第30章
《空军战士——驾驶B-24轰炸机的男孩们》章节:第30章,宠文网网友提供全文无弹窗免费在线阅读。!
Why was thisgauge or that instruments malfunctioning? Is there any way to stay straightand level over the target and still avoid the flak? How long can an enginebe on fire before it detonates the gas tank? What can you do when a bombgets stuck in the bomb bay? How does the plane fly with only three enginesoperating? With two? When the hydraulic system has leaked or been shot out,how do you get the wheels down?
McGovern had flown four missions on four days. These consecutive missionswere about the absolute limit. They left the pilot and his crew haggard,worn, jumpy, frazzled and spent. But each one of the attacks counted towardthe thirty-five missions that, when completed, would allow McGovern to returnto the States. When he had time to write to Eleanor, McGovern noted thenumber in his letter — number five after the mission to Zlin.
"I worried, as any wife would," Eleanor said three decades later. "Iwould feel a stab of fear whenever someone knocked at the door or the telephonerang. The first thing I would do when I got a letter from George was toscan through it for a number — the number of missions completed. Thatwas the first thing I wanted to know. Then I’d go back to read the letter."
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On December 16, radio operator Sgt. Mel TenHaken flew his first mission,against a refinery at Brux, Czechoslovakia. Because the crew were new, thepilot, Lieutenant Cord, was a veteran ofthirty-one missions. TenHaken ’s regular pilot flew as co-pilot that day. There was another newcomer, aphotographer on his seventeenth mission. Theirs would be one of the lasttwo planes on the bomb run and his photos would be among the official recordsof the raid ’s effect.
When the Group formed up and headed toward the target, TenHaken saw"a seemingly endless line of planes. I had never seen this many in one placeat one time." He thought that "obviously Rosie the riveter back home hadbeen very busy." The bombers were at 25,000 feet, just below the 26,000-footceiling for the craft.
On his B-24, TenHaken was in charge of the haff, what he had called"Christmas tree tinsel" back home. Its purpose was to confuse German radar,which otherwise would lock onto the group and know what altitude to setthe fuses for the shells to explode. The chaff was in packets, each onewrapped and tied with a plain brown band, each one crimped to open in thewind and allow the foil to drift down in individual pieces. Most veteransthought the chaff didn’t do much if any good, but they tossed them outof the plane with great gusto anyway.
When his plane got to the initial point and turned, then straightenedfor the bomb run, TenHaken saw "numerous little puffs ahead forming a blackcloud shaped like an elongated shoe box." The leader of his squadron wasflying through it. Those behind were about to enter the German box. It wastime to pull the flak jackets on. These were for the crew, whose membersdid not have the cast iron protection the pilot and co-pilot did. The jacketsconsisted of irregularly shaped metal plates stitched between two sheetsof canvas to form a vest. To TenHaken, "their purpose seemed primitive,identical to that of suits of armor." They weighed about twenty pounds each.Most veterans decided early on not to wear them, but to put them betweentheir seats and their butts, thus protecting the most important part.
Over the target, with flak bursting from the shells all around his plane,TenHaken started dropping the chaff packets through one of the waist windows.After dropping one, he tried to count to ten as he had been told beforeletting the next one go, but in the midst of the flak he seldom got pasttwo or three. Then the plane to his right got hit. "A flak explosion atits number three engine had blown the right wing from the body. The scenewas incomprehensible — the wing tumbled over and down, and the fuselagewas nosing into a dive." There were no parachutes. "The bam-bam-bams andpoof-poof-poofs were exploding everywhere; it was inconceivable to fly throughthis unscathed."
The bomber lurched. Have we been hit?