That unit was stationed in the Kurile islands. That particular aircraft is significant in that its’ airframe has been recovered for restoration.

https://www.pacificwrecks.com/aircraft/b5n/5353.html

Dear Stikpusher,

many thanks for your quick reply and a comprehensive answer too. You've answered my question which was where the 553rd Kokutai, and this particular airframe, were based, and not only that you've referenced me to the article in Pacific Wrecks on the very airframe in question - 53-305. That's brilliant. I'm vey grateful. It's so interesting to read the article.

I will now look for photos of Kataoka Airfield and of the Kurile Islands to try and create a diorama (albeit a small one) that is representative of the real place. I have done a small search on the Internet of the Kurile after I received your reply and the impression I get is that they are of a temperate climate or colder, quite baren, and lack trees. Before hearing that this particular airframe was in the Kuriles I'd visualized myself creating a kind of tropical diorama as I'd imagined that it was based further south in the Pacific, in the Philippines or similar. But the Kurile it was. So now I will look for suitable model material that will try (within my still developing ability) to create ground that simulates the Kuriles.

FFO, you’re quite welcome. All I did was a quick google search for 553rd Kokutai and it rapidly lead me to that site and aircraft. I like the fact on how it flew a strike on the Soviet forces invading the Kuriles after the Soviets themselves had continued hostilities after Japan‘s surrender. 

As far as how the Kurile islands look, I suppose some image searches will help with what you need. I’ve been to Hokkaido and Honshu in the dead of winter, and Hokkaido was quite snow covered at that time. A true winter wonderland. I can only imagine that the Kuriles being farther north are even more so. Probably like our Aleutian Islands in climate at least.

Good luck with your base for the Kate. I look forward to seeing what you come up with.

Sure. When I've completed the base I'll post some photos on this site.

I have finished building the model of the Nakajima 'Kate' in 1/72 scale by Airfix and created a vignette to place it on.

Here is a list of the products I used.

Airfix Nakajima 'Kate' B5N2, 1/72 scale (code AX04058)

Paints were chiefly Humbrol enamels, with a few Tamiya acrylics. The model was brush painted.

Pilot figure was from CMK/Czech Master kits CMF72043 Japanese Navy Pilots (resin)

Ground crew from PJ Productions PJ721134 Post war ground crew figures (resin) from various air forces.

Windsock from AIM-Ground Equipment GE72002

Sylmasta Green Stuff Original Duro - used to shape caps on the bare heads of the PJ Productions ground crew.

Vignette base from a wooden plack to write a house name on.

Concrete slabs made from balsa wood. These needed a lot of thick paint on them to hide the wood grain.

Winter grass and snow scatter.

Background winter photo printed from the internet.

Airfix offers two choices of decals in its Nakajima 'Kate' kit: one is for an aircraft on a carrier that took part in the Pearl Harbor raid in December 1941, and the other is a land based aircraft in 1944. While the instruction sheet says the second choice belongs to the 553rd Kokutai in 1944 it does not say where it was. I discovered where it was through enquiring on this forum, and thanks to the gentleman in the previous post who told me the 553rd Kokutai served in the Kurile Islands in 1944.

Whilst I knew roughly where they are I knew little about the Kurile Islands. I read that they are an archipelago stretching northeast from Hokkaido, Japan to Kamchatka, Russia. They separate the Sea of Okhotsk from the north Pacific Ocean. Their climate is generally severe, with long, cold, stormy winters and short and notoriously foggy summers.

From 1875 to 1945 Japan held all the islands in the Kurile but since the Soviet Union invaded the archipalago in August 1945 the Russians have administered them to this day. The Kuriles are a bone of contention today between Japan and Russia and the former claims the islands that are nearest to Hokkaido. The kuriles are regarded of strategic importance and the Russians are not willing to relinquish any of the islands.

Anyway, back to the vignette. As modellers and Pacific War historians are so used to seeing images of Japanese aircraft in a tropical setting it came as a surprise to me to find one location, which was the kurile Islands, where the Japanese military served in the Second World War was of cooler climes. So I thought rather than create the far more common setting for a WW2 Japanese subject that is either tropical or aircraft carrier based, I would create a vignette of a Japanese aircraft in the snow.

I didn't find a photo of a Nakajima 'Kate' in the Kuriles to guide me for the building of the vignette, so I just made it from my imagination. Whilst it is obvious why carrier based aircraft would have their wings folded, I did wonder whether land based 'Kates' would ever be parked in such fashion. When I found a photo of a land based 'Kate' with folded wings I was happy then to build my model in that configuration.

As I said, I've built the vignette from imagination and have created a scene where a sudden snow fall has hindered the unit from flying sorties. The pilot standing on the apron is waiting for his ground crew to clear the snow off his aircraft.

I wish to add a few more airfield accessories to the vignette when I obtain them, including a ladder, a tool box and brushes and shovels to clear the snow.

I have not built many dioramas before. I do notice some faults with the model aircraft, namely the aerial mast has bent and the wire is too thick, as well as slack. The snow is not as white after sticking down as it was before scattering. Maybe I could apply white paint to it.

This is the first time I have placed a photo behind any of my dioramas and am pleased with the result.

I regret that I can't for now seem to copy photos from my Flikr account to FSM forum. Flikr suggests that my current browser is out of date. I will look into this. Sorry the photos will have to wait.

I've revisited my post here on the Nakajima Kate and tried again to download my photos from the image hosting site Flickr to FSM but to no avail. As you can read above I failed before and now have failed again. I have a new computer now and, with a more modern browser, I thought that I could copy and paste my photos from Flickr to FSM. I was thinking that my browser on my previous computer was too old and not compatible. I have read instructions about how to copy photos from Flickr to FSM written by kind hearted, generous modellers who are friends of FSM and followed them, and whilst other users have chronicled that the instructions have worked for them they have not worked for me sadly. It's a pity that we can't copy and paste directly from our own photo files instead of having to go through an image hosting site like Flickr - I think we could do that at one time a while back.

I wonder can somebody suggest another image hosting site that has worked for them and explain briefly what are the steps to copy photos from it to FSM please?

Failing this then I'll have to engage the service of an IT consultant and ask him to sort it out for me. It's so frustrating not being able to load my photos and share images of the model and diorama I have made last autumn. I would love to hear some comments about them, even critical ones, if they help me improve my modelling skills. 

I use Postimage for my photo hosting site now after the Photobucket affair. 

To post images from there, copy the direct link for the image desired and then paste it into the photo posting icon where you're prompted to do so.

Ah krap, I'd really love to see your photos. Flickr should work as a photo hosting site, but I'm not sure how to get it work since I don't use it. 

Can you post a link to your photos if you can't get them to post? Just click on the web address and then paste it to your post. It should come up as a clickable hot link.