Posted by Keith in Washington on Thursday, August 28, 2003 at 1:02PM :
In Reply to: Nice Old Picture posted by Marty on Thursday, August 28, 2003 at 11:56AM :
Marty:
The B17 on the left I believe is the one I flew in about a year ago. My wife gave me the ride for father's day. The best part of it was I got to fly with my dad and brother. Both my wife and brother arranged the flight without each other knowing about it.
My dad worked for Boeing and was a flight engineer on the B17 team. His job was to reduce the exhaust flare so the Germans and etc could not use it for targeting the plane at night. I really learned a lot about my dad and the B17 that day. Interesting enough the pilot was an uncle of a good friend. The whole plane crew and support staff were really interested in talking to my dad. Interesting facts such as that they stated the highest altitude reached by the B17 was 36 0r 39 K feet (if I remember correctly) my dad corrected them that he had personally flown at altitudes much higher than that in the test program during the war.
I have several pictures of my dad in flight gear in/around the B17. This was one of the last major events that I had with my dad before he passed away.
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