ahead

In 1952 the CAF began to receive its first Privateers which were initially seen abandoned at the US Shangri La Navy Station, south of Manila. In March, 12 air crews from the 8th Heavy bombardment Group were ferried by two C-46s to Luzon. They were led to the bone yard of the base, a dozen PB4Y-2S long-range patrol bombers under the "as it is" condition were waiting for them. As an effort to bring the 8th BG back to FOC status, these Convair Privateers would replace its Consolidated Liberator relics on a squadron-to-squadron basis.

As an entire replacement of the 8th's B-24Ms was not immediately available, the PB4Y-2s had to be repaired as fast as possible and ferried back to Taiwan. But, getting them back in the air had not been easy, for it took combined efforts of many specially-trained technicians and lots of contributions to keep these vintage bombers airworthy. After one week of superhuman efforts, by applying the similar experience on the B-24Ms, all 12 Privateers emerged as a painstaking restored tribute to all the PB4Ys that had seen combat in World War II. Without proper tools and spare parts, these monsters were temporally repaired to the flyable level. After a three hours flight, the Chinese Privateers landed safely at the Jiayi AFB, while the 8th's home base Xinzhu had it's strips rebuilt then.

In 1954-56 besides the foregoing impressive heavies supplied under the Military Aid Program terms, further 26 units were transferred to the 8th, which comprised of the 33rd, 34th, and 35th BSs based at Xinzhu AFB. Struggled to maintain its Liberator remnants and a Liberator Express C-87 duo, fortunately the 8th began beefing up its strength to defend the Free China in Taiwan. Discharged in 1961, the PB4Y was the last four engine bomber operated by the CAF.