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B-17 Sighting!

Ok, that was fun. I was worried that there would be a fight to get to the flight deck and nose section, but, amazingly, most of the people were content to ride in the back. Me and this one other guy easily got the two flight deck seats on take off. Then we went down into the nose section, spent a little time there, to give the rest a chance. Before the flight was over, nobody was interested in the nose section anymore, so we went back up there. I spent most of the flight standing behind either the pilot or co-pilot. It was as awesome as awesome gets. The air was bumpy too, so much so that one young lad got sick, poor guy. But I was having a BLAST!!! There was air blasting back from the open windows up front, the ship rocking back and forth, up and down. Had to hold on to something to keep balance most of the time. DAMN THAT WAS FUN!!

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It's been flying over my house since this morning. Very low, probably around 2500' AGL (need to keep under the TCA since KSUS is not far from Lambert. That way they can stay VFR.

I'll try to get some inflight shots if I can.

-G-
 
Looks like you'll be months getting that grin off of your face Paul! :ernae:
 
:applause:Looks like you had a beautiful day for a flight. Nice pictures from the flight deck. I forgot to mention to take a picture of the pilots from the sexton blister in the nose but I see that you found that out. Good show!! Now when your watching those old World War Two movies/documentary's you can say, " I've flown on one of those."
Curt
 
Glad you had a great time Paul... It really is a blast... I can't tell who the crew was in that picture, but I'm sure they did a heck of a job... It is hard to tell yourself to give other people a chance in the nose, I've had to go down there and cycle through some reporters who wanted to stay down there the whole time on a media flight...
 
Great shots! Great looking day too. I agree with Curt, now you'll be able to say "I flew in one of those". Just make sure to say it real nonchalant and then yawn.
 
Wittpilot said:
... I can't tell who the crew was in that picture, but I'm sure they did a heck of a job...
Click to expand...

I spoke with the pilots briefly before take off and they introduced themselves as "John and John". The pilot looked quite young. The flight engineer was a retired TWA mechanic. It was so cool watching them fly the Fortress. I tried to watch how hard they were working, and how much control input was needed to bank the plane. Heck, they didn't look like they were working very hard at all. Just flying a B-17, that's all! I'd have been happy to stay right there the whole flight, but I went back aft and up forward to get the whole experience. It was fun walking along that narrow beam in the bomb bay to get to the radio room! The two seats on the flight deck behind the pilots face backwards, but as soon as the wheels left the runway, the flight engineer told us to "get up" meaning we were "free to move about the aircraft." So I stood up and turned forward to starting getting flight deck shots.
 
Curtis P40 said:
... Looks like you had a beautiful day for a flight. Nice pictures from the flight deck. I forgot to mention to take a picture of the pilots from the sexton blister in the nose but I see that you found that out. Good show!! Now when your watching those old World War Two movies/documentary's you can say, " I've flown on one of those."
Curt
Click to expand...

Yep, it was only by accident that I got that cool shot through the navigotor's dome looking at the pilots. I was in there looking around and saw it. At first I took a shot through there looking forward, but it was all scratched up and full of dead bugs so it wasn't no good. Only then did I think to face aft... It was a beautiful day today too. Yesterday was 98 and humid as heck. Today was just perfect.
 
Here a couple more. One because I think it's funny with that dude hanging out the top window, and the others because they show the pilots better, so maybe Witt can ID them!

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Thank you so very much. I've had a magical experience with a B-17 lately, but it was down for maintenance otherwise I would've bought a ride. What a beautiful thing to see. Call me crazy, but my heart lept as I looked at these.

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There are actually at least 2 or 3 pilots in Belle's rotation by the name of John believe it or not... I would wager a guess that the gentleman in the left seat was John Hess...

Like I said they are all great guys and pretty down to earth.... as is Mr. Don Brooks himself.

Check out this youtube link with an interview with Ray Fowler, the Belle's chief pilot. The interview is done by the daughter of the man who produced the future documentary about Liberty Belle's trip to the U.K.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0hqoj537pqw
 
Scratch that Paul, the guy in the left seat is not Mr. Hess, I believe that is John Shuttleworth, from somewhere in the midwest I believe.... Indiana possibly... I do not know the fellow in the right seat.
 
What an awesome adventure! :jump:
Thanks for sharing the pics. I really like the one taken from the dome looking back at the windshield :ernae:
 
Beautiful shots Paul. I had a chance to ride in a B-17 many years ago when one was at O'Hare for Armed Forces day. It is an opportunity I won't pass up again. Somewhere I have photos of my older kids gripping the machine guns in that plane.
 
fantastic Paul! Thanks for shaing the pics. What ride of a lifetime. :jump:

(I'd like to discuss your impressions of the sounds some more with you sometime)

- dcc
 
dcc said:
fantastic Paul! Thanks for shaing the pics. What ride of a lifetime. :jump:

(I'd like to discuss your impressions of the sounds some more with you sometime)

- dcc
Click to expand...

Rgr that David...

I do have one question for the B-17 experts here. As we were taxiing, there was, from time to time, a rather loud noise. It sounded to me like something being mechanically driven at high RPM. Rather like the flap deployment noise you can sometimes hear on airliners. Naturally I thought it was the flaps, but every time I heard that noise I would look at the flap position gauge, and it never left zero. I asked the flight engineer what it was, and he pointed to a green tank on the rear bulkhead, right side, near the floor, and said it was hydraulics, which powers the flaps, and a couple other things. So now I’m confused. According to the flap position indicator gauge, the flaps were never deployed. At least I think I was looking at the flap position gauge. It said “flaps” on it and had “0”, “20”, “30”, “40” etc., so what the heck else could it have been?
 
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