B-24J startup and takeoff:
The B-24 was the workhorse of the Army Air Corps bombing campaign in Europe. The B-17 got more of the glory and the -17 could take more of a punch. But they built 6,000 more B-24s, if that tells you anything.
Good Thing He Was Stealing A Glance
30 minutes ago
7 comments:
That still frame was alarming, until I realized he was just there for the startup.
I wonder about those warbirds and what they refurbish. Are those top turrets motorized? Or just a seat with a good view, now? If I was younger, I'd love to try a ball turret in flight. But I'm sure none of them are operational anymore.
Not so. The local CAF's B25 top turret s functional. I'd like to see a B-17 ball turret in operation, but I'm not aware of any that still work. Not that there's any way *I* would fit in there.
B-17 vs B-24—the eternal question. I'll always have a bias as my father was in '17s. But there was only one division of '24s in the 8th AF and two divisions of '17s, if that tells you anything.
Incidentally, in my father's group (457th BG) there were quite a few crews who trained on '24s in the States, but who were reassigned to '17s when they got to England. The sentiment generally was that they were grateful.
My next door neighbor in Illinois was in the 455th BG in Italy—the same group as George McGovern.
LRod
ZJX, ORD, ZAU retired
That special sound from the plane, right at the end of the video. It sends a chill down my spine thinking about a couple dozen of these babies roaring off to do some serious damage somewhere.
w3ski
What the fact of more B-24's produced tells me is that a) the USAAF appreciated the fact that it could carry significantly more bombs than the B-17 and get them there faster and farther than the B-17 (since it had a significantly faster cruising speed and longer range), and b) life was cheap, since it was a tin can with fuel tanks scattered all over the place that had a disturbing tendency to catch on fire and crash whenever flak came near it, much less shredded it. A B-17 would fly when half a wing was missing, the B-24, no way.
Is that "M" on the tail for Milo Minderbiner enterprises?
I think that Milo's outfit flew B-25s.
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