This Series about one of The Most Historic Aircraft of All Time is IMPORTANT ! The Story of the Memphis Belle NEEDS to be Told! These men and those who fought alongside them - SAVED - THE - WORLD !!!!!!!!!! 🇺🇸 Lest We Forget … Great Job young man telling Her / Their Story!
This is truly Terrific !!! I can’t believe I’m looking inside THE Memphis Belle! Thank u gentleman, I’m really enjoying this series about this Grand ol Lady 🇺🇸
Very nice video series. I appreciate your effort in making it. The Memphis Bell's "26th mission", after it returned to the U.S., was a war bond tour. I have not heard it mentioned often, but after that tour, it was used for training at MacDill down in Florida. My father was a ball turret gunner and flew a training mission in the Bell while it was at MacDill. I have a letter that he wrote to his parents describing the flight. You mentioned how having two people (pilot, co-pilot) was important not only for work load but also in the event that one person was incapacitated. My dad once told me how the pilot of the crew he was training in (the pilot's last name was Savage so they called him "Doc Savage") trained every other crew member on how to fly the plane enough to keep it in the air in the event that both pilot and co-pilot were unable to fly. I have no idea if that was a common practice but it certainly makes sense. Back in 1995 or so, I got to fly in the EAA's Aluminum Overcast. As you noted, there was not a lot of armor. I recall that, when I climbed into the Aluminum Overcast, I was struck by the fact that, at most places, you were looking at the inside of the outside - just a tiny thickness of aluminum between you and open air. Flying around at 3500 feet or so on a warm summer day it was not what you could call a comfortable ride. That certainly gave me a better appreciation for the courage of the men who climbed into those machines, flew for hours up where the air was so thin that you couldn't breathe and the temperature would quickly freeze you to death. Not to mention enemy aircraft and FLAK batteries doing their best to shoot you down. Definitely history that deserves to be remembered.
Thank you for the kind words and support. Glad you are enjoying the series. After we finish with the plane itself we have a lot more content on the restoration stories along with its war bonds tour information. Excellent information and feedback.
Crews often got split up and moved around as needed to fill gaps on other planes, especially late in the war. My dad said he flew in several different planes, but the one he was in most was named "Little Joe". I did a lot of research and found that Little Joe was SN 43-39037 and even found the nose art for it. I built a radio controlled model of the Little Joe back in 2010. I made a little video of the first flight. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-CbYdghf6KqA.html
Well done. Watch any video of the startup sequence and how it has to be managed during flight. There are two pilots and a flight engineer who manages the power settings, engine monitoring and tweaking power settings like richness, turbo boost, etc.
How did you get permission or access to look in side the Memphis belles cockpit as I thought. The us Air Force museum didn’t normally allow stuff like that.
Not quite. Skin is about 0.40 aircraft grade aluminum. Slightly thicker. One thing to consider is this, ruling out weight, if the entire aircraft was made of the same specs in steel, it would not hold up. Steel weakens with flex. Called metal fatigue. Pound for pound at that level aluminum is the best, strongest choice. Quite remarkable some of the abuse these things took and could still return home.
