More B-25s

[Jack Cook]

On the break #1 Jeff Wright #2 Lynn Hunt, #3 Bruce Guberman #4 Dave Wheaton.
Not bad for 4 guys who've never flown together before

[The Inspector]

Tongue hard, difficult to speak slobbering all over keyboard
much thanx Jack!

[Rajay]

Jack, what info do you have about the first photo (when, where, who, etc.)? Were they all on their way to Oshkosh or something like that? That seems like an unusually big collection of Mitchells, but they're not all painted up the same, so I assume that it was NOT part of the filming of "Catch-22" for example.

Also, there appears to be a C-47 trailing down low on the right side of the photo (left side of the formation). Do you know which one that is, too?

[Jack Cook]

That's when we were at the B-25/Doolittle Raider reunion at Fresno.

[Lynn Hunt]

I can shed some light on that. As the event was coming together from a planning standpoint, Bill Klears called me up one day and said that they wanted to do a mass flyby over the USS Hornet sitting in Alameda. Bill told me that since I was from up in these parts that I could get it organized with the FAA and everything considering it's Class Bravo airspace and all. Turns out that a good friend of mine Walt Smith just happened to be the tower chief at SFO at the time so I called him up and told him what we wanted to do. Walt is a Good guy and loves warbirds, always wanted an L5, anyway he took care of it. I got a call from someone at ATC asking our desired route of flight, up the coast from Monterey, in over the gate line up with the Hornet. They gave us all the same squak code and even shut down departures at SFO on 28R & L while we went by. I think we had 12 of the 13 bombers and a bunch of camera ships tagging along. Clay Lacy even made a sweep past us in his Lear Jet taking pictures. Good planes, good people, good times!

[rwdfresno]

That first picture is great Jack. Must be from the tail of the Rabbit. A great comment too on guys flying in formation that had never flown together. That is a great testament to the good talent in pilots we had on that flight and Bill and Lynn's flight planning. The last flight of three maintained a loose formation due to not having as much formation time but I thoguth that was even the good sense of those pilots to recognise that they lacked the experience so they would bring up the rear, although I bet it wasn't fun dealing with all the prop wash.

I believe there were 12 on the Doolittle Memorial Flight

44-29199 "In The Mood"
44-86698 "Sunday Punch"
44-86725 "Super Rabbit"

43-28204 "Pacific Princess"
43-28059 "Apache Princess"
44-30748 "Heavenly Body"

45-8835 "Betty's Dream"
45-8898 "Axis Nightmare"
44-86777 "Martha Jean"

44-29869 "Miss Mitchell"
44-29465 "Gaurdian of Freedom"
44-30823 "Top Secret"

Also, we had CAF's C-46 "China Doll", Kermit's King Air, and Clay Lacy's Lear as photo/video platforms. The best part of the whole event was when all 12 Mitchells were starting their engines and you could see the Doolittle Raiders standing up out of wheelchairs to clap and cheer. It was great to honor those heros.

Ryan

[Jack Cook]

I remember remarking to Jeff how fun that was and what a great view from the tail. He looked at me a said ''Glad you had fun, I just worked my ass off for 2.5 hours''
Something you do forget about but that was some pretty intensive flying for those guys

[Rajay]

Also, we had CAF's C-46 "China Doll"....

Ryan

I'm guessing that's the plane that I thought was a C-47 down low in the background. It was very hard to tell at that range....

Thanks for posting all of the details; I wish I could have seen it for myself!

[Lynn Hunt]

There were some really great shots taken of all of the bombers lined up taxiing down the taxiway. Does anyone have any??

[Roger Cain]

Here's one I posted several years ago from this event, and it should be safe to post it again. One B-25 was unable to fly during the mass flyover due to carb problems.

[Lynn Hunt]

Thanks Roger, gotta say, that really does it for me. What a sight!

[MattP38]

Beautiful photos, Jack and the accompanying stories are terrific, especially the Raiders ' reaction to the mass start up. I would only hope another such fly over can take place some day and with greater numbers.

M.

[Roger Cain]

your welcome Lynn, number four has always been my favorite.

MattP38: actually it did a couple years ago at Thunder over MI. I'll see if I can find a group picture for you.

[Jack Cook]

number four has always been my favorite.

You mean #5

Out in front were we belong

Arriving in Fresno

Who Dat?

Dave Wheaton

[Roger Cain]

Thunder over MI 2007 ramp.