SPA Modeler

NOT MINE.

Last night at the monthly IPMS Chapter meeting one of our newer members brought in this fabulous diorama. I had to share it with you guys here. It depicts USS Franklin as she was being assisted by USS Santa Fe after being bombed off the coast of Japan in the Spring of 1945. The Franklin is the Trumpeter kit and the Santa Fe an Iron Shipwrights kit. The photos that I took with my cell phone camera did not do this justice. Under the smoke were LEDs or some other lights to represent the fire in the hanger deck... anyways have a look for yourselves

Not this sure about the too massive white smoke cloud, but an impressive sight for sure! Thanks for sharing this!

I like the dramatic scene beautifully captured by this modeller! The super-tiny sailors add a great lot of life to this scene. I for sure would stop walking by and have a close look on this!

Impressive indeed. I, too would have stopped for a closer look and admire it.

that is something else, now.

Some amazing stuff,ever see the depiction of the surrender aboard the Missouri ? Ship dios are awesome

I was very impressed by the scope of effort here. The workmanship was not quite top notch, but the overall diorama was such a fascinating thing to look at. So much going on.

Thomas, the white smoke if anything is the result of my phone camera's flash washing out the black on that. It was much darker there in person

For those unfamiliar with the ordeal of USS Franklin, have a look at this link with the after action report and photos. She essentially was in the same state as the Japanese Carriers at Midway on the morning of June 4 1942 with a fully armed strike force on her flight deck and hangar deck when hit.

http://ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USN/WarDama ... tCV13.html

Actual footage of the event can be seen at the beginning of this clip, including the scene of this diorama, and her sailing home under her own power as well as the extent of the damage inflicted at the end.

wow, the red glow from inside is quite chilling.

This much smoke, this many explosions! A miracle that anybody did survive this at all. Tragic.

Wow. Very impressive diorama.

Carlos is right, photos do not do this diorama justice. The big black plume of smoke is indeed quite representative of what was pouring out of this ship at the time. Owl, the red lights flickered as well, giving this an even more eerie, surreal look. This was indeed a tremendous effort on this gentleman's part.