The B-17 Flying Fortress is a symbol of American airpower during World War 2. Jump inside with me to discover the amazing features of this aircraft and experience what it must have been like for bomber crews during this pivotal time in history.
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– Timecodes –
00:00 – B-17G
00:52 – Nose
02:21 – Wings and Engines
07:45 – Fuselage
08:11 – Tail
10:10 – Turrets and Flexible Mounts
13:00 – Bombload
15:05 – Jumping Inside
16:38 – Nose (Bombardier & Navigator)
18:19 – Cockpit
24:14 – Upper Turret
25:20 – Bombbay
27:05 – Fuselage (Radio Operator)
28:10 – Sperry Ball Turret
29:16 – Waist Gunners
30:45 – Tail Gunner (inop)
31:26 – Sentimental Journey
– Audio –
Music and Sfx from Epidemic Sound
33 Comments
When I started this series, I didn't know where it would go but this is the 51st episode in the Inside The Cockpit Series ! WOW ! Thank you so much to all of you for supporting Inside The Cockpit . See the playlist here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aSqwZig-9s4&list=PLWpO-JGPAanqanhSYqKuMG2C8md9vpX1H
This video is really nostalgic for me. I grew up in the vicinity of Falcon Field, AZ, where Sentimental Journey is stationed, and my dad was a member of Civil Air Patrol Sq. 305 which is also stationed there; I've got quite a few fond memories of visiting the place, including climbing around inside Sentimental Journey much like you're doing here. I was a kid at the time, and didn't know much about historical aviation, but I still knew it was one of the coolest machines I'd ever seen.
Nice I got to do a tour inside sentimental journey a few years ago, and I got to tour inside b-29 “doc” this year – two things I’ve wanted to do since I was a kid!
German propaganda making video of captured B-17 during WW2 remastered.
I saw sentimental journey when it visited Peachtree City Georgia many years ago. Beautiful plane.
having seen a few in museums and in airshows they're shockingly small planes. large by 1930s technology but shockingly small next to even a modern fighter jet or other contemporary planes like a Liberator
B-17 Cockpit, just like a 737! Nice work Chris. For upper turret, I gather that whole 'assembly' rotates 360 degrees and that narrow 'pass through' is part of the 'passage way' fore and aft?
something funny about the b17 not having enough guns so they handed the radioman a .50 cal to pop up behind the top turret with
Small point: the -G might have been the most heavily-armed B-17 bomber , but it wasn't the most heavily-armed B-17 per se. That would be the YB-40 "gunship" which was intended to escort bomber variants, and traded all it's bomb load for more firepower. It had a second dorsal turret behind the standard one, twin guns in each waist position, and also introduced the twin-gun chin-turret later seen on the B-17G. The bomb bay was converted to carry extra .50 cal ammo. It proved a failure, since, unlike the bombers, it didn't get lighter and faster after it had dropped it's bomb load, so the bombers tended to leave it behind on the journey home. Only 26 were built and they were withdrawn fom use after only 14 missions.
I remember reading stories about how dangerous both the tail, and ball, turrets were in these things. Let's just say it would be easier to hose them out than pick the person's remains out.
When I first got to tour a B-17 I was so surprised at how big and small they were. And yet the character, sense of presence and history…. A real privilege to have stepped inside them.
A fantastic Inside the Cockpit Chris and my many thanks and admiration to the men and women who built and maintained this piece of history.
A good book on flying in the B17 in war time is John Comer’s Combat Crew. He was a Flight Engineer/ top Turret gunner.
beautiful airplane! my 12 year old son and I toured the inside of this plane in spartanburg SC in 1993. fantanstic airplane,
Nice hat!! … "noisy bugger"! LOL!
Good vid!
In the Fall of 1988 I was a shiny new Border Patrol Agent stationed in Marfa, TX. At the time I was renting a small trailer at the north end of town. A mile or two north of me was the airport, with not much in between. As I got home from work one late afternoon I heard the distinctive sound of a large, multi-engine piston aircraft flying around. I scanned the sky for several minutes. Eventually, a B-17 dropped down through the overcast, and landed at the airport. "Wow! That was cool!" I thought. Then I went inside to shower and change. A little while later, I ran into the crew at the local IGA. I ended up giving them a lift to a Mexican restaurant and back to their motel. One of the crew then gave me a guided tour of Sentimental Journey from one end to the other, except for the ball turret. Even at 5'8" I'm too tall to fit in there! Great memories! Marfa is at about 5000 ft. above sea level. Some of the mountains around it are in the 8000-9000 ft. range. The superchargers weren't working and they didn't have oxygen, so the crew decided to overnight in Marfa.
Chris, what a beautiful plane & a very well done video. The fact she still flies is great, I'd love to.
A bit more cockpit/outside to inspect than usual. Thanks from Canberra.
So you are trying to tell me that they are operating a flying B17G and haven't paid for the roughly 4000 $200 each ATF Destructive device tax stamps required to keep it fully loaded with ordnance and .50 HEI/APHEI/AP-T belts? 😱😅
You have been living in England long enough to cuss like a native "that was a noisy bugger" a truly golden moment 👍
Awesome walk around, the best I've seen, especially your freeze-frame explanations. Clear and präzise, danke
Very interesting Video. Would love to see one of these up close one day. My Gradfather was a Hitlerjugend Flak Gunner and he said that the Leutnat let them have a look through the Range finder one day and he saw those bombers with the large tail. But in the end it was the RAF which destroyed my hometown 🙂
Nice video thx.
How tall are you?
15:51 "Oh, dear!"
Yes, sir. At the same time we admire these old machines, we should never forget that they were used not only for legitimate war operations to destroy military equipment factories and transport, but also in the "terror bombing" of the homes of civilians which were not involved in the war and, in many cases, did not want the war. And they were killed not as "collateral damage" but as the main target of generals who knew and told that they were war criminals that could have been judged if their countries had lost the war.
And I meant civilians at Germany, France, Netherland and Italy as the B-17s bombed also cities in countries occupied by the German army. Even the neutral Switzerland suffered because of errors.
Of course, the same is to be thought of any war criminal whatever his or her country in that war and in any other.
It's really shameful to watch on TV how a soldier shoots his assault rifle on an unarmed civilian at perhaps only 3 meters and how the news presenter does not tell us that the army that soldier serves in has arrested that man under the charge of war crime.
Because the first interested party in that crime, after the victim and the assasin, is the whole chain of command from his sargeant to the Defence Minister. And, of course, the people who does not regret that crime and demand the arrest of the assasin.
Man, I remember you posting IL-2 videos here. You've really come a loooong way.
Heh… Kraut Founder …. Im so sorry please dont kill me 🙈
Damn, they'll put a Garmin G5 in anything. I'm kind of surprised I didn't see a GNS 430 or GTN 650 in there as well.
Thank you for taking us on the tour! It means a lot to me as my health no longer permits travel, so I particularly value these vicarious experiences.
ps- The hat looks great on you, you're a natural. 👍
I think, and I could be wrong here, but among Lemay’s “Combat Box” orders was not that only the lead have the Norden, but rather only the Lead ship in a group carry the group bombardier and only he used the Norden to find and toggle — and the rest of the group toggled on him. Well into 1943 and after the disastrous Munster and Regensburg raid, it was obvious that there had to be deputy leads and trained crews able to take over lead duties, so every AC in a group would need to carry a Norden and be able to lead the survivors of a group onto the target. The intent was to improve bombing accuracy by only having one plane find the target and guide the group drop but it had the effect of being area-bombing in the vicinity of the desired target, rather than precision bombing the Bomber Mafia had desired.
Why does Germany need to "look away"?
Super content, as always! One wish – that you’d also include metric units so that the rest of the world can get a sense of the scale.
Superb video! Thanks!
Wow what an aircraft ! Thanks Chris (& Nathan J.) for an excellent video !
12:49 old 666 ?
She’s gorgeous!