The only Bomber type in the World to ever deliver an Atomic Bomb in wartime, is still flying today!
The most advanced aircraft of WWII was the B29 Superfortress. No other bomber could carry the load, nor carry it as far, as the Superfortress! The Russians interred, and reverse engineered three of them in WWII, and those planes became the core of the Russian strategic bomber force for decades after the War. This is the ONLY kind of bomber to ever deliver an atom bomb in wartime; and she did it twice!
Today, there are only two, still flight ready, B29s in the World; Fifi, and Doc, with Doc being a recent addition, salvaged and rebuilt from an aircraft boneyard!
Here is a short film of Fifi in flight:
My Father in Law was a Flight Engineer on the B29 Superforts, and so when Fifi came to town we took him to see her. She was HUGE, and Beautiful; and he got on board because he was a B29 crew member. He brought his flight manual for fun, and they almost wet their pants! Apparently, since the aircraft was so top secret, the flight engineers manual was marked top secret, and when the plane was made obsolete, they destroyed the manual so the Russians would not get a copy! They did so well, that the fliers in Fifi did NOT have one either!
He gave them his manual, and they offered him a flight. When he got on board, they set him in the flight Engineers seat! They were smart enough to film him, while he set up the aircraft for take off, and they asked a LOT of questions. He taught them for half an hour, before they even started the engines! They had been flying by their best guess, and he showed them how to get better fuel economy, and better take off lift ability; while running the engines cooler.
He got one Cadillac of a ride from these grateful people, and had the time of his life! He flew her several times more when they came to town, and did a lot of crew training. He has passed away now, but his flight manual is still on board Fifi to this day. I kind of suspect that a copy of his flight manual, may be on board Doc too, ROFLOL! The crew he trained, has, by now; trained Docs crew too.
He told me in passing, that he didn't get hazard pay, because to get hazard pay, you had to be shot down three times, and he was one shy of that! It was no big deal to him, but I was thinking that being shot down twice, was reasonably serious stuff!
I once met the navigator of The Enola Gay. When I was the buyer for G.H. Bass Shoe, he called on our company as a "ringer" with a salesman. Very interesting guy. His name was "Dutch."
I LOVE talking to these guys! He would have been extra special to meet!
My Son and I went to see a B17 (Aluminum Overcast) when she flew into Tulsa. I met a tail gunner, and a belly turret gunner at the plane! THAT was a special treat!
:DAlmost all those guys are gone now. Sad...
Yes time marches on, that was one of the reasons I was so happy to meet them!
:)Congratulations @smithlabs! You have completed the following achievement on the Steem blockchain and have been rewarded with new badge(s) :
Click on the badge to view your Board of Honor.
If you no longer want to receive notifications, reply to this comment with the word
STOPThanks, this post is special to me!
:)Congratulations @smithlabs! You have completed the following achievement on the Steem blockchain and have been rewarded with new badge(s) :
Click on the badge to view your Board of Honor.
If you no longer want to receive notifications, reply to this comment with the word
STOPThanks,for watching out for us!
:)ha! oh man that is too wild sir smithlabs! lol. what a great post..you mean the only way to get from the front or back of the plane was to crawl through that tunnel? because the rest was so loaded with bombs?
Basically, the middle of the plane was an un-pressurized Bomb Bay. She could really lift a lot! The rear was where the gunners were, and they were also lookouts for clearance on taxi, take offs, and landings. She is huge, and a very dangerous girl!
:Dsir smithlabs! did you get to crawl through her or just look inside? they had machine gun pods or whatever you call those things all over that plane didn't they? on the belly and on top and at the rear, or what that another plane?
and how in the world are you supposed to keep an eye on all those gauges? wow!
The turrets on the B29 were automated, and the gunners were inside the pressure cabin.
We went to see a B17, she was about 60% the size of her bigger sister. We did get on board, and it was cramped! The B17 was the most famous bomber, and did a lot of work in Europe.
sir smithlabs! well sir..but one of those types of bombers had so many machine gun bubbles and turrets that it looked like a porcupine.
Surely there is a B29 Bomber somewhere in a museum that you someone can look out right?
There is one in a Museum; The Enola Gay is in the Smithsonian. I would love to see that one.
The turrets on a B29 are deadly! She was the only bomber to carry 20mm cannon in her turrets ( approx 80 calibre) so she had TEETH! They also had the first computer guided turrets in the air, so she had a better hit percentage than any other bomber. It was hard to attack her!
Even at that though, and the extreme altitude , they still managed to shoot down a number of our super fortresses!
:'(sir smithlabs! the first computer guided turrets? I wonder how those worked, I mean how did they site them and see when to shoot I wonder.
The gunners placed their sights on the plane to shoot at. the system measured speed and distance, and corrected for lead. The gunner controlled the burst length. The computer was analog, and the turrets were deadly....
:)Gauges are easy to read, when your life depends upon it! If you loose an engine, especially when loaded, you will crash. Those gauges begin to look very interesting about that time, ROFLOL!
:Dsir smithlabs...so I imagine that with so many gauges alot of the pilots time in the air, when they weren't looking for enemy planes was to keep an eye on all those gauges.
Did they have radar on those planes?
The pilots didn't watch the gauges, the flight Engineer did all the monitoring, 100% of the time. That was what my Father In Law did, and that spot is the guy with his back towards the pilot.
This was the only plane I know of that the pilot relied on others to adjust the throttles for him, he couldn't even reach them.
This plane had the highest horse power piston engines that ever flew, and those monsters had to be babied constantly. That is what he taught Fifi's crew, how to make these engines sing!
They used radar for range and speed to aim the turrets for lead. I do NOT know what else they had in the way of radar; but she was the most advanced piston engine aircraft ever made!
:Dvery good sir smithlabs very good. Extremely interesting. Those designers and engineers must have lived at work to get all that put together!
She was a war machine without parallel! They designed her quickly, and it all worked perfectly! She was a predator without parallel, a war beast that owned the air!
The designers were gifted, and reached for an amazing level of design never reached before! No other aircraft could have carried the massive weight, over the great distances involved; to drop the atomic bomb, where needed!
This plane saved millions of lives with those two drops, and likely saved the Japanese race from extinction!
:O