Tidal Wave Footage Photos, 15th AAF and Luftwaffe, 'Black Sunday', 1 August 1943

The Pilot of JOSE CARIOCA lt Sampolis



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To ALL

BLACK JACK and CHATANOGA CHU CHU (last day photo on its way to Ploesti)

Alex

This post has been edited by alexkdl on January 30, 2005 02:58 am

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To ALL

This dedication reffers to the purpose of this topic started on here .

Alex

This post has been edited by alexkdl on January 30, 2005 03:03 am

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Tangerine, 41-11916, 376/513th, Ploesti target White I

Note especially the unusual twin machine gun mounted on lower chin (see also, detailed close up in following picture). I believe this may be what Artur was inquiring about in an earlier posting.

The crew of Tangerine:

Hobbs, Charles L., 1/Lt., Pilot, Returned Bengasi
Ruecroft, Richard C., 2/Lt., Co-Pilot, Returned Bengasi
Tegnazian, Albert W., 2/Lt., Navigator, Returned Bengasi
Walker, Robert A., 2/Lt., Bombardier, Returned Bengasi
Shultz, Harry, T/Sgt., Engineer, Returned Bengasi
Foy, James J., T/Sgt., Radio, Returned Bengasi
McGowen, Frank J., S/Sgt., Waist, Returned Bengasi
Perry, Alton M., S/Sgt., Waist, Returned Bengasi
Magaram, Henry, S/Sgt., Tail, Returned Bengasi


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Tangerine, 41-11916, 376/513th, Ploesti target White I

Detail of twin mount.




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"Operation Tidal Wave" aviation art by Nicolas Trudgian

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Fratello, thanks for posting this painting but it was already posted by me in the begining of the topic. Nevertheless you had a good point with the MG pilot controlled sighting system.....I wasn't aware about it as was not standard equipment on Aug 1, 1943 armada

Alex

Jim

Thanks for the new posts , which other bombers except the TANGERINE was equipped with pilot controlled MG fire system...and where was the plt of copilot boresight system mounted on the cockpit...I went through B-24 pilot training footage as well 41,42,43 series aircarfts and couldnt get fetails

Thanks
Alex

All TW fans here's the answer of Earl regarding LDAY BE GOOD loss due Navigational errors in Lybia , Earl is a TW Pilot veteran too


Yes, the friend of your family, Lt Bill Gilliat was our navigator on our first mission, if I recall, he never asked me to get a QDM (bearing) on our way back from
Crete. He only missed our base at Bengasi about 200 miles, pretty good for the first mission. Guess a little embarrasing for a navigator to ask the radioman to find out where we were. Your other friend Hines was down in Turkey with us. I dont recall talking to him as they kept the sexes separated even in Turkey,,, officers vs enlisted

I think everyone on the crew relied on the pilot to bring them back. When you put a 20 year old from the farm or from behind a soda fountain and give him a few months training in a bucket of bolts that is still in the experimental stage, what can you expect. I sometimes wonder how in the world we ever made it to the target...


How did the navigators in the Pacific, using those Jap slide rules, ever find those
small islands???

Have mercy you guys.

Earl

This post has been edited by alexkdl on January 30, 2005 06:36 pm

Alex

I wass radioman on the Lt Harold L. James crew. Our plane was being repaired after the raid on Bari and we were given 42-0744, which belonged to Lt Robert Schwellinger who was in hospital with the running GIs. He got released the morning of the Ploesti raid and flew in his plane as our co-pilot. It was a gas burner and had lots of trouble with leaking tanks which were replaced many times,
The plane had no name.

When we landed at Izmir I noticed the wing tanks leaking. We were hit by small arms fire on the pilots side but the Turks wouldnt let us look over the plane so the leaks might have been caused by the small arms fire or the history of leaking tanks. Lt Schwellinger missed many missions because of that problem.

The Turks repaired the plane and flew it for a number of years. My pilot James was late sent back to Turkey as Military Attache and tried to find out what happened to the plane but I guess no records were kept by the Turks and it probably wound up being made into pots and pans.

Earl

Sorry Alex, I din't see it.

WING DINGER at TIDALWAVE
===================


WINGER, GEORGE W. Pilot lst Lt. Columbus, KIA, WOM Florence Ohio
BARNETT, EDWARD Co-pilot 2nd Lt. Chicago KIA, WOM Florence Illinois
PALMER, FREDERICK H. Navigator 1st Lt. Palo Alto, KIA California
GRADWOHL, JACOB Bombardier Sgt. Portland, KIA Oregon
KRETZER, HAROLD Engineer T/Sgt. Clarks Grove, KIA, WOM Cambridge Minnesota
GOTTS, HOWARD F. Radio Oper. Sgt. Stanley,KIA, WOM Florence New York
TRAUDT, BERNARD G. Asst. Eng. S/Sgt. Milwaukee,POW returned to duty Wisconsin
CICON, MICHAEL J. Asst. Radio S/Sgt. Exeter,POW, returned to duty Pennsylvania
PHILLIPS, ELVIN L. Tail Turret Sgt. Salt Lake City KIA, WOM Cambridge Utah

The last of the 66th aircraft lost on 1 August was that flown by Lt. George W. Winger, and whose position in the formation was on the right of Lt. Gentry. Lt. Winger was flying a B-24 that was mistakenly reported to be bright orange in color. As this formation was on their bomb run, Winger’s ship was knocked aside by an explosion, and crossed directly below Hughes’ ship. On the other side of the target, Winger was still in the air but his aircraft was now an orange color because its Tokyo fuel tanks were aflame in the bomb bay. The pilots evidently knew that the end was near. Lt. Hunn said, “Winger climbed steeply to about five hundred feet. It must have taken him and his co-pilot (Barnett) enormous effort to get her high enough for people to bail out.” And two men did jump out of the waist ports, and their parachutes opened as the ship crashed and exploded. Winger and his men had completed 27 missions and were legally “retired” but chose to
go on one more mission as it was so important to the war effort.

The chutists, who had received the gift of life from their pilots, were gunners Michael J. Cicon and Bernard G. Traudt. Traudt was a seventeen year-old with a perpetual grin. He landed unhurt, concealed his chute, and crawled under some bushes and went to sleep. He had gotten no sleep the night before. Later he stated, “The other waist gunner, Michael Cicon, and I bailed out at approximately 500 feet, due to the fact that the plane was on fire and the bail out alarm rang. The
plane hit the ground before we did, and we did not see any one else get out.”
Lt. John Harmonoski reported that he saw Lt. Winger salute him just before he pulled his airplane upwards!

44th Memorial Hall

The 93 B.G.'s formation bombing run reconstruction over Roumania on Tidal Wave.

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The Pyramiders and Eight Balls initinerary over Romania on TW

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Liberandos Ploiesti attack

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