Supply drops: British colour-coding for parachutes?

Hello,
I am researching the parachute colours used for dropping supplies in operation Varsity. I found plenty of information on the American system, as can be seen in the attached excerpt of a US Army Field Manual. Basically it says that the colour coding could be changed from operation to operation. It appears, however, that both red and yellow were quite consistently used for dropping ammo and weapons. Red for ammo is - I believe - widely known, yellow was new to me. But there is proof in the attached loading list of a C-47 that went into Op. Varsity (and crashed). And it appears that both in Market Garden and in Varsity these two colours were used for ammo. As for the other colours - blue often seemed to indicate rations and water, white medical supplies, green in Market Garden was supposed to have been used for fuel.

Anyway - what information do we have about the British system? Was it the same as the American one?

Here's an illustration for Operation Neptune (D-Day)


And this is a colour photo of a supply drop at Bastogne:

 

Mentions colour of containers

Thread here Airborne - Parachutes Query
From member brithm
The colours of containers for paratroopers were

Khaki - Personnel
Blue - Food supplies
Yellow - Medical supplies
Red - Weapons
White - Miscellaneous equipment, personal and unit

This information is from the book D-Day paratroopers by Jean Bouchery and Phillippe Charbonnier, for those landing in Arnhem it was easier to see what the container probably contained whereas landing in Normandy in the dark it was harder to guess what the container might contain but could be found in the dark with the help of Thomas lighting devices described in the 3rd Parachute Sqn RE War Diary "The THOMAS lighting devices worked well and indicated the posn of the containers submerged 2 to 3 ft."

 

Ok - so the British and American appear to have used the same system.
Another question: Were the British containers (CLE) always painted white?
This is a photo taken on a DZ for Varsity.

 

That's a March 25th photo taken by Bert Hardy during his Picture Post tour of the Airborne sector with correspondent Macdonald Hastings. Probably somewhere near the Kopenhof HQ. The containers I suspect are British ones dropped by American Liberators as caught on film by Lee Howard near Kopenhof.



Regards ...

I should add that I have no idea if all the British containers dropped on Varsity were actually white.

 

Yo,

There's some good info on British WW2 CLE containers on this page:

Supplies from the Sky: C.L.E. Containers

According to them the one seen in the Varsity pic is a Mark III.



Regards ...