My B17 Ride ... A Somewhat Brief Report

"Morgans" wrote in message
...

Being able to enter the bird the old-fashioned way always delighted the
vets that came out to visit ol' 7th Wonder.

You know, I didn't think it was all that hard, but I guess I'm just a
monkey, from being a carpenter, and climbing around in the rafters all of
the time.

Not as hard as it is unnerving the first time you try. If your fingers slip
it's a long headfirst-fall to the tarmac, which is one thing, but you'll
miss whatever opportunity you had with the B-17, which is the worst of all.
:

It must have been quite a bit more of a challenge doing it with full gear,
though. I got to crawl out of the tailgunner's escape hatch several years
ago at PDX in a genuine escape. That's a video I would put on the internet
but it would embarrass the pilots and the organization. Since it was a
non-public flight, I got to crawl back and buckle in to the tailgunner's
bicycle seat for landing. That was obviously amusing...twin-.50s in the
pattern at an international airport. But the tower cleared an commuter
jet to depart on 28L and we were already over the fence landing on the
perpendicular, 21. I had no idea about any of this but suddenly the
airplane throttled up again, we started accelerating like we were doing a
go-around. As soon as we crossed the perpendicular, the engines dropped and
we began to decelerate rapidly (keep in mind I'm belted in, but crouched on
my knees facing backward.)

All of a sudden, there's a hideous noise, my head smacks against the left
side of the tailgunner's window and the tail starts coming around clockwise.
There's smoke outside coming from my right, which is the left side of the
plane. Then she yaws around the other way, and the tail began filling up
with smoke and the smell of burning rubber. I said something to my
grandfather (he'd been gone for two or three years) and then suddenly the
old bird settled down like nothing had happened.

In front of the hangar, there were three hatches open within seconds of the
props stopping. The tail was still filled with acrid rubber smoke, so I
just opened the tail, flung my feet out and thought "Doesn't this beat all!"

The pilot, whose name I won't mention, is the VP of the company and flies
747s. There wasn't a volunteer on board who didn't shake his hand
afterward. He seemed like he'd just pulled out of a near-collision and/or
ground loop in a four-engine bomber, but he walked it off calmly and then
explained that one of the brakes had seized up and, fortunately, broken free
a moment after but the resulting correction. I didn't see the copilot
afterward; I think he was already on the phone with the tower chewing ass.
In any case, I called my dad and told him I'd just bailed out of a smoking
B-17. It was a low bailout--3 feet-- no time for a parachute to open but
miraculously I lived.

-c