Warbird Information Exchange

I have been a serious lurker here for a while, so I decided to share some pics of a recent ride I took in the Collings B17 while it was here in Dallas.

I chose to ride in the B17 as for some reason I have had a infatuation with this airplane from the very first time I saw one around 4 years old or so.

These are some views of the inside.

Poking my head out the open top in the Nav Room?


Starboard side form just behind the copilot.


Other guys poking their heads out the open top.


Someone crawling to the bombardier room. I though of putting this one for the last pic for obvious reasons. But I wanted to try to post pics from aft-foreard.


Bomb bay, with a darn narrow pathway.


Bombardiers room, it seemed pretty good sized.


Looking out the front plexiglass dome getting ready to bomb a Dallas suburb.


This one is my favorite and if you want a larger file let me know I can email it to you.

Thanks for sharing your pics. It's a shame that you had such poor Wx that day. I went up on Friday at 1630 hours, and the Wx was mostly clear and very sunny. Still, your condx were probably a lot like "the real thing" for those brave men who flew from damp, foggy England. Great stuff!

Have you been out to see "your home town bird" at VFM yet?

Cheers!

_________________
Dean Hemphill, K5DH
Port Charlotte, Florida

On the weather, I was actualy hopping for a low ceiling. I wanted the effect of WW2. On the flight I was on, nearly everyone snuck over to the waist gunner spot and got real quite looking out the window. Afterwards we talked about it, we were trying to put ourselves back in time looking for Germans.

I was sort of aware of the B17 in Fort Worth but dont know much about it. I may be spending some time over there and should look into that.

Nice shots. The top turret shot would look good in sepia. Thanks for sharing the experience with us.