US 'candy bomber' pilot dead at 101

Gail Halvorsen, the former US pilot who thought up the idea of dropping tiny improvised parachutes loaded with sweets for children into Berlin during the Soviet blockade, has died at the age of 101.

The Allied Museum dedicated to Cold War history in Berlin's former American sector confirmed media reports of Halvorsen's death on Wednesday.

"Gail Halvorsen died in Utah in a hospital, surrounded by his family," a museum spokeswoman told AFP on Thursday.

A lifelong ambassador for German-American friendship, Halvorsen became famous in the embattled city as the first American pilot to drop bundles of chocolate and chewing gum from his plane to local youngsters waiting below.

Fans nicknamed him "the candy bomber" and "Uncle Wiggly Wings" for the way he manoeuvred his plane so the children, still traumatised by the war, would know to look out for incoming treats.

He inspired many imitators in the ranks of the airforce.

"Even though I flew day and night, ice and snow... I was happy because of the look on the faces of the children when they would see parachutes coming out of the sky," he told AFP in 2009. 

"They would just go crazy."

Halvorsen rose to the rank of colonel and eventually ended up commander of the Tempelhof airfield, the staging ground for the 1948-49 Berlin Airlift.

Pilots flew supplies to West Berlin's 2.5 million people, still reeling from the Second World War.