Enola Gay photo(s) request

[lmritger]

Mercy Jeezus, Taigh, I cannot praise you enough for this insanely detailed walkthrough. I would dare say this may be the most complete documentation of any B-29 interior anywhere.

As an aside... when the fuselage was still stored at Silver Hill back in 1984, I sneaked away from our tour group, rolled under the fuselage and stood up in the unrestored forward bomb bay. What happened next I still can't fully explain; I was immediately hit with the most incredible feeling of sadness, bordering on despair, but I could tell it wasn't something I was personally feeling- it seemed to be something external to me. I'm sure that probably makes no sense, but there was most definitely a "presence" to being inside of the most powerful single weapon ever used by man, and it was not a feeling of awe or reverence. It was just overwhelming sadness.

That experience has stuck with me ever since.

Mark and I also have a pretty sizable album on the Enola Gay over on our CRAP Archive (Central Repository for Aviation Photos) at the following link: https://www.flickr.com/photos/133697406@N05/sets/72157668194515923/with/18625868085/. Here's a pic of the Enola Gay taken during the Crossroads tests in 1946:




Cheers, and thanks again to you Taigh and Mark for sharing your photos with us!

Lynn

[AFWhite]

Great stuff!

For a "model " planning on building "Enola Gay" these are great reference photos!

[Badman]

Mercy Jeezus, Taigh, I cannot praise you enough for this insanely detailed walkthrough. I would dare say this may be the most complete documentation of any B-29 interior anywhere.

As an aside... when the fuselage was still stored at Silver Hill back in 1984, I sneaked away from our tour group, rolled under the fuselage and stood up in the unrestored forward bomb bay. What happened next I still can't fully explain; I was immediately hit with the most incredible feeling of sadness, bordering on despair, but I could tell it wasn't something I was personally feeling- it seemed to be something external to me. I'm sure that probably makes no sense, but there was most definitely a "presence" to being inside of the most powerful single weapon ever used by man, and it was not a feeling of awe or reverence. It was just overwhelming sadness.

That experience has stuck with me ever since.

Mark and I also have a pretty sizable album on the Enola Gay over on our CRAP Archive (Central Repository for Aviation Photos) at the following link: https://www.flickr.com/photos/133697406@N05/sets/72157668194515923/with/18625868085/. Here's a pic of the Enola Gay taken during the Crossroads tests in 1946:




Cheers, and thanks again to you Taigh and Mark for sharing your photos with us!

Lynn

Perhaps you or Mark (or anyone else) might be able to clarify something about Enola Gay for me - I've noticed a number of these photos appear to have been taken at Tinian and in some EG has the Circle R on the vertical tail and others it has the Circle Arrow. When and why was the tail marking changed and which marking was it wearing when it dropped the bomb?

[AFWhite]

Mercy Jeezus, Taigh, I cannot praise you enough for this insanely detailed walkthrough. I would dare say this may be the most complete documentation of any B-29 interior anywhere.

As an aside... when the fuselage was still stored at Silver Hill back in 1984, I sneaked away from our tour group, rolled under the fuselage and stood up in the unrestored forward bomb bay. What happened next I still can't fully explain; I was immediately hit with the most incredible feeling of sadness, bordering on despair, but I could tell it wasn't something I was personally feeling- it seemed to be something external to me. I'm sure that probably makes no sense, but there was most definitely a "presence" to being inside of the most powerful single weapon ever used by man, and it was not a feeling of awe or reverence. It was just overwhelming sadness.

That experience has stuck with me ever since.

Mark and I also have a pretty sizable album on the Enola Gay over on our CRAP Archive (Central Repository for Aviation Photos) at the following link: https://www.flickr.com/photos/133697406@N05/sets/72157668194515923/with/18625868085/. Here's a pic of the Enola Gay taken during the Crossroads tests in 1946:




Cheers, and thanks again to you Taigh and Mark for sharing your photos with us!

Lynn

Perhaps you or Mark (or anyone else) might be able to clarify something about Enola Gay for me - I've noticed a number of these photos appear to have been taken at Tinian and in some EG has the Circle R on the vertical tail and others it has the Circle Arrow. When and why was the tail marking changed and which marking was it wearing when it dropped the bomb?

The "Circle Arrow" was the tail markings for the 509th BW. Once on board Tinian, the 509th aircraft were painted with tail markings of existing BWs already operating there so that they wouldn't stand out, either to folks on the ground or to Japanese defenders...in the weeks leading up to the atomic missions, several practice missions were flown dropping "shapes" and there were still plenty of Japanese interceptors still in play. Exact dates of the change? I don't know.

[sandiego89]

Thank you so much for posting the interior photos Taigh! Incredible.

Is the "blue box" on the radio operators table? Starboard side aft the flight engineers station?

Lynn- I also saw her at Garber @1990 and it was also a very moving experience for me. They wanted us to touch her in 4 places where they had they put on 4 different types of preservative to see which was most durable. Sadness not the right word for me, but it was most moving experience I can recall from seeing an artifact in person. Overwhelming. Part of it I think was the feeling of being at Garber perhaps and the entire place felt like you were being let in on some kind of secret- like going into King Tut's tomb. Still very moving to see her at UH and Bock's Car at Dayton, but Garber was indeed special.

Any ides about the crossroads colors of the tails bands? Black and yellow perhaps? I recall reading that although Enola Gay was there, B-29 Dave's Dream (known as Big Stink during the wartime atomic strikes) made the drop on Bikini. I think I recall reading conflicting stories about picking the drop aircraft for Crossroads- that Enola gay had a technical issue, or some thought it already had made enough history?

Thank you again! Dave

[APG85]

I think I recall reading conflicting stories about picking the drop aircraft for Crossroads- that Enola gay had a technical issue, or some thought it already had made enough history?

Thank you again! Dave

If I remember correctly, Tibbets wrote in his book that there was a drop competition to see which crew would drop the Crossroads weapon. Tibbets and the Enola Gay won the competition by getting closest to the training target but the "powers that be" changed the criteria after the drops and gave the win to the crew of Dave's Dream saying the prevailing winds would have made their drop closer (or something along those lines). Enola Gay did not have a maintenance problem...

[Old SAR pilot]

I wondered why they blanked off the scanners domes for Silverplate

They were blanked off to reduce any extreme flash effects produced by the nuclear explosion and protect the scanners, most likely.

[wendovertom]

I wondered why they blanked off the scanners domes for Silverplate

They were blanked off to reduce any extreme flash effects produced by the nuclear explosion and protect the scanners, most likely.

My understanding from interviews - and my poor recollection - is that it was somewhat long the lines of - no guns, no need as well as the CFC station. Perhaps the nuclear flash was a thought too. The two B-29s that were supposed to fly aerial coverage for the Trinity test were "A" models so who knows - I'll dig out my copy of "They were called Silverplate" and see what it says about the scanner stations.

Tom P.

[Silverplate]

From our touring General Tibbets during speaking appearances in Florida in the late 90's, I still have several signed copies of the Generals book available for $40 a copy plus shipping. Send me a PM if interested. Thanks...Mike

[lucky52]

Taigh, what percentage of the interior is original (a guess would be fine).Thanks.

[APG85]

I wondered why they blanked off the scanners domes for Silverplate

They were blanked off to reduce any extreme flash effects produced by the nuclear explosion and protect the scanners, most likely.

My understanding from interviews - and my poor recollection - is that it was somewhat long the lines of - no guns, no need as well as the CFC station. Perhaps the nuclear flash was a thought too. The two B-29s that were supposed to fly aerial coverage for the Trinity test were "A" models so who knows - I'll dig out my copy of "They were called Silverplate" and see what it says about the scanner stations.

Tom P.

From what I have read, the planes were stripped of almost all of their armament (except the tail gun) and the blisters. The reason for this was to make them slightly faster. At the altitudes they were flying and at that stage in the war, armament was something they thought they would not need. The flash had nothing to do with removing the blisters as they all wore welders googles during the drop...

[Silverplate]

From our touring General Tibbets during speaking appearances in Florida in the late 90's, I still have several signed copies of the Generals book available for $40 a copy plus shipping. Send me a PM if interested. Thanks...Mike

Thank you to those who have ordered. I still have a few copies available.

[lucky52]

I bet the Russians had a lot of fun taking a B-29 all apart and duplicating everything to build a copy.

[Taigh Ramey]

Wow! A historic set of photo's. Mucho Gracias for posting those!!!!

General curiosity question that may have been addressed before. Is (or could it be) the EG in some sort of semi-airworthy condition?

She is in amazing condition so anything is possible. I was joking around with Bernie that I was bringing basic tools, a 24 volt battery and a pre oiler so we could fire up the old gal. Okay so maybe I wasn't joking...and we had a wrestling match in the parking lot...and i had to leave the battery and pre-oiler in the car...

The reality is she will never fly and is a national treasure especially to have been restored as beautifully as she has. True restoration by cleaning and preserving what mostly was there. An outstanding job for sure.

There is a photo of Walter Soplata sticking his head out of the Enola Gay with all 4 engines running presumably at Andrews AFB. He was likely the last guy to have seen/made her operational.

I believe that she was worked over pretty good by souvenir hunters while at Andrews and other outside locations, so NASM and other individuals have replaced the missing gear during her restoration and to some degree it is still going on.

Mike Hans donated radar and radio gear from his collection and other sources to replace the missing components. He also made sure that the tubes inside of the radar and radio gear were of the proper date for the August 6th mission. Very cool mike.

As with any of these well preserved aircraft , yes they could come alive again with the resources and talent to do so safely. This is what we did with the Harpoon. Tim Savage did it with his A-26. EAA recently did it with the NA-64 and countless others have and will do the same. Sometimes you can do all that you can and still have a main bearing failure on an original Ford built R2800-31 engine from 1945 or have the same bearing fail on a new one a week out of overhaul. All flying is about risk management.

which marking was it wearing when it dropped the bomb?

The Enola Gay carried a lot of different markings throughout her career. Bernie Poppert has done quite a lot of research on her as well as spending decades of his life restoring her. Here is a slide from his powerpoint of her paint scheme for August 5th, 1945:


Here is the plate from August 14th with the circle arrow


The photos below look like crossroads markings which were apparently removed before she went into storage afterwards. Bernie mentioned finding remnants of these markings and they were indeed yellow and black.

Here is Bernies plate from April to July of 1946 for Crossroads with the bands.

Is the "blue box" on the radio operators table? Starboard side aft the flight engineers station?

Yes the blue box, and presumably the original control box, were mounted above the normal location for the ART-13 liaison transmitter which was just aft of the flight engineers stand and forward of the radio operator. Incidentally a second ART-13 was mounted on the floor under the radio operators table as a Silverplate mod. It looks like they used the same shock mount too for the special equipment box as for the ART-13 which was a slide type of rack.

As for the side blisters being blanked off...

They were blanked off to reduce any extreme flash effects produced by the nuclear explosion and protect the scanners, most likely.

I wondered about this but then the nose structure and tail turret glass would have provided just the same exposure if not more. As I recall the crew were issued the variable density goggles for eye protection but removing the blisters for reduced exposure seems unlikely.

From what I have read, the planes were stripped of almost all of their armament (except the tail gun) and the blisters. The reason for this was to make them slightly faster. At the altitudes they were flying and at that stage in the war, armament was something they thought they would not need. The flash had nothing to do with removing the blisters as they all wore welders googles during the drop...

This seems like the best reason to me. Those blisters would present additional drag and speed and performance was paramount to them.

I would sure like to see some good documentation as to why they were blanked off.

Taigh, what percentage of the interior is original (a guess would be fine).Thanks.

My pure guesswork would be 80-90% original insulation material and 60-80% equipment is original. All of the wiring and fittings look spot on and original to me. I am guessing that the souvenir hunters took easily removeable parts. I am sure that NASM has quite a file of photos of what they started with. I am curious too.

Remember that there were a lot of mods done to her in the years post August 6th for Crossroads and other reasons. The idea at NASM was to restore her (as I recall) to the time period within one hour of her arrival back at Tinian after the Hiroshima mission. Not an easy task in itself considering how you have to piece together all of the photos and information and create a timeline. Another great example of the hard work and dedication of those at NASM.

On a side note one cool/frustrating thing was when I was visiting Gary Austin at the CAF in Midland I found some of the bullet resistant glass that mounted above the pilots and copilots instrument panels. This stuff is uber rare and to date no B-29 had this put back in place except the ones I put in the B-29 at Pima 30+ plus years ago. Thanks to Gary I was able to get a set for the Enola Gay.

There was a debate with one of the not so great NASM curators (now thankfully long gone) who said that they would not have used the glass so he didn't want it. It was his opinion, not based on research or fact, that it didn't belong in the Enola Gay. As a result Gary never received a thank you letter from them before he died. Burns me up. later the idiot curator was presented with photos showing the glass installed on the August 6th mission and it has since been restored and put in place.



It looks like the glass that was used to replace the ones in the armored glass above the instrument panels was standard plate glass that looks green especially when it is thick or layered. One of the nose glass pieces looks like it too. There is a truly clear glass that should have been used to avoid this tinting issue. Oh, well next time...

The above photo was shamelessly stolen from here:

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/564x/fc/93/df/fc93dfff5d27ad5d98cd125de41b341d.jpg

Enough rambling for now...

[CoastieJohn]

Thanks you sir for the discussion on airworthiness. You're right...someday ya never know how things will play out.