How a WWII Bomber Became a "Photo of Death" 

Seeing that no-one has commented in 3 months, I am glad it helps you. To a lesser degree, I am in a similar position to yourself. My father was a British Royal Navy submarine officer in WW2, First Lieutenant on HMS Torbay at 22 years of age, and awarded the DSC. He commanded T-Class submarines until 1956, but never sasid much about it. After his death, a video came to my attention, showing HMS Tactician in the Sea of Japan during anti-submarine exercises with other ships, during the Korean War. I realised that one of the tiny figures on he conning tower was almost certainly my father. A strange feeling! / You grandfather and my father played their part in fighting against tyranny, and we can be proud of that. Sad to say it, but tyranny is everywhere in the world today, and using tools of social control unavailable to the tyrants of the 1940s. Even tiny children are a battlefield of the Left, brainwashed over marxist sexual theories. I think our world will turn very dark again, before things change for the better. .

@@malcolmmcfarlane7565 You mean utterly selfish people who expect everyone else to dance to their tune, or be vilified? Behaviour that is so 1930s, and led directly to a world war. Intolerant people, always pushing their agenda forward to achive a marxist world, where there is no freedom at all. / That is what millions of people fought to stop from 1939-1945, includng Carrie's grandfather, my mother and father, and a number of uncles.

​@@malcolmmcfarlane7565they are the same ppl that claim their country has turned communist, and has actually never lived in a true communist country, and experienced the atrocities the ppl had to live under.

​@@malcolmmcfarlane7565wtf are you commenting about? 🤡

​@@malcolmmcfarlane7565xi and putin aren't trying to force rainbow stuff on our children

Btw if i'm correct he is highly decorated.

30 was 5 more than the required 25 to go home.

What was the planes name ?

🫡

The Americans were told how dangerous daylight bomber were but Americans never listened

Your friend ws an accomplice to the slow deaths of thousands of children. NOt all were German or Italian.

@@michaelwhisman Don't be a griefer. I doubt that the kids in occupied countries were doing OK under occupation, either.

The difference was that the Axis were killing people in a deliberate manner on an industrial scale. If Germany had surrendered, the bombing would have stopped the same day. If the Allies had stopped fighting, the concentration and death camps would have just carried on killing.

@@michaelwhisman war is brutal for everyone involved no getting around that fact but dont go around acting like things would have been better if we left the nazis continue their genocides and brutal occupations of the countrys they took over

@@michaelwhisman troll.

My father was a pilot shot down June 29 1944 spent almost a year in Stalag Luft 3

@@billcounts9516 Our dads were in there at the same time. My dad was in there from Aug 1944 until liberation.

👍😁I hit the like button

It's not the photo where a P39 pulls straight into a B17, although the crew is just as dead.

@@seanm2511 Do you mean a P38 Lighting.

@@christopherhughes9984 No, I mean a P39. In Dallas. The recent incident.

@@seanm2511 Oops sorry, anyway a very interesting story keep up the good work regards Chris. 👍

I wish they would either fully convert it(Dianond Lil) to B-24A configuration, short nose and appropriate paint job and all, and correct the cockpit greenhouse, or just completely restore it back to it's original LB-30 configuration..It's a beautiful plane, but too many things are incorrect on it the way it is...

My uncle started flying and as he would say killing Germans over North Africa many did it in the Soviet Union and over Europe. He really dislike the Nazis I mean he did not like but after flying in witnessing the Japanese capacity for just downright murder he really hated them. He used to say it doesn't take long to start hating when you see your friends machine-gunned helplessly in a parachute by some Japanese soldier in a zero. People forget those airplanes a lot of times would get hit with a loaded bomb loading just disappear into a puff smok and aluminum.

Thank you for your story & a reminder to all that the suffering, sadness & loss has been felt by many many thousands of families, lest we forget the sacrifice made for our freedom today.

Not Liberals.

@@CFITOMAHAWK Biden was not on board 😉👍 didn,t understand the call🤣

Yeah today we might not do those kind of war crimes...

My father in law built B-24s during WW2. Pretty interesting time to live....

@@theman3456 ...and without those crimes you would not have your freedom from the totalitarian Huns (assuming they let your parents live).

My grandfather was a medic who picked up soldiers from the front and flew back to England. He was sick, and a friend covered his shift. The plane was shot down, and his friends died. He lamented, "That should've been me."

My grandfather switched planes for a person...his plane had a horrible crash and he almost died. The guy he switched with the plane was lost and all of the crew. He was navigator for B26.

cool detail i was waiting for the narrator to give the name of that plane. sorry for your loss.

Norden is now the subject of lots of good writing showing what a long-term scam it was. Bomber Mafia is good, too.

Yes the continuation of the propaganda re the Norden! It was rubbish!

Correct, the Norden bomb sight was garbage. The Germans captured one that was not tossed out of a B-17 before it crashed like it was supposed to, and they said it was trash.

There is a video on YT about the myth and fallacy of the Norden BS, all PR from CEO to help win contracts. Can probably search for it

Yeah I dont think the bomb sight improved rather the tactics leading up to the bombing run, and the bombardiers ability to have control of the plane on bombing run is what really improved.

my grandpa said the same thing when "saving private ryan" came out.. "why would i want to watch that i already lived through it"

I went to a memorial service once for a WW2 bomber crew that crashed in training / a ferry flight. I think somebody had done a lot of family tree research and tried to get as many relatives of the crew together as possible.

Read Stephen Ambrose en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wild_Blue about the B-24 and George McGovern.

My father was ground crew for the 482nd Bomb group. He was apparently one of the best welder/solderer/instrument specialists and they would send him all the problem aircraft for repairs. The trickiest part was the thermocouples soldered to engines to indicate temperatures. Apparently he was a wizard in this field. Dad was a big-rig mechanic whose hobby was fixing radios and record players. (Later, TVs)The 482nd had planes on every mission because they had the super secret airborne radar the Germans didn't know about. The Army actually gave classes to the soldiers to explain the "bathtubs" (radardomes) where B-17's normally had a chin turret. The deflecting strategy was with jokes about how our "chicken" pilots keep soiling themselves so they need a bathtub to get cleaned-up. Or, good place for officers to sleep-off a hangover. Where else you gonna hide the hookers? etc. This unit at Alconbury included both B-24s and B-17s. Dad was with 17s. BTW, he said the 17s had a much better chance of returning when badly shot-up because the wing had more lift at lower speeds. Many made it back on one remaining engine. The B-24 needed more airspeed to generate lift on the Davis wing. Anyway, Jimmy Stewart "Shanghaied" Dad from his unit to fit and weld a piece of armor plate under his seat in his B-24. Apparently a small fragment of flak had come through his seat and sliced his backside a bit too close to the Stewart Family Jewels. Ironically, Dad couldn't mention it until after the war because of all the secrecy. I can imagine Stewart's drawl as he told Dad "Dying for your country is one thing, but, uh . . . ." Dad lost one of his favorite aircrews on their 24th mission. He was a totally closed-up person but the only time I ever saw him break down was whenever he mentioned that loss. That crew all called him "Gramps," because at 35, he was older than his crews.

Great story. We'll always remember him as George Bailey from It's A Wonderful Life

I read of the 'Lady be Good' many years ago. They thought they were over the Med when they bailed out. It's amazing that the plane was ever found.

Their story is told in the book "Log of the Liberators". Check my post above for a link to the ebook version of this book.

Didn't they make a film about it.

@@tonyclough9844 1969 TV movie Sole Survivor. Richard Basehart, and William Shatner.

the irony of the name flak magnet is brilliant.

Somewhere in the back of my head is a fuzzy memory of seeing "Flak Magnet" in a photo in one of my history books...!

@@nairbvel so cool

Some men in tanks and Merchant ships would like a word with you.

@@marchellochiovelli7259 statistically ball turret gunner on the b 17 was the most dangerous in the war

they were very brave. The most dangerous must have been Uboats, it would have certainly been beyond me.

Looking at this video, I noticed one thing that may have had impact on the German fighter pilots choices of target, Extra Joker was not painted, it was shiny aluminium and therefore easier to pick out. Low hanging fruit so to speak. However, the other two that were also shot down were painted dark green. So that would indicate the surviving B24 was just lucky that day.

​@@KatraMoo Bare aluminum is easier to spot from a distance, but only if you catch a reflection. The rest of the time it's actually pretty decent camo in the skies (especially on cloudy days viewed from below or winter campaigns viewed from above). I've lost several really nice RC planes because of this too, they just kind of disappear and you can't figure out which way they're oriented. OD green is pretty dark in the sky and only modestly helpful when viewed from above, might as well be painted black viewed from below. Mostly irrelevant to this situation, as camo is only helpful to prevent detection at very long distances, and only if your entire formation is the same, AND only if you're not producing any contrails. Once you get within engagement range, it doesn't really matter if your plane is day glow orange with bullseyes painted on or wearing a ghillie suit made out of clouds, you're still going to stand out in a big way. Even without any kind of camo, spotting anything beyond 5 miles or so is extremely difficult in the air. I've tried spotting aircraft using ADS-B while ferrying around places and it's tough even when you know their exact direction and altitude. Around 3 miles out is generally where color or size makes a difference in spotting. Within a mile they're hard to miss, no matter the size or color. I think it's just a matter of circumstance, to be honest. The tactics used by the interceptors on this encounter was to pick off the bombers from the rear because the formation was weak, but usually they try to go for the lead planes first and pick off the strays after a few runs. They might have changed their tactic to pick off the lead if the rest of the bombers had stayed in formation, and then the Thunder Mug might have been the first target instead. If the other crew was trained first, same situation.

Generally, the only crews that were delegated to a specific position were the top ranked pilots plane. They were usually the most experienced and the commanders of the squadrons.

Same fear/stress/duty of attack fighters, that died in droves....One P47 pilot reportedly came back from a terrible mission, stood up in the cockpit,and emptied his pistol into the plane. He was sent home. Another, P47 pilot had a bomb ,that was hung up, come off on landing, exploding near the plane. After many misshaps, he had a nervousbreak down. Bravery is usually finding a way to function, with terror.

My Dad was nursery school age when my Grandfather went off to WWII. He didn't talk about his experiences, but I gathered from my Dad's tales of his childhood that he was a mess for several years after the war. They lived in Basilone Homes in the San Fernando Valley for a time. Pretty sure it was training barracks turned projects for returning vets. Later he went to a couple of weekend retreats hosted by this guy who had radical ideas about therapy and transformation, but stopped going because it was too out-there for Granddad... that man's name was L. Ron Hubbard. By the time I was born in the late 60s, he'd been working as a succesful Radar engineer at Hughes Aircraft.

I have visited that airfield you will be pleased to know the tower has been fully restored along with some of the other buildings and a big marble plaque of commemoration is placed here to commemorate those that served. They have open days but it mostly serves small civilian aircraft today and you can take flying lessons there now. Raf Horsham St Faiths also had B24's flying out of it, its now Norwich airport but there is also a museum here to and plaque to commemorate those that served, our city library also has a large section dedicated to the USAF flying missions out of bases in East Anglia the wall is lined with small versions of B24's tail fins from all squadrons serving very nicely done.

❤this is hard to comment but i appreciate you sharing your story because 1. my grandpa flew the b24 over 30 missions came back to New York and met my grandma and they had my Dad in 1946 2. my Dad often told me how difficult his childhood was. after the war my Grandpa suffered the same PTSD tried to smother it with alcohol. divorced my Grandma after about ten years of a miserable marriage. 3. my Dad suffered his own version of PTSD and social anxiety as a result. in his 70s it came to haunt him in the form of dementia and Alzheimer's. 4. both my Dad and Grandpa are gone now. i hope theyre all up in Heaven someplsce having a good time together.

@darrinsiberia Thank you for your comment. Tens of thousands of vets never really got over their combat experiences. The Eight AirForce suffered more casualties than the US Marine Corps did in the Pacific campaign. My father told me that before the belly tank was invented to extend the range of the fighter cover, you had a one in ten chance to be shot down every mission. At the morning mission briefing, you couldn't help but notice the missing faces. He said you just knew your turn was coming. He said they were told to try to make it to a luftwafe base if you got shot down. They would protect you. The Gestapo would shoot you on the spot and the farmers would hang you.

Very interesting Jim! My Dad also flew with the 783rd, he was a Flight Engineer. He went down twice, Sep13, 1944 into the Adriatic then finally Feb 16, 1945. The first time 5 of the 9 crew perished, the second time 7 of the nine perished. The German village of Haselbach built a memorial to the 7 Americans who died there on Feb 16th. I attended the dedication in 2013. Gerry Brown

I already covered this one :) this is Miss Donna Mae. Should be able to find it on my channel.

@@TJ3 Ah right, I missed that one!

I've had a book with a photo of that event for years and I've always wondered about the details. I'll have to check that out!

If I remembered, everyone was able to jump out. Unfortunately, it was over enemy territory, so a lot of them were captured

@@danielbayer278 The book you are referring to that has all these pictures and details of that incident and the one in this video in it is called "Log Of The Liberators". It's a fantastic book.

My father's first cousin, Gene Greenwood was a member of the 100th Bomb Group at Thorpe Abbot.

Love this idea look into this TJ3!

The photo of Wee Willie and his wing blown off and also the one of Queenie coming back in shreds after the party at Schweinfurt.

Thunderbolts are my favorite US fighter's and Typhoons are my favorite British fighter's, precisely for the reason that both of them are big nasty looking beasts, when I attack an enemy I want him to look up and think "Oh shit!!! Look at that hideous beast coming at me!!!" and drop dead from a heart attack before I even have to pull the trigger.

True about the spit vs hurricane, but p51 and thunderbolts were two very different planes both loved because they excelled in their own fields

Hellcat vs Corsair is another I love the HC

It worked for the atom bombers.

@@tonyclough9844 didn't exactly need to be precise

The Norden bomb sight had been around before the War. 1936, I believe. The Germans had the plans for it pretty quickly

The Germans and Japanese both captured examples and thought it wasn't that impressive, but it needed to work with other systems on the plane, not just on it's own. There was a late-war German prototype bomber that used B29 landing gear. Yes, they were so desperate they had to rely on salvaged wreckage for production!

Germans had access to it. They were not impressed. And had their own.@@andiesayer5085

Yes; I had heard it was some Operational Training Gruppe, not one of the 'front line' units like JG2 or JG26

Mmmmm.

When they told your Dad he had a 2% chance they lied to him. Statistically it was impossible to survive a tour. But 20% beat the odds. You had a better chance of being in a German U Boat than a US bomber. US bomber crews suffered the worst losses in the war.

The thermometer on a B-17 only went down to -65. It was probably often colder than that.

That and the Catalina along with other flying boats

Hi, Where in Italy was he stationed? Thank you

@@robinboucherwonderfulflight He died in 2001. Didn't talk much about it. Perhaps it might have to do with the morning following a mission the day before where they took some enemy fire when the crew chief came up to him and said: "Do you know that you flew out of Europe across the Mediterranean and back to base with one strand of wire left on your main battery cable?. Shot nearly clean off". The Isle of Capri was mentioned his plane was unpainted and he was there from August 1944 to sometime late 45 .And he did some time flying in a B29. Talked about the huge technological jump forward with the B29. Why do you want to know. ?

@@robertlong7033 I had a grand uncle who was a flight engineer/ top turret gunner with the 455th in the 15th Army Air Corp flying out of Italy in B-24s.

I miss those beautiful beasts, especially that flying fortress 😫

That incident with the B-17, unfortunate as it was, showed the spectators what WWII was about. It was not about heroes, it was about aircrew dying in large numbers and then getting cremated in aviation fuel. Also, if debris had fallen on spectators, it would have also shown how bombers delivered death on the people on the ground. Air shows are twisting the story trying to glorify the war. And in that respect, that terrible accident hopefully revealed to the crowd what war was really like.

It's probably not a good subject for TJ- way too recent, the families of the victims are still living, and probably disrespectful to simulate the crash.

@@demetridar506 That’s a pretty stupid take on air shows.

@@demetridar506 That’s a pretty stupid take on air shows.

Kudos to your uncle, I guess it's better to be exhausted and alive than rested and dead :/

Exactly. B24s were hard to keep in formation--and a 'loose/bad' formation attracted interceptors===apparently German ground controllers and 'airborne' station keepers could pick out a crappy formation (and a lack of escorts) and deploy their forces accordingly.

The B-17 when hit, looked like a wounded eagle. The B-24 would fly apart like a Chinese motorcycle.

@@stephenkalatucka6213 or as my uncle called it 750,000 pieces flying in loose formation!

My dad flew in B-24's late in the war, and got in 6 missions, (2 over Berlin!) before VE day. He said that the 24 was a much better bomber than the 17. It could fly higher, faster, farther, and with a bigger payload. It was, however, more fragile, and could be shot down easier. The 17, being the 'prettier' plane, got all the positive press. Nobody ever called the 24 a beauty!

One in ten and similar "data" are popular to downplay the effectiveness of the bombing campaigns, which were nonetheless devastating enough on German war efforts.

I could never understand how dropping bombs unto innocent Civilians can ever be considered Brave. When Americans Genocide People its brave, when Germans do it - its the worst thing ever. Talk about some double Standarts.

@@TheBlackfall234 The difference is one was a war of conquest supported & aided by the civilians to enslave the free world. The other was a desperate war of liberation to free the enslaved & stop the completion of said conquest by any desperate means possible. War is hell

@@bhall4996 Thats the Story weve been told. The World of today proofs that a lie.

Too many migrants. USA will never be the same.

Sad to say, but I think most of this generation now are cowards. Not all, but most. We’ll have to fight three.

AMEN 🙏

I agree that the greatest generation was amazing. They saved the world from tyranny. Also, our Republic WAS saved when trump was voted out in the 2020 election and when the attempted coup was thwarted on January 6, 2021. Had the insurrection succeeded, we'd be living in a dictatorship today. We still have a Republic, thank God.

Bankers always do what's best for business

Did he ever cover the last flight of the devil plane? It was a B17, tail number 666. Most heavily armed B17 in the Pacific,if not ever built. If I remember correctly, the whole crew died and it was because of a superstitious commander not wanting to escort the plane on its mission. Makes me hope he got charged with dereliction of duty for that crap.

@@justincooper5189 not that I know of , or seen in any of the photographs that I have of his

And B24's were the first to complete 25 missions not B17's. B-24D "Hot Stuff" of the 330th Bomb Squadron, 93d Bomb Group, 8th Air Force was the first bomber even though she was attached with the Memphis Belle, the Belle got the story.

In more ways than one: Most B24 units were attached to the 15th airforce in Italy. Southern Italy was a pretty 'dreary' place==no night life like in London. The B24 had longer range, sure, but if the books by Donald Caldwell on the luftwaffe fighter force were any indication, the 'Liberator' had a few weak points: it was very hard to fly in a tight box formation (it was said that if you just trim the 'Fort', it would pretty much stay that way) so pilots found it very fatiguing--the further into the mission, the more the formations would loosen. Also, apparently it had a lower operational ceiling (which just happened to be right in the prime altitude for the FW 190). Finally it was not as resistant to battle damage. So you combine lower ceiling and sloppy formation, it was always a magnet for German fighters. That being said, The B24 was very useful in the Pacific theater due to its long range and very useful in the struggle against the Uboats.

Yes it is, and despite the age old narrative that the B17 could absorb more punishment and get more guys home it's simply a myth. One of the ways it got started was researchers figured a good way to compare the two was by looking at the early 8th Air Force results from when they'd fly missions with mixed B17's and B24's, on it's surface it seems like a good way to compare the two when it comes to survivability but it's actually highly flawed for a reason. B24's could fly a little faster than B17's but B17's could fly a little higher, as a result when they had mixed missions they'd have all the B17's up front since being slower they'd have to set the pace, and since they flew a little higher that meant that the B24's were not only at the back but also around 2,000 ft lower. Any WW2 fighter pilot would tell you that "Tail end Charlie" was always the best aircraft to attack, and since B24's were at the back they already had the disadvantage of not having the interlocking fire of defensive guns from bombers behind them, that was made even worse by the fact that they were flying 2,000 ft lower than the rest of the bombers denying them even that much more benefits of interlocking defensive gun fire. After a while the 8th Air Force caught on to what was happening and why they were losing a disproportionate amount of B24's compared to B17's and quit mixing the two, but early aviation writer's doing research to compare the survivability of B24's to B17's didn't know that, they just figured the two bombers being on the same mission would be a good comparison when it came to survivability. Last year I read an article written by a guy who went over all that and other things that led to the myth of B17's being more survivable than B24's, he did an exhaustive study that took him over a year to complete and his math came out to the B24 being about 1% away from the B17 in the survivability category, it's like he said in summary 1% is easily inside of any kind of standard deviation for a study as complex as the one he did and that his conclusion is that neither one was more survivable than the other. That being said however the B17 overall was the better of the two for the simple reason that it was a more stable platform and would put more of it's bombs on target, however the B24 could carry slightly more bombs on the same mission so destructive power evens out in the end, but since the B17 could do the same with less the edge goes to it, but not by much.

Because is Ugly as hell.

@@dukecraig2402 WOW thanks for that fantastic response!

@@jpmtlhead39 Ugly is in the eye of the beholder. I think she is a beautiful a/c!

As aircrew I would prefer the Flying Fortress as a commander I would probably prefer liberators. Actually no! I would prefer SBDs as their airfields are mobile.

Everyone in the whole war had a better chance to survive than an airman in the US 8th. The 8th lost 80% even Germans in U boats only suffered 75% losses. The guys flying all knew the odds too. They were all dead men walking.

British four engined, strategic bombers were primarily the Avro Lancaster and Handley Page Halifax. Earlier examples included the Short Stirling. Two engined, medium bombers early in the war were the Handley Page Hampden, Bristol Blenheim, and the full war's length Vickers Wellington. You could throw in the later war DeHavilland Mosquito light bomber and popular American imports like the Douglas Boston light bomber and Matin Baltimore. The Avro Manchester was a bust, but was developed from a two engined disappointment to the four engined Lancaster of the Dam Busters fame. I left out some others as these are all I can recall without looking online .

The cowardly British only did night area bombardments.

@@1pcfred The cowardly Germans targeted military targets until late August 1940, then only civilian targets for the rest of the war. They started with daylight bombing of London, but Coventry was burnt out in a night raid. Liverpool, Manchester, Portsmouth , and the other cities were hammered at night in The Blitz until German attention shifted to Eastern Europe to begin the invasion of the USSR. Twin engines bombers, Jabos, and then the V-1 and V-2 tickets were delivered by cowards through the end of the war. What was sauce for the goose, was also sauce for the gander. Besides , the bombing of Nuremberg in late 1943 went terribly wrong for Bomber Command and they lost a whopping 94 bombers in a single night versus the worst American loss of 60 bombers on the Schweinfurt-Regensberg raid of October 1943. Don't forget the cowardly Zeppelin raids on British cities in WW1 and the German battle cruisers shelling seaside towns with 11 inch naval rifles on multiple occasions . The World Wars were not fought by the rules of the Earl of Queensbury.

@@amerigo88 remind me who declared an unjust war on whom?

​@1pcfred Idiot. From mid 44 to 45 it was more dangerous night bombing over Europe. German nightfighters using radar guidance and upward firing cannon brought down more British heavy bombers than the US bombers in daylight. One German ace brought down 7 Lancasters in less than 30 minutes. By then the US bombers were escorted to Berlin by Anglo American Mustangs. Fancy calling them cowards. British had a tour of 30 missions and many did 2 or up to 4 missions. More RAF died than Americans bombing Europe, admittedly they served longer. But of course they ALL were heroes, both RAF, USAAF and many other nationalities who died, including the German and Soviet airmen.

we can go a long way to repaying that debt by being a good person , and ensure our children become good responsible adults , and enjoy the life, the sacrifice of these wonderful brave men made possible .

@brianliggett9087 Thank you for replying. I have a grown up daughter, she's been brought up to respect others and to enjoy her life. Looking at some of the kids these days, it's unbelievable to think just how young these crews were. Good health to you and your family 🇬🇧.