B-47 over the USSR
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 28 ก.ย. 2023
- The 1960 "U-2 incident" revealed what the Soviets had claimed for years, that the US was violating Soviet airspace with covert spy missions. But the breadth of the so called “ferret flights” remained a state secret that only started to emerge decades later. Many of those flights were made in a special reconnaissance version of the Boeing B-47 Stratojet.
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#history #thehistoryguy #usairforce
I flew the B-52, not the B-47. But it was typical for high value missions to send an extra aircraft (or two) along. At a predesignated point, those aircraft with the least maintenance glitches would proceed with the important task. Any with more would turn back to perform routine training. (We’re generally talking about minor issues that degrade performance, not major ones.)
I also once landed my B-52 in Russia! Our base had the most advanced B-52 simulator available during the early 80’s. We could fly our entire mission in a kind of “virtual reality” setup. After the bomb run, I asked the simulator operator what would happen if I landed on one of the open fields we saw. He said if he removed the “off airfield” function, any flat surface without obstacles like trees, buildings or fences would suffice. So we found a nice open field, landed, turned around, and took off again. No simulated Migs came up to challenge us!
I was a radio intercept operator in the Air Force. Believe me, those ferret flights were scheduled like Grey Hound Busses.
Thank you for your service!
At the V.A, I once talked to an older veteran who flew C-130A's in the 50's. After I told him I flew in the Navy, he started opening up about recon flights they did over China, IN A FREAKING C-130! He said that they got jumped by some MiG-15s and immediately headed for the deck. They made it back to base but the ground crew pulled pieces of tree tops out of the wing panels!
Good stuff and a HUGE salute to them and others!
When I was maybe 7? years old, I remember my dad taking me for a walk over to the city park, which was about two blocks from our house.
I don't know how long it had been there, but sitting in one corner was a static display retired B-47.
I remember being pretty surprised when, dad walked over to the plane, fiddled around on the bottom and opened up a hatch. (He had flown B--47's years earlier before retiring from the AF) He then proceeded to hoist me up into the lower? part of the cockpit.
I remember scrambling up into the pilot seat and grabbing the yoke and pretending to fly for a few minutes. Of course the instrument panel had been removed, but the yoke and rudders will still there but restricted by something.
Made quite an impression on me since it happened over 50 years ago.
I later learned from dad that the plane was referred to as "the widow maker" due to it's tendency to crash on a frequent basis.
He had been on several investigative boards for a few "incidents" with the plane, including one now famous accidental bomb drop.
This accident? th-cam.com/video/rzt2BRdEe6g/w-d-xo.htmlsi=SOPMksGqqxw-Ga1-
Altus Air Force Base? See my post above.
I'm the same age and grew up listening to B-58 engines being run up from MILES away (they were LOUD) as well as hearing what were probably some of the last sonic booms heard in the continental US. However, in ALL my many years of investigating aircraft set up as public displays I've never seen a static display aircraft that didn't have the hatches screwed shut. to keep people out. Can you imagine the liability of the organization displaying these planes if the interior was accessible to the public with the cramped space and all the "sharp objects" remaining after al the valuable;e equipment was removed? Not to think of the problem they would face with theft and vandalism. And these old planes are what insurance companies call "attractive nuisances". There was a B-47 monument at LRAFB to commemorate the time it was a SAC base and had B-47s. I remember climbing into the wheel well and being disappointed that the hatches were disabled. As a pilot I remember one trip when I found an old Howard 500 sitting at the end of a runway at Little Rock, AR. It had blown an engine and was abandoned. The interior was vandalized and smelled like a urinal. An interesting side note, there was a bar with a long deep cooler compartment in the plane and hidden WAY BACK in the corner was an unopened bottle of Glenfiddich scotch, the good stuff. ;-)
The only time I was ever able to find access to a retired military aircraft was in the 70's at Davis Monthan AFB. At that time the Pima County Air Museum had first opened. Before the museum was moved to it's present location where it had room to expand (across the street) it was situated next to DMAFB with only by a chain link fence to separate them. Probably the location facilitated transport planes from the graveyard to the museum?I At that time there were at least 40-50 fuselages of many B-29's (maybe B-50's?) awaiting the scrap yard. Since these were stored on a government facility awaiting disposal they were not buttoned up tight. I climbed into the nose-wheel well and was happy to find the hatches operable. I climbed into the cockpit and sat behind that big "Eisenhower" control yoke surrounded by plexiglass with an excellent view. Unfortunately this was before cameras where in everything and, even though I was a photographer, I did not have any of my cameras with me. And even though they were destined for scrap it didn't feel right to vandalize one for souvenirs. And because my dad was a B-29 crew chief I have enough B-29 memorabilia such as the brass fire extinguisher from the radio compartment with CCl4 for electrical fires. As a kid whenever I needed to de-grease something I just dribble out some solvent from that extinguisher, ahhhh, memories lol With aviation an integral part of my life a restored my first of many antique aircraft, a 1940 Taylorcraft. Eventually I decided I just HAD to strap my ass to an afterburner and so, at the grandfatherly age (for fighter pilots) of 28, I became a USAF pilot.
The B-47's lost a lot of crews before they figured out the wings could fold during a bomb toss pullup. 🤠
@@TheHistoryGuyChannel I checked your playlist of Nuclear Near Misses and did not see the 1961 Goldsboro crash. I'm sure that would make for another good video, as parts of one of the bombs are still buried in a farm field.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1961_Goldsboro_B-52_crash
I recommend the little-known movie “Strategic Air Command” with Jimmy Stewart, Harry Morgan And June Allyson. B-47s and B-36s feature prominently. It’s a ‘50s rah-rah piece, but as a retired Air Force officer who spent 7 years in SAC, I love every minute of it.
Dad was stationed at Lakenheath AFB in 1960 and my mother took me to see that film. It is really funny how they wouldn't say Russians but instead "the other fella". lol
Great movie.
It’s a cool old Cold War movie, jimmy was a air force general in real life, he talked the talk and walked the walk, not like John Wayne who just played pretend on a Hollywood sound stage❤
That was my father's squadron in the movie. He flew with his plane (crew chief) to Alaska which were involved with these recon flights.Also England and Africa. I believe his planes had the red tails. I had pictures of him on the wing ( B-47) with B-36's in the back ground (Alaska). One shot for the movie at Mcdill they wanted them to all taxi down a small road to get a shot of all the planes taxiing which dad told them not to due to the small outrigger wheels where in the dirt. It did happen as dad said it would. The dust and dirt from each plane wiped out the engines of the planes behind. I had pictures of all the broken blades. Best looking bomber ever when in the air. Not so pretty on the ground.
I was not born until 1963, But love the military stories so few even look at. I believe the men and women how fler these new jets were some of the bravest persons in the U.
s. military.
It's extremely lucky for that crew that that big cannon round only knocked out their intercoms. That whole mission was a string of miracles.
I found this episode extremely informative. I would appreciate more information about the shooting down of the two B 47s being given. I have a suggestion for a future episode. That's the role of Facist Italian submarines in World War Two. It is my understanding that the submarines work solo instead of in wolf packs.
@@jameswoodbury2806 I well might tell those stories. One has quite the story behind it. The other is more mysterious.
I imagine not being able to fire back at the Migs is also a miracle. How hot would things have gotten had the US shot down Migs over their own air space.
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In 1960 my dad was transferred to Lakenheath AFB in England. One time he took me to a hanger and I was allowed to climb into the cockpit of a F-86 Saber jet. Quite a thrill for a child of six. My mother took me to the base theater to see "Strategic Air Command" with Jimmy Stuart. I will always remember the scene when Jimmy was taken to a hanger and shown a B-47. I loved that movie.
Jimmy Stewart was a B-24 pilot in WWII and flew in a B-52 Mission over Hanoi in 1970. He learned to fly at Mapes Field which is now Los Angeles International Airport and retired as a General Officer. He liked Henry Fonda but was the political opposite of him. 🤠
I was only five in 1960, my dad was stationed at Alconbury, he flew the RB66 at the time. But still, we were there at the same time, so that's kinda cool, a fellow brat.
I grew up in Ft. Worth, TX so I loved that movie. Seeing the B-36s fly out from Carswell over parts of the city that looked so different. It was a sad day when the last of the BUFFs flew away to Barksdale. I loved watching them take off and land. I played soccer just off the end of the runway.
@@kylecarmichael5890 I was born at Goodfellow AFB in San Angelo long ago. I don't remember much about it, unlike Chuck Norris l didn't build the hospital l was born in, wasn't quite that bad ass. 🐴
I'm so sorry you had to drink San Angelo water. Worst water I have ever consumed. Luckily I haven't been to the Midland/Odessa region. I've heard stories.
What a terrific presentation. I have been studying the history of aerial and satellite recon for a long time, and this was all good stuff.
I would really love to see you do a similar presentation on the British program of overflights that took place before the USA could get their surveillance efforts going full bore. The Brits made an unknown number of overflights of the USSR under the code name Project Robin using the Canberra jet bomber modified to carry cameras...including at least one flight to take pictures of the Soviet rocket complex at Kapustin Yar in August of 1953.
In the mid-50s, my father maintained and flew on RB-36s of the 72nd Bomb Squadron out of Travis AFB, California. Years later, he would only say that sometimes they would comeback with "hail damage" to the underside of the RB-36. If you see a picture of an RB-36 with a Circle X on the tail, that denoted an aircraft of the the 5th Bomb (formerly Strategic Reconnaissance) Wing (Heavy), parent unit of the 72nd Bomb Sqdn.
I believe there was also a mission carried out by a Canberra of the RAF. Canberras could fly higher than any US plane until the U2
My ROTC detachment at Georgia Tech (1973-77) was a rogues' gallery of Air Force flyers. Our first detachment commander had started his career flying P-51 escort missions over Germany. Our second detachment commander was a former B-47 driver who kept a massive photo of the plane over his desk. One of my class instructors had been an AC-130 aircraft commander in Vietnam and another one had flown the RB-57 during that conflict. I don't recall if it was the D or F model, but in one of his desk photos he was wearing what looked like an orange space suit (as best I recall).
Well done a blend of Airplane history and specification and missions performed by heroic airmen.
Well done!!!
All Airmen are heroic! But thats just the biased opinion of former Sgt. Dale Leisenring of the U.S. Air Force talking. What would he know?
a family friend, major ralph lusk was a test pilot for the rb-47 reconnaissance version of the b-47. he told me a story of how on a night flight he experienced an electrical problem that shorted out everything in the cockpit. he stayed calm and used the compass that was essentially a plate balanced on a post for the artificial horizon and landed the plane safely on the ground. he was an absolute badass.
In 1980 I worked for a company called IASCO at Napa airport in California. The dispatchers working ther were retired Air Force pilots who had flown these missions and first told me about this nearly unknown cold war history. They said they had radar mapped every square mile of the Soviet Union before the U-2 came along. As a Naval Aviator I was surprised and impressed.
Consider this nothing more than a rumor.
Until the MiG-19 "Farmer" came along, as well as the AA-2 "Atoll" missile, B-47s could fairly much overfly the USSR with impunity. They simply had nothing that could carry any manner of weapons load that could get at the altitude of the Stratojet and CATCH it. Having the USSR ringed with a periphery of bases in East and South Asia and Western Europe was VERY helpful, something that the Soviets, save for doing overflights from their Far East over Alaska, couldn't retaliate in like manner. And their ability to penetrate Alaska air space wasn't that great, never mind that any significant assets were well inside AK itself, enabling detection and RESPONSE.
@@selfdo A Mig21 shot down an RB66 in from my dads squadron in 1964, we were at Toul-Rosieres in France. It was egg on our face but not to the extant of the U2, the crew was returned safely. It was blamed on equipment failure....us being over East German Airspace. I think the next year DeGaulle kicked us and NATO out of France, didn't want retaliation from Russia in a war, turned out he was also highly upset about the dollar being used the global currency, the Petro dollar
Thanks for showcasing another piece of history that was hidden deep and meant to be forgotten. Yet, it still deserves to be remembered.
My father flew B-47s from about 1961 to 1966. I remember those jet assistance takeoff while we were stationed at McDonald AFB and Schilling AFB, both in KS, and Pease AFB in NH. It was chilling to the bones watching them and a very noisy, beautiful plane.
Your aviation history segments are well done, and I always appreciate the humorous interjections. This is what keeps me as a subscriber
1:23 *That KC-97 must be flying balls to the wall & the B-47 must be flirting with stall speed for that mid-air refueling evolution*
The KC-97 was put into a slight dive to get extra speed during refuels
The technique was called "tabogganing." The footage HM2SGT refers to appears to have been taken from the ground during a flyby. If you tried tabogganing at low altitude, you'd run out of sky quickly. Props to the tanker and B-47 crews for doing this at low altitude! @@robertheinkel6225
I am quite versed on world history and especially on recent conflicts history but I have never heard about this cold war era B-47 recon flights. Thank you for always teaching us interesting stuffs
Track down a copy of "By Any Means Necessary..." by William Burrows.
Talk about a funny brain fart: I had the B-58 Hustler confused with the B-47, and for the first five minutes of the video I was genuinely thinking they kept showing the wrong plane, I was thinking, "isn't that the smaller B-52 like plane we had way back in the day?" Hahaha, oops...
Years later the pilot heard his name called by someone at a shopping mall in Riverside California. The person calling him was Curtis Le May. LeMay said, "We damned near started WWIII that day, probably a shame we didn't!"
When become high ranking military officer the job is to fight , offence or defence , but job is destruction no matter what.
In the Air Force had a contract with Lockheed to maintain B-47s at Elmendorf Air Force Base in Anchorage, AK. My father was an aircraft mechanic first in the Air Force in the early 50s and beginning in 1953 with Lockheed. Just after I was born in 1956 Dad was sent to Anchorage by Lockheed and he spent about a year there. When I got older I asked a lot of questions about what he was doing. For the next 40 years he would never say more than maintaining B-47s for the Air Force. He passed away in 1995 and the next year the information was declassified. It was not until I read "Blind Man's Bluff" in 1999 that I learned what he had been doing.
Also, apart from USAF missions discussed here. The RAF also had a program of flights in operation using RB 45 Tornados re marked as British aircraft and later on EE Canberras, some of these flights were likewise intercepted.
In a city park in the small town of Altus, Oklahoma which is adjacent to Altus Air Force Base, sits a B-47 named “The City of Altus”. The bomber was inside a chain-link fence topped with Barbwire. In September 1962 a small group of graduating seniors scaled the fence with stencils and paint. The stencil message “Donated by Seniors 62”. I was the youngest member of the B team at 15 and just starting my of freshman year of high school. We finish the operation just after midnight and mom was not happy when I arrived home about 1 AM. Dad, a boom operator on a KC 97, was on alert duty that week. Mom woke me up early the next morning and said I was to ride my bicycle to the Alert barracks to meet with dad. I was aggressively interviewed, but never let on what it happened. Even even asked “ was a girl involved”. I was too naïve to realize that would’ve been a get out of jail, free card.😂. I trust the statue of limitation’s has run out.😊
At Griffiss AFB in upstate New York, we had a small group of anti-war protesters get inside a maintenance hanger and damage a B-52 with hammers. They were caught by AF Security Police and arrested on federal charges. One cop told us they hammered on one of the bomber’s external fuel tanks, believing it to be a nuclear weapon. (Why anyone would think that was a good idea is a mystery.)
That’s actual sabotage, not a prank on a defunct display aircraft. I think you’re safe.
@@rbeard7580,
Well depending on the year that incident occurred, the public had been repeatedly been told for several years that USAF thermonuclear bombs were designed to survive various falls, crashes, fires, etcetera, so a little hammering shouldn't really do any significant damage, is probably what the protestors figured.
It probably would have been better for the protestors to figure out how to safely and somewhat quietly delate all the tires on the aircraft by releasing the air/nitrogen through the nitrogen/air filling device (valve stem).
@@davidhoffman1278 As far as a nuclear detonation? That's highly unlikely, pretty close to impossible. But they're not cheap weapons, and other kinds of hazards can occur. And they wouldn't be on a bomber in a maintenance hanger except under very unusual circumstances, and then they'd be under heavy guard. (You might get shot trying something if that's what was happening.) Today, I'd say that since 9/11, trying to sneak onto a base would be very hazardous, no matter where you were headed. But I'm long retired and have no "need to know" such details.
@@rbeard7580 I hope those morons got some LONG prison sentences. Sabotage and TREASON. In war time, they'd have been HANGED.
@@rbeard7580 Recall a news story off how missiles with tactical nuke warheads were accidently transported across country while armed, the missiles being ferried for maintenance of the missile and of warhead.
It was an E/4 (a lower enlisted man) who when going through the checklist at the destination airfield spotted that the warheads of the live missiles were armed.
He reported his finding to the senior non commissioned officer and then watched the composure of many of the officers as they grasped the career ending gravity of the situation.
Great video History Guy, thank you!
Little did we know. I was in grade school in a town just east of Wichita during this period. B-47s on their downwind leg to the air base and Boeing's factory runways passed just west of our school many times during the day. I recall four times that planes had accidents around us, crashing into fields in the area.
There was actually a terrifying scare in the 1950s IIRC where a visiting B-47 crash-landed in Britain, slid off the runway area and almost hit a nearby building that the RAF was using to store nuclear weapons. Afterwards, the British quickly changed their nuclear weapons storage procedures/locations to avoid any such close calls in the future, whether with our planes or their own planes.
This was not my favorite topic but strangely enough I learned a lot thanks to you. It was worth my time to watch and learn something new. Thank you for that sir. Keep it up!
The B-47 was a hot rod as far as Bombers went for it's time. All that performance over taxed the airframes I believe that led to the majority of crashes and its early retirement. The B-52 turned out to be a superior aircraft that we tax payers are still getting the best value for our money out of any aircraft ever built. When they finally retire that bird they need to take the last one and bronze it as a monument to its long service life.
It was the LABS maneuver that stressed the airframe and wing structures.
This was fascinating - my Dad was a boom operator on a SAC KC-97 and talked about these flights. I always thought he made this stuff up. I can't believe we took this many risks to get pictures of the USSR. I was in submarines during the cold war, but it was much easier for us to hide.
While serving as an aide de camp in the 1960s in Wiesbaden, I met an officer whose RB-47 was shot down over Murmansk. He was fished out of the water just before dying. He was sent to Lubjiana prison. Later returned in quiet prisoner exchange.
My father was stationed as a radio tech at the US base in Wakkanai Japan in the late 50's. I remember he told me that he had listened to the radio chatter during some of these "flyover" missions where the Russians scrambled their MIGs to chase the 47s and just couldn't catch them.
😃👍 Reminds me of a story I read in a novel written by a Vietnam war helo pilot. His loach was playing a BDA mission & somehow the pilot of one of the buffs overheard his transmission. The author said suddenly this unknown voice broken on the freq and said that they had just made a bunch of dump truck drivers very happy.
I've heard that happened with the SR-71s as well. Since the MiG-25 Foxbat was meant to intercept planes such as supersonic bombers, a squadron of them would be sent off in hot pursuit of the Blackbirds. The result was a ridiculously high speed chase in the skies over the Soviet Union with the SR-71 always escaping due to its ability to fly at around Mach 3 for sustained periods (the MiG-25, despite being incredibly fast itself, couldn't do this without severely damaging its engines). This inability to stop the spy missions infuriated the Soviets and had them waving their fists over their heads in frustration. That spyplane was one of the best aircraft we ever built, it's a shame none fly today.
Colonel Hal Austin was a long-time member of the board of directors at the March Field Air Museum where l am a volunteer. He was as fine a gentleman as you will ever meet. May he rest in peace. Lance, this is a very fitting tribute to some incredibly brave Americans.
Another amazing episode. Thank you.
My father was a Bombardier/Navigator on B-47s carrying atom bombs. His missions were only secret to you and the press, but not to the USSR. From the early 1950s, he was stationed at Wichita, Lake Charles, and finally at Lockbourne AFB Ohio. retiring in 1964 as a Lt Col. He also was a planner of major missions throughout the Cold War, Korean War, and Vietnam. In 1964 I got the chance to see his maps and the locations of all his bomber's strike points. His B-47s, including his own, flew into the USSR and outran the MiGs flying back out, as the B-47 was the fastest plane in the sky at that time. Dad always loved the B-47 and his pilot and co-pilot said it flew like a fighter jet. It was a beautiful jet bomber. So sad we still don't have one left to fly at Air Shows.
I remember seeing an operational B-47 when I was detached with a patrol squadron to Roosevelt Roads Navy Base during the annual Spring Board training exercise in the winter of 1974.
The U.S. Navy had some B47s conversions in the late 1960s to Fleet Training Electronic Warfare Support. The last one under the Navy flew in 1977.
@@lindycorgey2743 It did have a lot of antennas on it. I was an avionics tech on P-3Bs at the time. Spring Board was a big event back then. NATO countries would come down to the Caribbean for 5-6 weeks and play war games around February to get away from winter.
The B-47 is my favorite bomber. It's my second most favorite jet, superceded by the F104 Starfighter.
Splendid 👍👍
Thanks for covering the B47. For such a significant aircraft it's existence is not very well known.
My Dad was a B-47 navigator from 1956-1964, stationed at Dyess AFB, McConnell AFB and Lockbourne AFB. He retired as a Lt.Col. in 1974. He always said the B-47 was his favorite airplane. Dad died of Parkinson’s in 2018. Interestingly, even in the throes of dementia, he could recall his crew members’ names, squadrons, commanders’ names and other flight details from that era, as if they were hard-wired into his brain. I have as one of my most cherished possessions his complete flight log containing every flight he took in the B-47 and B-52, and the EB-66 from Tahkli, Thailand in the Vietnam War. Many of Dad’s B-47 flights were labeled top secret on the flight logs. Seeing this video makes me wonder if he participated in the Soviet recon flights.
Captain Jim Ridgley was a hero in this one. Taking off without permission because you think you're buddy is in trouble is some genuine heroic cowboy stuff you usually see in the movies.
THG, what a great story of cold war shenanigans by SAC. Thanks for the great photos and film.
I remember visiting Bunker Hill AFB, Indiana, with my brothers and Dad in about 1960 for an open house. Lined up on the flight line were a number of B-47's and we actually got to talk to some pilots. When we got home I couldn't wait to get to the hobby store and buy a plastic model kit of the B-47!
Bunker Hill AFB, then Grissom Air Force Base, now Grissom Air Reserve Base. I served there, and then worked as a civilian until this past April. Good little base.
@@papabear562I was a crew chief there from 78 to 80, and again from 84 to 93. I helped to close the base. Sad day.
@@robertheinkel6225 I was stationed there from 89-92, then I separated right before the active duty pulled out. I just completed 20 year civil service and retired in April. They just completely renovated the runway, and will work on the taxiways next year.
Excellent video and information. Thank you.
I remember my Dad being an aviation fan would talk about the B17, B29 and fighter aircraft of WW2. I did I did a an oral and written report on the B29 for 7th grade history. I largely didn't known about other US bombers till the B52. The B36 is a totally fascinating plane to see for the first time! It's huge and uses both piston engine propellers and turbojets engines. The B47 with is fighter pilot canopy always looked like something out of a fantasy rather than a real bomber.
The Soviet Union continued the German development of high altitude ground based air defense missiles. It was a long time in the making till they were able to shoot down a U2 spy plane with it. That U2 was far below its top operating altitude when hit. It could have easily been 20,000 feet higher and almost impossible to hit.
Six turnin'; four burnin' !
always fantastic information ...cheers from Florida, Paul
Once again, you found an interesting Cold War story that not many people know about.
Excellent video. Thank you!
Excellent segment. My friend, Joe Racine, flew those missions; he had 200 hours on the one that’s on display in Dayton.
A good book on this subject is “Silent Warriors, Incredible Courage”, by Wolfgang W.E. Samuel. Not just b47’s, b45’s and Canberras. Real heroes of the Cold War, flying reconnaissance missions over hostile territory. Not even their wives were allowed to know what they did or how they died defending America . Thanks for the video
I appreciate you and thank you for making content.
You are the American equivalent of Dr. Mark Felton, the noted historian on another channel along the same lines. That is an unapologetically directed accolade , as he is recognized widely for his attention to detail in a passionate tone. Good work, Sir.
Excellent comparison!
THG's theme music strings along better. Doesn't march along on a warpath.
Actually I think he's quite a bit better, as Mark Felton has just been reading Wikipedia articles a couple of times and when you look deeper into his videos you find that his research is quite sloppy at times (he seems to put quantity over quality)....
That's nothing the history guy could ever be accused of!!!
Felton has only war history. THG, does everything from the origin of Ketchup to Space flight.
A classic case of "Some things better left unsaid". Sometimes people don't need to know what happens behind closed doors for national security.
This is a really good story! The B-47 was not easy to fly and manage with the limited crew it was designed to have operate it. The B-47 had a lot of mishaps in training and practice mission exercises. I imagine the Air Force's very best pilots volunteered to do these secret reconnaissance missions in Soviet Air Space. Great story!
The problem was not the plane, it was the toss bombing. The "over the shoulder" bomb toss and "idiot loop" severely stressed the airframe and flight controls and caused planes to crash after structural failures.
One of my favorite channels. Just leaving this one because I am too beat up by work today, brother. Everyone else please, this is good stuff.
"The Little Toy Dog", by William L. White, documents a RB-47 that was shot down on July 1, 1960 over international waters. All but the co-pilot and navigator were lost. The body of one of the remaining four was recovered but the other three were never found. Captains Bruce Olmstead and John McKone were picked up by a Russian trawler, and imprisoned, but released after the inauguration of President John Kennedy as a good will gesture by Nikita Khrushchev. The book is a very good read.
Excellent read.
I was a scanner on a RC 130 during the 1960`s, flew missions in the north sea, Black sea around Cuba in the summer of 62, the shoot down of the RB 47 gave us hope, we might make it back in case things went bad, the RB 47`s hung out the same places we did
The significance of the B-47’s influence on the designs that followed it, including the immortal B-52, cannot be overstated. A landmark design and aircraft.
Inspired by the Junkers EF132, although it's not a direct copy.
The B-47 followed by the emergence of the B-58 is what prompted the Russian's to design the MIG-25 Foxbat.
MIG15's absolutely could not intercept a B-47, the only incident that involved MIG-15's shooting down a B-47 was one where North Korean MIG-15's shot one down that was in international airspace over the Sea of Japan, hardly the same as shooting one down while it's "doing it's thing", it's the equivalent of the shooting down of Korean Airlines flight 007 on Sept 1st 1983.
Later MIG's could intercept them but not by a very big margin, then with the emergence of the B-58 and later the possibility of the B-70 Valkyrie entering the fray something with the speed and powerful radar developed along with it of the MIG-25 was needed to counter them.
Great video! Thanks.
The B-47 was one slick looking bomber.
Excellent episode - many thanks!
Great video and history lesson. I’ve always wondered what the role the B 47 was and now I know.
Good video as always!
The B-47 was revolutionary. But since it was also "cutting edge technology" it had many "teerhing problems" that resulted in a number of fatal accidents. But all-in-all it was a success and the pilots who mastered it thought highly of it. Although it was eclipsed by the B-52 by the end of the 1950s.
The B47 was a mix of the old and the new. The old way of building futuristic Jets. It was a learning experience for Boeing. Which was later used to build the B52 and the KC135 and the 707.
As usual a great episode ❤😎
My dad was a navigator on the recon version. Piloted by the great, General Urshler. My dad told me so many great stories. I wish he had written a book before he died in 2006
My father was stationed at Forbes for almost 13 years as a B47 pilot with the 55th. He loved what he did and till his dying day he loved the B47. Once many, many years after his retirement I took him to the Air and Space Museum in D.C. and there happened to be an exhibition about reconnaissance with displays about satellites and the U2 but no mention of the B47. He looked across the exhibit space and saw a series of photographs taken by the U2 and instantly identified them by name and location and remarked that they hadn’t been allowed to directly fly over the sites but had to fly off to the side. I went over the display and read the explanations and he was correct about the identification of each one, even though it had been decades since he had last seen them from his plane. That was the first time he had really ever spoken about the sort of thing he spent years doing while flying the B47.
Reminded of LeMay’s response to a 1st Class Airmen on the ramp during his aircraft’s refueling that he should put out his cigar as the plane could blow up….”it won’t dare”.
Excellent episode! ❤
Great episode. Maybe a future episode on the RB-45s and the other "spy" aircraft like special versions of the PB4Y-2 and C-130, some of which were shot down.
I might tell some of those stories, yes. Unfortunately, many lives were lost, and families never got the full story.
Great video!
Good video. According to my late Father in Law, USAF Ret, there were more black ops flights elsewhere in the world as well that aren’t well known.
Thank THG🎀
Back in the Saddle Again Naturally
Incidences from the Cold War where both sides had the habit of pushing recon flights and defense "probes" as far as they could get away with, give context to the tragedy of Korean Air flight 007.
Since you brought it up, how much has been declassified about that?
My father was USAF head of all crew chiefs based at Burtonwood UK during the mid 50’s.
Several times they had 53rd weather squadron B-57s and B-47’s come in shot up. I have very clear photos of SAC B-47’s with the undersides shot up. The B-47s were stationed at Iceland but they didn’t have proper tools to patch them up there. The planes were sent to Burtonwood for repairs. My father shot photos of the damage including missing bomb bay doors (removed in Iceland). One of the B-47 was called “atom bum”.
They lost a LOT of crews. Almost 70 in total. Many of the Canberras never came back. The Brit’s flew a lot of these missions.
Many families didn’t know that their fathers/husbands/sons were lost in combat rather than training as the were told.
overflights were always necessary, but with the development of better, longer range sensors deep penetration was no longer needed to get good intelligence on Soviet border defences when the SR-71 and later versions of the U-2 became available.
Satellites have 2 major drawbacks: they are highly predictable in their orbits and weather can easily block their cameras (the latter of course also applies to aircraft but those can be launched with little preparation when weather forecasts change, do that with satellites).
Outstanding ... tyvm !
Great content!
Been awhile since I've watched you. Time to do some catch up...
Great presentation
Always learn something new!
Excellent Content.
I was born in 1946 and my dad was an Army Air Corps pilot at the time flying B-17's and B-29's our of MacDill AFB, Tampa, Florida. He was also a B-17 pilot in WW II and was shot down over Germany on July 26, 1943. Five of the crew were killed and five survived. My dad spent the rest of the war as a POW in Stalag Luft III and Stalag VIIA.
He stayed in the Air Force flying bombers. At first, he flew B-29's out of MacDill AFB into hurricanes to collect weather data. In the late 1950's and early 1960's he flew the B-47.
In the 1950's, my dad was assigned to Sedilia AFB, Missouri. It had been a WW II base that had closed after the war but reactivated. My dad was one of the very first officers assigned there to reactivate the base. It had no base housing and so we rented a farm just outside of the main gate which was nothing more that a wooden shack with two unarmed airmen who often played with me and my older brother. Everything was very primative. There were only abandoned wooden coal heated barracks on base with dilapidated hangars and buildings.
I clearly remember that the only entertainment on base was a makeshift "theater" where there were metal fold down chairs, a 16mm projector showing WW II gun film camera on a white sheet.
Initially, my dad was flying WW II B-25's and there was curiosity about why the base was being reactivated. But then came the day when we found out. Sedilia AFB was activated because it was to become the first B-47 base. I remember the day as a child. All of the B-25's took off, and the new B-47's landed. Everyone was in a kind of shock. We had never seen anything like the B-47 and it was like space aliens landing. It was a science fiction kind of scene. And then they demonstrated a JATO (Jet Assist Take Off) in which rocket bottles along the fuselage allowed the B-47 to take off in extremely short distances.
Sedilia AFB continued to be a base where new technology bombers called home starting with the B-52. Sedilia AFB was renamed Whiteman AFB which is the current base for the B-2 stealth bomber. I was there when the base was reactivated and now at 77 years old, I see that it has become the most sophisticated stealth bomber base in the world, and I used to live just outside of the main gate when it was just a reactivated WW II base. BTW, the two main gate guards who both looked like Andy Griffith and Barny Fife were Page and Lyle. Those were great days.
My dad didn't talk about he WW II experiences and I was too young / stupid to ask.
But there were times when he talked generally about the B-47 and B-52 in those early days. I know what he told me, but I have never found anything that confirmed it.
1. He said that the very early B-47's didn't have any defensive armaments because it could fly higher and faster than any of the fighters then, jus like the SR-71 didn't have any armaments because it was too fast for missiles at the time. Later models did have a tail gun that wasn't effective.
2. There were alert crews for the B-47 that were on "dry tanks" alert which I assume was an internal reference that has never been published, so I don't know if was true or not. Dry Tanks Alerts meant that the crews of specific missions in case of nuclear war would not have enough fuel to make it back to a tanker or a friendly country before having to bail out. In other words those were one-way missions and not expected to return. I wondered how crews would accept the certain death / POW of their missions.
My answer came many years later when I was a Marine infantry platoon commander in the Vietnam War when we were in firefights. I realized that the crew or team bond was far stronger than the fears of an individual. You may not understand, but I experienced it myself and finally knew what my dad was trying to tell me. It is almost if not impossible to explain why a crew or a team in combat will sacrifice their lives to support their crew or team.
I would have gladly given my life to save anyone in my platoon. It's impossible to explain and I'm sure it was impossible for the B-47 crews on dry alert to explain as well. It's a bond that ordinary people can understand--the willingness to give up your life that others may survive.
Unfortunately, my dad died on active duty of a heart attack in his sleep at the age of 51, just a year after his mother died of cancer. I was just a captain in the Marine Corps when I attended his burial in Arlington Cemetery, but I had no remorse because I knew that what was in the casket was not my father because his soul was already in heaven at the instance of his death. Graves are for the living--no for the departed.
Anyway, this was a poignant video for me as it brought back so my memories as a young boy whose father was a bomber pilot in WW II and in the Cold War.
I remember that we were stationed at Homestead AFB south of Miami in early 1960 during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Homestead AFB was a B-52 base at the time and within range of the Cuban missiles. One night my dad received a phone call. He didn't say anything as he collected his flight gear and left. That night we could hear the B-52's taking off and other aircraft landing all night.
In the morning, all of the B-52's were gone and there were countless fighters now at the base. We had no idea where my dad was. Even after the crisis and the B-52's returned to Homestead, he never told us where he was or what his mission might have been.
I'll tell you this about my parents. No kid ever had better parents than I had. I was the luckiest kid on the planet as far as I was concerned and I still am at 77.
Sorry for the long post, but the video brought back intense memories.
Excellent lesson History Guy.
Well I didn't know that so thanks for all the info.
That most likely explains why the night sky suddenly lit up like day on a winters evening in country UK back in the mid '50's. Probable a training mission out of Brize Norton.
Your channel is awesome
Used to be a static B-47 on display on a couple of pedestals in a small park next to the highway on the west end of Wichita, KS. The road curved slightly near the park so it looked like you were head on with the aircraft if you were traveling east toward town. Legend was that a guy was driving when he saw the B-47 up ahead, panicked and drove off the road because he thought it was an aircraft making an emergency landing on the highway or something.
Not as big a history buff as you. But I've seen several spy plane missions of history, and I've never heard of the B47 until now. This was very interesting thank you very much.
Post B47's there were lots of JATO rocket "bottles" to be had. One tale was an Air Force mechanic who attached one to a Jeep. Didn't end well. There is one of a Dodge dart that wound up hitting near the top of a mesa. The real story, from NPR website years ago was of an old Chevy, on bare rims on an unused rail road track that did work. Prudently unmanned. The article described in great detail how to make detonator out of a tail light bulb. really. pre 911.
MythBusters did a nifty episode on it as well
Especially the earlier engines had difficulty producing enough thrust at low speeds for takeoff. The B-47 had mounts for 18 RATOs- 9 to a side.
GREAT STUFF..... Thank you
As a rule sir I give you a thumbs up before I even listened enjoy every episode thank you Silas
And the Canberra high altitude reconnaissance/bomber built by English Electric and manufactured under licence in the US by Martin
GREAT EPISODE!!! There certainly are many things kept hidden from us regular citizens!!!
B-47 was a great airplane. I didn't know how great until now. Thank you for sharing. Have a great day and stay safe.🙂🙂
After hearing that General LeMay was cunducting these flights over the Soviet Union without briefing Washington, I now see the 1954 movie Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb as more of a documentary than political satire with George C. Scott playing Curtis Emerson LeMay.
It's amazing we all survived.
Another suggestion for the subject of a video: Curtis LeMay.
Although I suspect due to the length of his career and his significance, this would be along the lines of trying to do one about a notable US President. I'm sure it would involve a massive amount of research and could easily result in a video that is at least an hour long. But I would certainly love to see THG's take on him.
I remember reading about gravesites of US airmen in the Soviet Union. Some planes must not have made it.
Yes, I’ve read about that. “Apparently” buried with full military honours.
Valuable account. Thanks.
For anyone who wants to see a B-47 on screen, look up the movie Strategic Air Command starring Jimmy Stewart.
My father flew the B-47 out of Omaha and had quite a pucker factor incident. While on a night training flight the right inboard engine experience a catastrophic failure that also resulted in a cabin depressurization. My father ordered the rest of the crew to move backward into another area of the plane as there was the risk of a loss of the canopy. While on approach the canopy did explode and he was forced to bring it down, with a 200mph wind in his face. Because he was able to save the aircraft he was awarded the opportunity to go to B-52 school and later engaged in the World Security missions out of Plattsburg AFB in upstate N.Y., carrying 4 nukes in the hold, the same route that resulted in the loss of a B-52 and tanker near Madrid Spain back in 1966.
Do you mean out of Lincoln AFB, Lincoln, Nebraska?
@@danelder6846 It might have been that one. When he told me the story he said it was a training exercise near Omaha.
Very good story. Thank you. How about a companion piece of Soviet Russian reconnaissance flights over other NATO and other countries?
What a cool movie this would make. I can appreciate Colonel Austin's hesitancy to talk about the mission if LeMay had still been alive. He was always a daunting personality, even in old age. When I was a brand new shave tail (2nd lieutenant) in 1978 I was assigned to escort duty for distinguished visitors at a major USAF Security Police symposium on Lackland AFB. One of these guests was General LeMay, who had been instrumental in the creation of the predecessor organization, the Air Police (now Security Force). During a BBQ housed under a large general purpose tent I saw him sitting alone at a picnic table eating his lunch. I briefly pondered the notion of joining him, but remembering all the tales my Dad had told me about LeMay when Dad had served in the Air Force in the late 40s and early 50s, I hesitated and decided discretion was the better part of valor. Soon some old acquaintances of LeMay showed up and they began chatting, so he was no longer alone. As for me, I've always regretted my decision, even though it was likely a prudent one, because we so rarely have the opportunity to interact with living history.
I had a similar experience. I was the aide to a 3-star and we were on a carrier in SF Bay for a VJ day commemoration (being politically correct they renamed it "Peace in the Pacific" day.) Bush 41 was onboard. He was the VP then. He was in the wardroom and everyone who was anyone was in there trying to get some facetime with the him. I was out in the adjacent passageway. At the end of the passageway was a little old lady sitting in a chair. I struck up a conversation with her. It turns out she was Douglas Macarther's widow. I was speechless. A woman who had lived history and I had no idea what to say.
@@vanceb1 If only we could relive such moments in our lives. Then again, we might step in it.