Thank, Boilerdoc. Sorry, been away a while, recovering from some back surgery. Beautiful photos. He loved/lived to fly, but he hated flying those B-47s. Said they were prone to crash due to bad design. They were fitted with JATO (jet-assisted take-off, although they were actually solid fuel rockets) units on both sides of the fuselage, in order to get it off the ground if they ran out of runway before rotation. That second photo of a B-47 (the seventh photo) looks like the pilot it off his JATOs.
He did love the B-52s, but resigned his commission (Capt.) due to an ultimatum from my mother, who didn't like service life. He flew as an engineering test pilot (after leaving SAC in 1952 or 53, can't remember which) for Sperry Rand, when they were developing the first inertial navigation system.
But it was his flying B-17s at 21 years old that really showed his mettle. I spoke with the three crewman still alive in 2002 (the whole crew made it through the war safely, believe it or not), and they said he was an incredible pilot. However, he died in '73 from cancer. He had just turned 50.
Thank, Boilerdoc. Sorry, been away a while, recovering from some back surgery.
ReplyDeleteBeautiful photos. He loved/lived to fly, but he hated flying those B-47s. Said they were prone to crash due to bad design. They were fitted with JATO (jet-assisted take-off, although they were actually solid fuel rockets) units on both sides of the fuselage, in order to get it off the ground if they ran out of runway before rotation. That second photo of a B-47 (the seventh photo) looks like the pilot it off his JATOs.
He did love the B-52s, but resigned his commission (Capt.) due to an ultimatum from my mother, who didn't like service life. He flew as an engineering test pilot (after leaving SAC in 1952 or 53, can't remember which) for Sperry Rand, when they were developing the first inertial navigation system.
But it was his flying B-17s at 21 years old that really showed his mettle. I spoke with the three crewman still alive in 2002 (the whole crew made it through the war safely, believe it or not), and they said he was an incredible pilot. However, he died in '73 from cancer. He had just turned 50.