My dad worked on the Enola Gay, Bockscar, and some of the chase planes for both missions. One of his crewmen forgot the ground rules they'd been told and picked up a rag in one of the chase planes that had flown through the mushroom cloud over Nagasaki and wiped his hands with it and years later developed tumors all over his hands. He lived on our block. . . he was retired on a medical from his civilian job with the Air Force at full pay the day he told his supervisors he had tumors on his hands.
The tumors turned out to be benign, but his hands were almost unusable for him. He lived to about 85 or so. . . the same as my dad.
My dad also worked on all of Jimmy Doolittle's B25s before the Tokyo Raid. . . and is even mentioned in the book "Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo," but not by name. He was the civilian crew chief that earned Lt. Ted Lawson's ire for over-revving his beloved Ruptured Duck's engines while it was tied down.
Dad had to rev those engines. He was charged with assuring those engines would operate at 115% of their rating smoothly because they needed them to accelerate to high speed to take off from the Hornet in a VERY short distance. If he couldn't get them to do that, the engine (which was already fairly new) was pulled and they'd put a new one in and tune that one to the nth degree. When told what the take-off load was supposed to be, fuel, bombs, and men, Dad didn't think even with 115% over spec would get them off the ground in the distance they told him the planes had to be in the air. He drove his crew to get every bit of extra power out of those engines.
My dad finally made the suggestion they put water injection systems in the carburetor system like they used in fighter planes to boost horsepower. It worked. Got the extra boost they needed. The water injection increased the surface area of the fuel to burn because it coated the water droplets. . . and the water droplets flashed over into very high pressure steam.
This water injection concept had come out of noticing that cars and planes had slightly better performance in higher humidity air. . . it beat the hell out of the engines though. It's not a good practice. But, then, they didn't think they were going to be using these engines for an extended time, and they'd only need to use the water injection during takeoff.
Hats off to your Dad! You must be proud!
Thanks for the stories.
I think they still water injection to assist in take offs, that, and jato packs.
Thirteen Air Depot? South Pacific
If so they served together.
New part of the air force museum opened in Ohio honoring them.
Some of dad’s picture are headed that way. I have many snapshots that may have your dads picture in them.!
We were never allowed to open the wooden trunk until he died.
Three years ago.
Until we went on honor flight to D.C. Dad was very quiet about what he did
When he saw the wall of stars he cried. In fact it was several days after we got home before he could speak. Finally “all those stars — ALL those stars and how many more would there have been if we hadn’t done our job!
Dad was a captain in charge of supplies Was sometimes called Hikey becomes of the strenuous hikes he took his group on. The job he hated worse was /JAG officer. “Too much stress on good soldiers. “
I was born nine months to the day he came home. A very wanted child!
Thirteen Air Depot? South Pacific
If so they served together.
New part of the air force museum opened in Ohio honoring them.
Some of dad’s picture are headed that way. I have many snapshots that may have your dads picture in them.!
We were never allowed to open the wooden trunk until he died.
Three years ago.
Until we went on honor flight to D.C. Dad was very quiet about what he did
When he saw the wall of stars he cried. In fact it was several days after we got home before he could speak. Finally “all those stars — ALL those stars and how many more would there have been if we hadn’t done our job!
Dad was a captain in charge of supplies Was sometimes called Hikey becomes of the strenuous hikes he took his group on. The job he hated worse was /JAG officer. “Too much stress on good soldiers. “
I was born nine months to the day he came home. A very wanted child!
Thirteen Air Depot? South Pacific
If so they served together.
New part of the air force museum opened in Ohio honoring them.
Some of dad’s picture are headed that way. I have many snapshots that may have your dads picture in them.!
We were never allowed to open the wooden trunk until he died.
Three years ago.
Until we went on honor flight to D.C. Dad was very quiet about what he did
When he saw the wall of stars he cried. In fact it was several days after we got home before he could speak. Finally “all those stars — ALL those stars and how many more would there have been if we hadn’t done our job!
Dad was a captain in charge of supplies Was sometimes called Hikey becomes of the strenuous hikes he took his group on. The job he hated worse was /JAG officer. “Too much stress on good soldiers. “
I was born nine months to the day he came home. A very wanted child!
Incredible story/history. Thank you for sharing.
wow! very impressive!
That’s great text about your dad and the Doolittle B-25s!
I have seen film of one or two of the B-25s launching from the Hornet going on that historic mission. IIRC, the video shows one of those planes going into rotation after about no more than 50’ off roll out. Amazing...but I figured the Hornet was mashed at 30 knots going into a wind of about the same. There’s 60 knots of air speed right there. Add the Wrights doing 110% so yeah...50 feet.
The Republic P-47 had a Pratt & Whitney R-2800. I read at full throttle (aka war emergency power) a dose of water and methanol was injected to keep the heads from blowing off.
that was a great post, thanks!
Interesting, thanks for sharing
Interesting stories about your dad at post 1082.
Thanks for posting.
Swordmaker - My great Uncle was a pilot that flew supplies over the hump (Burma?) and I think was part of the Doolittle raid from what I recall. His plane was shot down over China, but the whole crew survived, the worst injury being a broken ankle. God was watching over them. People from a small village in China rescued them and hid them from the Japanese, gave them mules to ride through the mountains back to their base. I have a copy of the flight log that was kept. All these guys are such incredible heroes. My heart breaks for how their service is disparaged by the corrupt behavior of the so called elite.
Unfortunately upon returning to the states after the war my g- uncle drowned trying to save a little boy (which he did) while at a family picnic. I truly believe he was put on this earth to save his men and that little boy. His job was done. Just like your father.