Details from NOLA.com: “Hours of ground tours and display are: 2:00 PM through 5:00 PM on Friday, March 9; 9:00 AM through 5. Also on display will be a P-51 Mustang. Visitors are invited to explore the aircraft inside and out – $12 for adults and $6 for children under 12 is requested for access to up-close viewing and tours through the inside of the aircraft. WWII Veterans can tour through the aircraft at no cost. Discounted rates for school groups. Visitors may also experience the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to actually take a 30-minute flight aboard these rare aircraft. Flights on either the B-17 or B-24 are $425 per person. Get some ‘stick time’ in the world’s greatest fighter! P-51 flights are $2,200 for a half hour and $3,200 for a full hour.”
Tips from bomber gunners to prevent guns and gunners from freezing during missions from a special edition of Army Talks, “Stars over the Reich,” published for the officers and men of the Eighth Air Force.
WORDS FROM THE WING WISE
These tips on preventing frozen guns and gunners come from gunners who were on operations last winter.
How to Keep Your Guns from Freezing
Thorough cleaning before and after every mission is point number one. Remove all moisture and powder deposits, especially from the bolt recesses. Firing pin port and receiver (especially extractor switch recess and front barrel bearing) should be thoroughly cleaned, dried and then properly oiled with AXS 777 (new specification number—2-120). Leave only a light film of oil. And keep oil cans tightly closed to keep out dust and foreign matter.
A canvas bag will keep recoiling parts dry while they’re being carried to the plane.
Charge your gun just before or just after take-off (whichever is your Group’s policy). If your gun freezes when unloaded you’re stuck. If it’s loaded the recoil will loosen any frozen parts.
Test-fire at bombing altitude. If you can charge the gun but it won’t fire, hold the trigger back while the parts slam forward into battery—this sometimes loosens frosted parts. Only charge the gun when you have to; it lets cold moist air in to the recoiling parts. If the extractor switch is frozen, charging may result in an out-of-battery stoppage.
How to Keep Yourself from Freezing
Use the correct equipment and wear clothing as it says on the posters. Clothing should fit loosely, as air insulates, and your blood circulates better.
Keep dry. If your feet get wet, change your socks before take-off. Don’t Work around the plane in too heavy clothing before take-off, as sweat increases the danger of frostbite.
Pre-flight your heated suit. The connection in the plane may be out of order. Only turn your heated-suit rheostat up far enough so you are just warm enough to keep you from being miserable. Be sure to have fleece-lined clothing in case the suit goes permanently out of order. If it does, keep moving the parts of your body that don’t have heat, flexing the muscles, wiggling your fingers and toes. And it’s a good idea to have extra heated gloves and cords.
Wear mufflers or bath towels around your knees, neck and anywhere else that gets cold. Goggles and canvas or wool hoods are available, and they sure are handy if the plexiglass is broken near you.
If you have to take off your heated glove at altitude don’t remove the glove liner. Don’t leave any part of your body exposed for more than a few seconds. Remember, at 40 below zero you may freeze a hand badly enough to lose a finger before you feel any pain or realize anything’s wrong.
Color photograph of the B-17 Flying Fortress “Idiots’ Delight” of Eighth Air Force in England. The original caption states the M/Sgt is Penrose A. Bingham of Reading, Pennsylvania. The B-17 “Idiots’ Delight” served with the 332nd Bomb Squadron, 94th Bomb Group and later with the 710th Bomb Squadron, 447th Bomb Group. (U.S. Air Force Photograph.)
B-17 Flying Fortress "Idiots' Delight" (U.S. Air Force Photo.)
The B-17 Flying Fortress “Chuckie” is moving from the Vintage Flying Museum in Fort Worth, Texas to the Military Aviation Museum in Virginia Beach, Virginia. The B-17 “Chuckie” was used for cropdusting until 1979. Owned by Chuckie Hospers, the B-17 was purchased by Don Anklin for permanent display at the Military Aviation Museum. The museum plans on sending the aircraft to American Aero in Florida for restoration work after which the B-17 returns to the museum.
Boeing color film from 1943 telling the story of the B-17 Flying Fortress.
“Here is the story of the B-17. THE FLYING FORTRESS. The research, engineering and production genius which built this airplane has since given America its great new aerial weapon… the BOEING B-29 SUPERFORTRESS.”
Swedish Fortresses, a new book on the B-17 in Sweden, has been announced by MMP Books.
Swedish Fortresses: The Boeing B-17 Fortress in Civil and Military Service Author: Jan Forsgren Illustrated by: Teodor Liviu Morosanu and Nils Mathisrud ISBN: 978-83-89450-87-6 A4 hardback plus 8 A2 foldouts, 128 pages with 64 pages of color.
Publisher’s Description: Many USAAF aircraft landed in neutral Sweden during WW2. The Swedish authorities arranged to buy many of these from the US, to supplement their limited and aging aircraft stocks. The B-17 Flying Fortress was selected for conversion to an airliner, and Saab undertook the work. This book tells, for the first time in English, the story of these aircraft and their subsequent careers, in Sweden, Denmark and France. No other B-17s were ever used as airliners, so this is a unique addition to the well-known history of the Fortress. Illustrated with many photos, both contemporary and of surviving airframes, and with color profiles of the colour schemes carried by these aircraft. Detailed plans of the modified airframes are included. Story of the “Shoo Shoo Shoo Baby” restoration is included.
U.S. Air Force photographs of B-17 Flying Fortress “Thunderbird” and a B-52 Stratofortress participating in a Heritage Flight at the Defenders of Liberty Airshow at Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana. The wallpaper images are sized to 1024×1024 pixels and 1024×768 pixels for the iPad and other computer desktop backgrounds.
1024 x 768
1024 x 1024 Wallpaper
B-17 and B-52 Fortresses B-17G Flying Fortress and B-52H Stratofortress representing over seventy years of U.S. Air Force Fortresses. Photograph by U.S. Air Force, Master Sgt. Michael A. Kaplan.
1024 x 768
1024 x 1024
Bomber Heritage Flight B-17G “Thunderbird” Flying Fortress and a B-52H Stratofortress from the 2nd Bomb Wing in 2006. Photograph by U.S. Air Force, Master Sgt. Michael A. Kaplan.
B-17H search and rescue variant of the Flying Fortress showing additional radar and rescue boat. This B-17H of the 6th Emergency Rescue Squadron was photographed at Floridablanca Airfield, Luzon, Philippine Islands in June 1945. (U.S. Air Force Photo)
The Pacific (HBO Miniseries)
The Wings of Freedom Tour visits New Orleans with vintage aircraft including P-51 Mustang, Consolidated B-24 Liberator “Witchcraft”, and Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress “Nine O Nine”. The Collings Foundation’s Wings of Freedom Tour will be at Lakefront Airport from March 9th to March 11th.
The B-17 Flying Fortress “Chuckie” is moving from the 
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