Warbird Information Exchange

Cees was wondering what happened to me, so I thought I might reassure him by asking a transatlantic question - i.e., one regarding an American aircraft in Europe.

The recent B-17 survivors listing in FlyPast reminded me that in 1989 I had been invited by the late Mark Hanna to visit the filming of "The Memphis Belle" remake, and possibly fly as gunner in a B-17. It didn't happen, because the production people were not half as interested in making it happen.

When I heard that one of B-17s was written off during the filming in the UK, I decided that with my luck I would have been aboard on that very flight. The pessimistic view was perhaps influenced by the fact that I lay in bed with a broken thigh, courtesy a take-off stall in a Tiger Moth. In which, I hasten to add, I was flying as passenger.

In any case, the Tiger has since been rebuilt, reflown, re-stalled and in being rebuilt again.

But what happened to the presumably substantial remains of the (French) Fortress that crashed in England in 1989? I cannot bring myself to believe that they would have been scrapped - not in 1989 in England ...

By the way, I think the story goes that the cameras kept rolling and that some of the crash footage was used in the final film.

Gregory

Gregory,
They did use the crash footage in "Memphis Belle". I'm sure that others out there know more about this then I do, but this is what I know. And When you see Rob Rohr back on the WIX(his computer is down) ask him, as he knows way more about the movie than I do. Don

I'm not sure where this myth started. The take-off crash of the B-17 was not captured on film, and was certainly not used in the final movie. A (very obvious!) model was used in the crash sequences in the movie.

After the take-off crash, the B-17 burned to the ground in the ensuing fire, and only the remains of the vertical fin were recognisable in the photos of the wreckage that I have seen. The remains were scrapped in situ, as far as I know.

Hi all--

Re the B-17 lost at Binbrook (iirc) during filming of "Memphis Belle", I didn't think I remembered seeing anything resembling the accident in the movie; maybe the mixup is with one of the B-17s used in "Tora Tora Tora", which suffered a gear "hangup" and one-wheel landing that WAS caught on camera and used to great dramatic effect in that film.

F-BEEA, the IGN's last Fort (and remembered as the last "working" B-17), was burnt out as Mike says, with part of the empennage surviving. I'd guess that any steel structures and perhaps part or all of the engines would have remained as well (cf. the aircraft lost in the Mt.Hope fire in '93: the Spit and TBM were simply gone except for things like gear legs, while the Hurricane fuselage and centre section primary structure survived, albeit warped and badly oxidized--the gear legs from the Hurri being refurbished for use on the GRP replica they now have). One would like to think the fin structure of F-BEEA could have been salvaged for museum display...but I guess not!

S.

Hi Greg,

As for F-BEEA the remains were last seen in storage near BinBrook. As for the film usage yes one small fram was used during the open crash scene.

Go back and watch it look at the firer trucks going to the scene they are mordern ones. It was decide to use the film since no one was hurt of killed. Like the B-17 from Tora Tora Tora.

Cheers A still bumming Col

Thanks to all for clearing up the situation with F-BEEA.
I guess the dataplate must have melted down too ...


Gregory

Gregory

Now that's just being cynical...

Dave

I plead guilty to a bad joke.

As an extenuating circumstance, I note that no one was hurt in the B-17 accident, so I was not being disrespect to anyone.

On the other hand, I must confess that if I found a box of unused dataplates I would be tempted to put them to good use myself...

Gregory

The plane crash was indeed caught on camera, by an amateur video. It is in the making of programme, "Belle and the Glory Boys". It wasn't caught on the film cameras and was not used in the film itself.

Also, the wreck wasn't used in the film either. See this thread from Flypast Forum that has all the details written by a couple of chaps who were there:
http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/showth ... phis+belle

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