15 Aug A ride on the Aluminum Overcast
My guest contributor today is Herman Allen’s grandson, Johnny DiGeorge …
I recently had the opportunity to take a flight on the restored B-17 “Aluminum Overcast” when it was visiting the Waterbury-Oxford CT airport. The plane is one of a handful of B-17s that are still airworthy (maybe 13-15 worldwide depending on who you ask) and it travels to different airports around the country and offers rides and tours. I spent the day exploring the aircraft on the ground, watching it take off and land, talking with a number of B-17 airmen/veterans who had come out to see it, and grilling the crew and mechanics on various points of interest.
The B-17 Aluminum Overcast
Then came my turn to go up… I’ve always thought of my grandpa Herman’s B-17 experience mostly in terms of the scarier aspects — the fact that whenever they went up there was such a great chance of dying, their friends getting killed all around them, getting shot at and crashing…
I really got in touch with another part of the experience though. When those huge engines are going and the thing lifts off, it’s like the most amazing ride at Six Flags! — us 10 temporary crew members were all hooting and hollering the whole way up. It was absolutely thrilling, and I imagined that despite all the fear and darkness, it must have felt at times like such an amazing adventure for Herman and crew.
The vantage point of the bombardier
I spent most of the flight in the glassed-in nose, and as much time in Herman’s bombardier’s chair as I could. The first thing that struck me was the stunning panorama he had of the ground below, and the land, sea and air ahead of him. The nose bubble wraps totally around you when you’re sitting there, your toes feel like they’re hanging off the front of the plane, and if you look forward and forget the roaring engines for a moment, it’s really like you’re just out there flying — it’s totally unlike anything you experience as a passenger on Delta or even in the cockpit of a plane. The other side of it is that you feel very vulnerable — if something shoots at you there’s nothing to stop it. Throughout the plane, I was struck at how it’s just one thin piece of metal between you and the outside — it really feels like you’re flying in a tin can and that it wouldn’t take much to rip it open (though I felt totally safe on our non-combat flight).
The bombardier straddles the bomb sight contraption, which you look down into to find your target. To the right of the bombardier’s chair is a little Star Wars-esque joystick you can pull over to operate the ‘chin gun’ just below the nose bubble on the outside of the plane. Also an oxygen tube to plug into your mask, and an outlet for your electric clothing warmer (they said at 20-25,000 feet up it could be 50 below in the plane). And then the ‘Bombs Away’ button… I believe that Herman had to occasionally crawl back to the bomb bay and fiddle with the bombs or deal with problems there. The bombs are all suspended over the bomb-bay doors on the belly of the plane, which are designed to fly open if a bomb shakes loose and falls onto them (or a person!)… there’s a tiny catwalk that stretches over the bomb-bay and I could see how Herman would have to straddle those doors below to reach each bomb!
Just behind Herman’s chair in the nose sat the Navigator — his friend ‘Steve’ (Charles Stevenson) — who had a little table and a bunch of maps, and I think guided them mostly by compass and by looking for landmarks on the ground. He sat very close to Herman, almost like someone sitting in the back seat of a car you were driving. On a mission when Herman was temporarily grounded with a burst eardrum and another bombardier was replacing him, Steve was hit in the head with a bullet or shrapnel and instantly killed. Herman was very very close to death sitting in that chair — I think about what that must have been like and what brought him through…
I would heartily recommend riding in or checking out a B-17 if you have the chance — the flight was amazing and well worth the fee (I believe they don’t do much more than break even on their tours). The crew of the Aluminum Overcast and the EAA volunteers that hosted the Oxford visit were all engaging, friendly and informative. Many thanks to them for keeping this beautiful plane in the air!
Johnny DiGeorge
Thank you, Johnny. By the way, our contributor is a talented filmmaker/designer. He lives too far away, in Brattleboro, Vermont, but I do understand why. It’s beautiful. I’ve always said that Brattleboro is the Sausalito of New England, full of talented people who enjoy being able to drive into New York but don’t want to live there.
Mom
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