I'm doing research for a forthcoming series of Weekend Wings articles on strategic bombing. In the process, I've been reading a lot of books that are long out of print, neglected by many modern scholars, but containing much valuable material. One of them is 'Flying Fortress' by Edward Jablonski, published in 1965. In its pages, I found this story, that I thought might interest my readers as well. I've included links to the unusual place names and other subjects.
On November 23, 1944, spotters of a British antiaircraft unit near Cortonburg, Belgium, were astonished to see a B-17, its landing gear down, approaching their gun positions. As the gunners put in a call to their Operations Room at nearby Erps-Querps, the Fortress came in fast for a rather rough landing on a plowed field near the gun position.
It bounced to within thirty yards of the gun crew and came to a sudden stop when one wingtip dipped and dug into the ground. The propeller buckled and the engine stopped but the other three remained in operation.
John V. Crisp arrived upon the scene about twenty minutes after he had been notified of the plane's approach. The three propellers continued revolving, but no one had emerged from the B-17.
Crisp finally discovered the front entrance underneath the fuselage and was able to get inside the plane. He found no one aboard, "although evidence of fairly recent occupation was everywhere".
He managed also after some experimentation to turn off the four engines and then proceed to inspect what came to be called "The Phantom Fortress".
"I next looked at the navigator's table," Crisp has written. "The aircraft log was open and the last words, written some time before, were 'Bad flak'.
"We now made a thorough search and our most remarkable find in the fuselage was about a dozen parachutes neatly wrapped and ready for clipping on. This made the whereabouts of the crew even more mysterious. The Sperry bomb-sight remained in the Perspex nose, quite undamaged, with its cover neatly folded beside it. Back on the navigator's desk was the code book giving the colours and letters of the day for identification purposes. Various fur-lined flying jackets lay in the fuselage together with a few bars of chocolate, partly consumed in some cases."
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