More so than you might imagine. I recently read the book "The Lost
Airman" about a B-24 flight engineer and top turret gunner who was shot down
during a bombing raid near Bordeaux. He described a number of flaws in the
B-24, including the fact that the top of the fuselage was a fuel tank and that
the only exit for bailing out was near the tail. The Germans would shoot
incendiary rounds at the top of the aircraft to cause it to explode.
The book describes what it was like to be concealed by the French
Resistance while moving around in Vichy France, then walking across the
Pyrenees into fascist Spain, avoiding Gestapo agents, and finally making it to
Gibraltar. It is NOT a novel. Damned good read.
>
>And baling out would have been a challenge!
>
>Chris
>
>> On 19 Sep 16, at 04:16, Jim Nichols <jhnichols@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>
>> A friend of mine during my working years was a teen-age belly gunner in a
>> B-24 crew flying over Europe. I've looked closely at that task, and find it
>> amazingly confining, for long periods of time.
>>
>
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Chris
When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro
- Hunter S. Thompson
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