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Old 15th November 2017, 14:54
RSwank RSwank is offline
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Re: Highest scoring B-29

There are several newspapers articles about Thumper at the time. It was the first B-29 the complete its tour and return to the US for war bond tours. The 22 July 1945 St Louis Dispatch has an article and picture of the plane. It is hard to make out the mission bombs and kill flags in the photo, but the article says it is the only surviving plane from the original 120 planes in the 73rd Bomb Wing. The plane completed 40 bombing missions. Members of it crews were credited with 26 Japanese planes and 19 probables. During is fighting career it has flown over 175,000 miles and dropped over 600,000 lbs of high explosives and fire bombs. The plane had been "hit" over 100 times according to one article. Another article mentions 10 flak holes. It is not clear how many different crews flew her. On the tour was the first pilot that had flown her, Col Robert E Haynes and apparently the crew that flew her home.

It does appear that at some point the way the mission bombs and kill flags were painted was redone. Some of the early photos show the "named" mission bombs with flags sticking out of the bombs for kills and Thumper riding each bomb. One of those photos shows Thumper with six kill flags on one bomb (Tokyo) along with perhaps at least 1 purple heart.

Early nose art: https://twitter.com/wwiipix/status/913127724579000321

The war bond photos in the newspapers seem to show 4 rows of 10 bombs and the kill flags in rows of 5 in a separate section of the nose. Cannot tell if the bombs still have target names on them. I would guess some clearer photos exist somewhere.

Last edited by RSwank; 16th November 2017 at 13:00.
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