Two of TAA's 'new' DC-3 freighters parked at Essendon on a Sunday afternoon. VH-TAE was built to a USAAF order as 42-92274 but delivered to the RAAF as A65-29. Sold to TAA and registered on 27 September 1946. Re-registered and renamed VH-SBL 'Mt Hagen' in 1960 for TAA's New Guinea 'Sunbird' services. Sold to Air Niugini in 1973 as P2-SBL. Returned to the Australian Register as VH-SBL in 1981 and still current. VH-AEZ, in the background, served with the USAAF as 42-23949 until sold to TAA and registered in Australia on 2 May 1945, named 'Currie'. Became VH-EWD with East-West Airlines in 1955.

Nearly brand new - TAA's Thomas Mitchell parked outside the TAA hangar at Essendon, as seen from the Bulla Road (now the Tullamarine Freeway). The aircraft had been registered just a few months earlier on 4 November 1946.