boeing b-29 superfortress - snabber · browning machine guns and a single m2 20 mm cannon. later...
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Boeing B-29 Superfortress
Design and development Boeing began work on pressurized long-range bombers in 1938, in response to a United
States Army Air Corps request. Boeing's design study for the Model 334 was a
pressurized derivative of the Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress with nosewheel undercarriage.
Although the Air Corps did not have money to pursue the design, Boeing continued
development with its own funds as a private venture.
The Air Corps issued a formal specification for a so-called "superbomber", capable of
delivering 20,000 lb (9,100 kg) of bombs to a target 2,667 mi (4,290 km) away and
capable of flying at a speed of 400 mph (640 km/h) in December 1939.
It featured a pressurized cabin, all dual wheeled, tricycle landing gears, and a remote,
electronic fire-control system that controlled four machine gun turrets.
Boeing received an initial production order for 14 service test aircraft and 250 production
bombers in May 1941, this being increased to 500 aircraft in January 1942.
The first prototype made its maiden flight from Boeing Field, Seattle on 21 September
1942
Manufacturing the B-29 was a complex task. It involved four main-assembly factories: a
pair of Boeing operated plants at Renton, Washington (Boeing Renton), and Wichita,
Kansas (now Spirit AeroSystems), a Bell plant at Marietta, Georgia ("Bell-Atlanta"), and
aMartin plant at Omaha, Nebraska ("Martin-Omaha" - Offutt Field).
B-29 Superfortress General characteristics
Crew: 11 (Pilot, Co-pilot, Bombardier, Flight Engineer, Navigator, Radio Operator, Radar
Observer, Right Gunner, Left Gunner, Central Fire Control, Tail Gunner)
Length: 99 ft 0 in (30.18 m)
Wingspan: 141 ft 3 in (43.06 m)
Height: 27 ft 9 in (8.45 m)
Wing area: 1,736 sq ft (161.3 m²)
Aspect ratio: 11.50:1
Empty weight: 74,500 lb (33,800 kg)
Loaded weight: 120,000 lb (54,000 kg)
Max. takeoff weight: 133,500 lb (60,560 kg) ; 135,000 lb plus combat load
Powerplant: 4 × Wright R-3350 -23 and 23A Duplex-Cyclone turbosupercharged radial
engines, 2,200 hp (1,640 kW) each
Zero-lift drag coefficient: 0.0241
Drag area: 41.16 ft² (3.82 m²)
Performance
Maximum speed: 357 mph (310 knots, 574 km/h)
Cruise speed: 220 mph (190 knots, 350 km/h)
Stall speed: 105 mph (91 knots, 170 km/h)
Range: 3,250 mi (2,820 nmi, 5,230 km)
Ferry range: 5,600 mi (4,900 nmi, 9,000 km,[75])
Service ceiling: 31850 ft [24] (9,710 m)
Rate of climb: 900 ft/min (4.6 m/s)
Wing loading: 69.12 lb/sqft (337 kg/m²)
Power/mass: 0.073 hp/lb (121 W/kg)
Lift-to-drag ratio: 16.8
Armament
Guns:
eight or 10× .50 in (12.7 mm) Browning M2/ANs in remote-controlled turrets.[76] (omitted
from Silverplate B-29s)
2× .50 BMG and 1× 20 mm M2 cannon in tail position (the cannon was later removed)[N 11]
Bombs: 20,000 lb (9,000 kg) standard loadout
The nose and the cockpit were pressurized, between fore and aft pressurized sections
was a long tunnel over the two bomb bays so as not to interrupt pressurization during
bombing. Crews could crawl back and forth between the fore and aft sections, with both
areas and the tunnel pressurized. The bomb bays were not pressurized
. Cockpit
General Electric Central Fire Control system
B-29 Guns
The revolutionary General Electric Central Fire Control system on the B-29 directed four
remotely controlled turrets armed with two .50 Browning M2 machine guns each. There
were five interconnected sighting stations located in the nose and tail positions and three
Plexiglas blisters in the central fuselag. Five General Electric analog computers (one
dedicated to each sight) increased the weapons' accuracy by compensating for factors
such as airspeed, lead, gravity, temperature and humidity. The computers also allowed a
single gunner to operate two or more turrets (including tail guns) simultaneously. The
gunner in the upper position acted as fire control officer, managing the distribution of
turrets among the other gunners during combat The tail position initially had two .50
Browning machine guns and a single M2 20 mm cannon. Later aircraft had the 20 mm
cannon removed,[30]and sometimes replaced by a third machine gun.
Battle of Kansas
The combined effects of the aircraft's highly advanced design, challenging requirements,
and immense pressure for production, hurried development and caused setbacks.
Changes to the production craft came so often and so fast that in early 1944, B-29s flew
from the production lines directly to modification depots for extensive rebuilds to
incorporate the latest changes.
the B-29 project was unprecedented in Aviation history: from inception, to drawing board
and mass production took three years, at a time when such a design should have taken
five years just to become a prototype. Instead the engineering design, production and
testing were being undertaken simultaneously, with all of the expected and unexpected
problems.
at the end of 1943, although almost 100 aircraft had been delivered, only 15 were
airworthy. The basic design of the B-29 was sound, but significant shortcuts had been
taken in the rush to get it into service, causing numerous defects and quality problems.
o The biggest headaches were caused by the new R-3350 engines, which were
constantly overheating. the uppermost five cylinders (every 25 hours of engine
time) and the entire engines (every 75 hours). . This problem was not fully cured
until the aircraft was fitted with the more powerful Pratt & Whitney R-4360 "Wasp
Major" in the B-29D/B-50 program, which arrived too late for World War II.
o Other problems arose with defective pressure seals around the cockpit windows
and sighting blisters, which needed precise fitting to avoid leakage.
o Also causing problems were the sighting systems (four analog computers) for the
remote controlled defensive armament, as well as the turrets themselves.
o Then came electrical failures, caused by faulty Cannon plugs, which supplied
connections throughout the ten miles (16 km) of wiring in each B-29.
o Sub-standard glass in the cockpit transparencies meant the pilots had problems
due to the distortion.
o A minor "beef-up" was found to be needed on the wing structures
o When General Arnold visited the Wichita Plant on 11 January 1944 he wanted
175 combat ready B-29s for the XX Bomber Command. As he was shown around
the assembly lines he picked out the 175th fuselage section and signed it
commenting: "This is the plane I want. I want it before the First of March. When he
discovered two months later that no B-29s were actually combat ready, and that
some had been sitting waiting for parts for two months or more Arnold was livid.
o This prompted an intervention by General Hap Arnold to resolve the problem, with
production personnel being sent from the factories to the modification centers to
speed modification of sufficient aircraft to equip the first Bomb Groups in what
became known as the "Battle of Kansas". This resulted in 150 aircraft being
modified in the six weeks between 10 March and 15 April 1944. Specialist USAAF
ground crew and technicians were called in from all over the country and 600
workers were pulled from the Wichita assembly lines. Subcontractors were told to
stop all work on non-B-29 components until they had fulfilled their commitments
o With the thermometer often reading below zero the 1,200 technicians who had
gathered at the Wichita factory and the Modification Centers were being asked to
modify each bomber inside and out.
Firstly the wings needed to have some of the plating removed, the
required "beef-ups" were added then each piece of skin riveted back in
place.
At the same time the cowl flaps, which controlled airflow through and
around the troublesome engines, were being modified.
Each piece of glass installed in the nose had to be pulled out and
replaced with new distortion free panes. After that the pressurization had
to be rechecked: 75 B-29s in total needed new glass.
Internally every electrical plug had to be removed, disassembled and
resoldered - a total of 586,000 connections in completed aircraft, plus
those on the assembly lines and in wiring harnesses ready for installation.
A lot of the work was being done in the middle of the frequent snow-
storms: it was so cold crews could only work for 20 minutes at a time, with
most of the jobs requiring delicate handling
Operational history In September 1941, the Army Air Forces plans for war against Germany and Japan
proposed basing the B-29 in Egypt for operations against Germany as British airbases
were likely to be overcrowded. Air Force planning throughout 1942 and early 1943
continued to have the B-29 deployed initially against Germany, only transferring to the
Pacific after the end of the war in Europe.
By the end of 1943, however, plans had changed, partly due to production delays, and
the B-29 was dedicated to the Pacific Theater.
Operational history China A new plan implemented at the direction of President Franklin D. Roosevelt as a promise
to China, called Operation Matterhorn, deployed the B-29 units to attack Japan from four
forward bases in southern China, with five main bases in India, and to attack other targets
in the region from China and India as needed. Keep China in the war holding down
Japanese forces.
The Twentieth Air Force was formed in April 1944 to oversee all B-29 operations. In an
unprecedented move, the commander of the USAAF, General Henry H. Arnold, took
personal command of this unit and ran it from the Pentagon in Washington, D.C.
If airpower delivers an independent service would be created.
B-29s started to arrive in India in early April 1944. The first B-29 flight to airfields in China
(over the Himalayas, or "The Hump") took place on 24 April 1944.
The first B-29 combat mission was flown on 5 June 1944, with 77 out of 98 B-29s
launched from India bombing the railroad shops in Bangkok and elsewhere in Thailand.
On 15 June 1944, 68 B-29s took off from bases around Chengdu, 47 B-29s bombed the
Imperial Iron and Steel Works at Yahata, Japan. This was the first attack on Japanese
islands since the Doolittle raid in April 1942.The first B-29 combat losses occurred during
this raid, with one B-29 destroyed on the ground by Japanese fighters after an emergency
landing in China,[44] one lost to anti-aircraft fire over Yawata, and another disappeared
after takeoff from Chakulia, India, over the Himalayas This raid, which did little damage to
the target, with only one bomb striking the target factory complex, nearly exhausted fuel
stocks at the Chengdu B-29 bases
Japan was bombed on: 7 July 1944 (14 B-29s), 29 July (70+), 10 August (24), 20 August
(61), 8 September (90), 26 September (83), 25 October (59), 12 November (29), 21
November (61), 19 December (36) and for the last time on 6 January 1945
Brutal Japanese offensive against bases.
-29s were withdrawn from airfields in China by the end of January 1945. Throughout this
prior period, B-29 raids were also launched from China and India against many other
targets throughout Southeast Asia, including a series of raids on Singapore and Thailand.
The B-29 effort was gradually shifted to the new bases in the Mariana Islands in
the Central Pacific, with the last B-29 combat mission from India flown on 29 March 1945.
Overall, Operation Matterhorn was not successful. The nine raids conducted against
Japan via bases in China succeeded only in destroying Ōmura's aircraft factory.
XX Bomber Command lost 125 B-29s during all of its operations from bases in India and
China, though only 22 or 29 were destroyed by Japanese forces; the majority of the
losses were due to flying accidents
Operational history Pacific
in addition to the logistical problems associated with operations from China, the B-29
could only reach a limited part of Japan while flying from Chinese bases. The solution to
this problem was to capture the Mariana Islands, which would bring targets such
as Tokyo, about 1,500 mi (2,400 km) north of the Marianas within range of B-29 attacks.
The Joint Chiefs of Staff agreed in December 1943 to seize the Marianas.
A joint US forces invaded Saipan on 15 June 1944
Operations followed against Guam and Tinian, with all three islands secured by August.
Naval construction battalions (Seabees) began at once to construct air bases suitable for
the B-29, commencing even before the end of ground fighting. In all, five major air fields
were built: two on the flat island of Tinian, one on Saipan, and two on Guam. Each was
large enough to eventually accommodate a bomb wing consisting of four bomb groups,
giving a total of 180 B-29s per airfield.
The first B-29 arrived on Saipan on 12 October 1944, and the first combat mission was
launched from there on 28 October 1944, with 14 B-29s attacking the Truk atoll.
The 73rd Bomb Wing launched the first mission against Japan from bases in the
Marianas, on 24 November 1944, sending 111 B-29s to attack Tokyo. For this first attack
on the Japanese capital since the Doolittle Raid in April 1942,
Problems with Jetstream, weather fronts, interception, engines affecting bombing
accuracy.
In typical American fashion, they found the meanest S.O.B. they could to clean up the
G*****M mess.
Japanese cities congested, built of wood, low level industries contribute to war effort.
In early 1945, Major General Curtis Lemay, commander of XXI Bomber Command, the
Marianas-based B-29-equipped bombing force . ordered most of the defensive armament
and remote-controlled sighting equipment removed from the B-29s under his command
so that they could carry greater fuel and bomb loads as a result of the change of role from
high-altitude, daylight bombing with high explosive bombs to low-altitude night raids using
incendiary bombs. To maximize the effectiveness of the firebombing attacks, LeMay
ordered the B-29s to fly at the low altitude of 5,000 feet (1,500 m) .
More bombs carried, greater accuracy, less strain on engines.
With these new tactics, a total of 302 B-29s participated in the Operation
Meetinghouse raid on Tokyo on the night of 9–10 March, with 279 arriving over the target.
The raid was led by special pathfinder crews who marked central aiming points. It lasted
for two hours. The raid was a success beyond General LeMay's wildest expectations. The
individual fires caused by the bombs joined to create a general conflagration, which would
have been classified as a firestorm but for prevailing winds gusting at 17 to 28 mph (27 to
45 km/h).[4] When it was over, sixteen square miles of the center of Tokyo had gone up in
flames and nearly 100,000 people had been killed. Fourteen B-29s were lost. The B-29
was finally beginning to have an effect.
On the night of 13–14 March, eight square miles of Osaka went up in flames. On 16–17
March, three square miles of Kobe were destroyed, and on 19–20 March in a return visit
to Nagoya, three more square miles were destroyed. This destructive week had killed
over 120,000 Japanese civilians at the cost of only 20 B-29s lost.
The most commonly cited estimate of Japanese casualties from the raids is 333,000
killed and 473,000 wounded. There are a number of other estimates of total fatalities,
however, which range from 241,000 to 900,000. In addition to the loss of mostly civilian
life, the raids caused extensive damage.
In Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya, "the areas leveled (almost 100 square miles (260 km2))
exceeded the areas destroyed in all German cities by both theAmerican and English air
forces (approximately 79 square miles (200 km2). 136 B-29s were downed during the
campaign to Japan's cities and contributed to a large decline in industrial production.
Name of Japanese Percentage of the Equivalent in size to
city firebombed city destroyed the following
American city
Tokushima 85.2 Ft. Wayne
Fukuyama 80.9 Macon
Kofu 78.6 South Bend
Nara 69.3 Boston
Tsu 69.3 Topeka
Okayama 68.9 Long Beach
Mito 68.9 Pontiac
Takamatsu 67.5 Knoxville
Shizuoka 66.1 Oklahoma City
Tsuruga 65.1 Middleton
Nagaoka 64.9 Madison
Maebashi 64.2 Wheeling
Imabari 63.9 Stockton
Gifu 63.6 Des Moines
Kagoshima 63.4 Richmond
Toyohashi 61.9 Tulsa
Hamamatsu 60.3 Hartford
Isezaki 56.7 Sioux Falls
Ichinomiya 56.3 Sprinfield
Kobe 55.7 Baltimore
Kochi 55.2 Sacramento
Kumagaya 55.1 Kenosha
Akashi 50.2 Lexington
Himeji 49.4 Peoria
Hiratsuka 48.4 Battle Creek
Tokuyama 48.3 Butte
Sakai 48.2 Forth Worth
Saga 44.2 Waterloo
Chosi 44.2 Wheeling
Utsunomiya 43.7 Sioux City
Numazu 42.3 Waco
Kure 41.9 Toledo
Sasebo 41.4 Nashville
Uhyamada 41.3 Columbus
Ogaki 39.5 Corpus Christi
Siumonoseki 37.6 San Diego
Kawasaki 36.2 Portland
Omuta 35.8 Miami
Osaka 35.1 Chicago
Yokkichi 33.6 Charlotte
Omura 33.1 Sante Fe
Okazaki 32.2 Lincoln
Kumamoto 31.2 Grand Rapids
Oita 28.2 Saint Joseph
Miyakonoio 26.5 Greensboro
Miyazaki 26.1 Davenport
Nobeoka 25.2 Augusta
Fukuoka 24.1 Rochester
Moh 23.3 Spokane
Sendai 21.9 Omaha
Yawata 21.2 San Antonio
Hbe 20.7 Utica
Amagasaki 18.9 Jacksonville
Nishinomiya 11.9 Cambridge
Toyama 99 Chattanooga
Fukui 86 Evansville
Kuwana 75 Tucson
Hitachi 72 Little Rock
Hachioji 65 Galveston
Matsuyama 64 Duluth
Yokohama 58 Cleveland
Tokyo 51 New York
Wakayama 50 Salt Lake City
Shimizu 42 San Jose
Chiba 41 Savannah
Nagoya 40 Los Angeles
Aomori 30 Montgomery
Operation Starvation Although less publicly appreciated, the mining of Japanese ports and shipping routes
(Operation Starvation) carried out by B-29s from April 1945 significantly affected Japan's
ability to support its population and move its troops.
Operation Starvation was an American naval mining operation conducted in World War
II by the Army Air Forces, in which vital water routes and ports of Japan were mined by air
in order to disrupt enemy shipping.
The mission was initiated at the insistence of Admiral Chester Nimitz who wanted his
naval operations augmented by an extensive mining of Japan itself conducted by the air
force. LeMay assigned one group of about 160 aircraft of the 313th Bombardment
Wing to the task, with orders to plant 2,000 mines in April 1945.
The mining runs were made by individual B-29 Superfortresses at night at moderately low
altitudes. Radarprovided mine release information. This mining proved the most efficient
means of destroying Japanese shipping during World War II. In terms of damage per unit
of cost, it surpassed strategic bombing and the United States submarine campaign.
Eventually most of the major ports and straits of Japan were repeatedly mined, severely
disrupting Japanese logistics and troop movements for the remainder of the war with 35
of 47 essential convoy routes having to be abandoned.
For instance, shipping through Kobe declined by 85%, from 320,000 tons in March to
only 44,000 tons in July. Operation Starvation sank more ship tonnage in the last six
months of the war than the efforts of all other sources combined.
The Twentieth Air Force flew 1,529 sorties and laid 12,135 mines in twenty-six fields on
forty-six separate missions. Mining demanded only 5.7% of the XXI Bomber Command's
total sorties, and only fifteen B-29s were lost in the effort. In return, mines sank or
damaged 670 ships totaling more than 1,250,000 tons.
After the war, the commander of Japan's minesweeping operations noted that he thought
this mining campaign could have directly led to the defeat of Japan on its own had it
begun earlier. Similar conclusions were reached by American analysts who reported in
July 1946 in the United States Strategic Bombing Survey that it would have been more
efficient to combine the United States' effective anti-shipping submarine effort with land-
and carrier-based air power to strike harder against merchant shipping and begin a more
extensive aerial mining campaign earlier in the war. This would have starved Japan,
forcing an earlier end to the war.
WWII Summary
The Twentieth Air Force lost 414 B-29s during attacks on Japan
Much of Japan's industrial capacity was also destroyed by Allied bombing. Over 600
major industrial facilities were destroyed or badly damaged, contributing to a large decline
in production
Approximately 40 percent of the urban area of the 66 cities subjected to area attacks
were destroyed ]This included the loss of about 2.5 million housing units, which rendered
8.5 million people homeless.
To achieve this, the American Twentieth Strategic Air Force, in concert with its Allies,
dropped 160,800 tons of bombs on the Japanese home islands. Of this total, 147,000
tons of bombs were dropped by the B-29 bomber force. Around 90 percent of the
American tonnage fell in the last five months of the war.
The financial cost of the campaign to the United States was $4 billion; this expenditure
was much lower than the $30 billion spent on bomber operations in Europe, and a small
proportion of the $330 billion the US Government spent on the war.
Japanese payed the price for militarists refusal to surrender.
Did not talk about atomic bombs, firebombing often overlooked.
UK
American post-war military assistance programs loaned the RAF enough Superfortresses
to equip several RAF Bomber Command. The aircraft were known as the Washington B.1
in RAF service, and served from March 1950 until the last bombers were returned in early
1954. 87 loaned from the USAF as the Washington B.1
Soviet re-engineering of the B-29 During 1944 and 1945 five B-29s made emergency landings in Soviet territory after
bombing raids on Japanese Manchuria and Japan.
The Tu-4 first flew on 19 May 1947, piloted by test pilot Nikolai Rybko.[19] Serial production
started immediately, and the type entered large-scale service in 1949.
Entry into service of the Tu-4 threw the USAF into a panic, since the Tu-4 possessed
sufficient range to attack Chicago or Los Angeles on a one-way mission, and this may
have informed the maneuvers and air combat practice conducted by US and British air
forces in 1948 involving fleets of B-29s.
Eight hundred and forty-seven Tu-4s had been built when production ended in the Soviet
Union in 1952, some going to China during the later 1950s
Korean War and postwar service Sovet fighters appeared over Korea, and after the loss of 28 aircraft, future B-29 raids
were restricted to night-only missions, The B-29 was notable for dropping the large
"Razon" and "Tarzon" radio-controlled bomb in Korea, mostly for demolishing major
bridges,
Boeing B-50 Superfortress The Boeing B-50 Superfortress strategic bomber is a post–World War II revision of
the Boeing B-29 Superfortress, fitted with more powerful Pratt & Whitney R-4360 radial
engines, stronger structure, a taller fin, and other improvementsHowever, the later B-50
Superfortress variant (which was initially designated B-29D renamed for congress)
was good enough to handle auxiliary roles such as air-sea rescue, electronic intelligence
gathering,air-to-air refueling, and weather reconnaissance.
The B-50D was replaced in its primary role during the early 1950s by the Boeing B-47
Stratojet, which in turn was replaced by the Boeing B-52 Stratofortress.
The final active-duty KB-50 and WB-50 variants were phased out in the mid-1960s, with
the final example retired in 1965. Seen picture of recon jets refulled on ground in Vietnam.
Boeing built 370 of the various B-50 models and variants between 1947 and 1953.
Lucky Lady II Lucky Lady II is a United States Air Force Boeing B-50 Superfortress that became the
first airplane to circle the worldnonstop when it made the journey in 1949, assisted by in-
flight refueling. Total time airborne was 94 hours and 1 minute.
LeMay cited the significance of the mission as indicating that the Air Force now had the
capability to take off on bombing missions from anywhere in the United States to "any
place in the world that required the atomic bomb"
The aircraft's crew were each awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross and were
honoured by the National Aeronautic Association with its annual Mackay Trophy,
recognizing the outstanding flight of the year and by the Air Force Association with its Air
Age Trophy.
After flying 23,452 mi (37,742 km) he aircraft flew at altitudes between 10,000 to 20,000 ft
(3,000 to 6,100 m) and completed the trip around the world at an average ground speed
of 249 mph (401 km/h; 216 kn)
Boeing C-97 Stratofreighter The Boeing C-97 Stratofreighter is a long-range heavy military cargo aircraft developed
from the B-29 and B-50 bombers. Design work began in 1942, with the prototype's first
flight being on 9 November 1944, and the first production aircraft entered service in 1947.
followed by its commercial airliner variant, the Boeing Model 377 Stratocruiser in 1947.
. fitting an enlarged upper fuselage onto a lower fuselage and wings which were
essentially the same as those of the B-29 Superfortress with the tail, wing, and engine
layout being nearly identical.
Between 1947 and 1958, 888 C-97s in several versions were built, 811 being KC-
97 tankers
A heavily modified line of outsized-cargo variants of the Stratocruiser is the Guppy / Mini
Guppy /Super Guppy which remain in service today with operators such as NASA.
A transport developed from the B-29 was the Boeing C-97 Stratofreighter, first flown in
1944,
Boeing 377 Stratocruiser The Boeing 377 Stratocruiser was a large long-range airliner developed from the C-97
Stratofreighter military transport, a derivative of the B-29 Superfortress. The Stratocruiser's
first flight was on July 8, 1947.[2] Its design was advanced for its day, its innovative
features included two passenger decks and a pressurized cabin, a relatively new feature on
transport aircraft. It could carry up to 100 passengers on the main deck plus 14 in the
lower deck lounge; typical seating was for 63 or 84 passengers or 28 berthed and five
seated passengers.
The Stratocruiser was larger than the Douglas DC-6 and Lockheed Constellation and cost
more to buy and operate. Its reliability was poor, chiefly due to problems with the four 28-
cylinder Pratt & Whitney Wasp Major radial engines and their four-blade propellers. Only 55
Model 377s were built for airlines, along with the single prototype.
Aero Spacelines, Inc. is an American aircraft manufacturer which made a name for itself
by converting Boeing 377Stratocruisers into the famous Guppy line of airplanes, re-
engineered solely for transporting oversized cargo such as space exploration vehicles.
Survivors A total of 3,970 B-29s were built.
Twenty-two B-29s are preserved at various museums worldwide, including one flying
example; Fifi, which belongs to the Commemorative Air Force, along with four complete
airframes either in storage or under restoration (including one to airworthy), eight partial
airframes in storage or under restoration, and four known wreck sites.
Important part of aviation history, defence of the west.
Conclude on a lighter note, what we were fighting for…