The Big Picture: Operation Blue Jay (1953)

This film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Short. A Walt Disney production called "The Alaskan Eskimo" won the Oscar.

This episode of The Big Picture focuses on the secret construction of an air base near Thule, Greenland in the early 1950s. Built during the Cold War, the base was to provide the U.S. a home for long-range bombers closer to the Soviet Union and China. Staged at Norfolk, Virginia, Operation Blue Jay moved over $125 million worth of equipment by ship to the remote Greenland site. Once the convoy arrived through ice-packed waters, soldiers began working on port facilities and shelter. Working expeditiously during the short summer season to avoid facing temperatures of fifty below, the Corps of Engineers built an expansive air base nine-hundred miles north of the Artic Circle.

"The appearance of U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) visual information does not imply or constitute DoD endorsement."

NARA ID: 111-TV-227
Video ID: 887697
VIRIN: 230405-O-QT950-816
Filename: DOD_109717884
Length: 00:28:22

URL: https://www.dvidshub.net/video/887697/big-picture-operation-blue-jay

More on The Big Picture:
http://www.armypictorialcenter.com/the_big_picture.htm