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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 28 ส.ค. 2024
- Here's my compilation of video from my flights in the Collings Foundation B-24J Liberator. Those flights were soooo much fun you would hardly believe it ! You need to go for a ride on all their aircraft but as far as the bombers, the B-24 is definitely the most interesting from the historical standpoint as far as I am concerned (and also the loudest !). The aircraft is flown with the waist gunner panels wide open to the elements (unlike the waist gunner positions on the B-17 and B-25 which are enclosed with Plexiglass [historically correct}). There is also a WHOLE lot of wind blowing through that B-24 fuselage, quite unlike the B-17 and B-25. Enjoy the video ! For the ULTIMATE thrill, take a flight in the Collings Foundation P-51C dual-control Mustang where (depending on your experience and ability), you can actually take control of the aircraft for the majority of your flight. Simply unbelievable and a dream come true ! I've done it twice (see my other videos). Thanks !
Great video Octane!
My dad was a B-17 pilot in WWII (385th BG), I have flown in one with him twice, before YT. This video, though a Liberator, brought back the memories of those flights for me. The noise, buffeting, bouncing, even the smells. Kudos climbing to the radio position during what looked a pretty tight turn. No soft places to bark your shins on in one of these birds.
Can't imagine what it was like for these men at 27,000 ft, -50 Fahrenheit, in flak, enemy fighters... brave souls all!
My dad was a B-24 nosegunner in the Pacific, he said most of his crewmen were teenagers like him, since they were drafted as seniors in high school,
Staff Sergeant rank, and they called their pilot "The Old Man"... he was 23 years old.
Thank you for this. My father was a ball turret gunner under a B-24. He flew 30 missions in "Male Call".He passed away a few years back and I got all his war stuff. He was awarded The DFC with 4 oak leaf clusters. I always support any effort to keep the memory of what all of our warriors have gone through to keep this country free. As the liberals try to destroy freedom, it is important to always hear from the other side. Keeping our history is so very important as we go forward.
Several years ago My wife and I took a ride in this very plane. It was at KMSS in Massena, NY. A million dollar ride for $400 each. Born in 42 with a family members in WW2 it was a life time dream to fly in either a P 51 or a Liberator. Now for the P 51! GREAT video, loved the inside outside transitions, I took my vids from port side waist gunner and bombardier positions. Thank you for posting.
Just saw an old video on B24's that stated during WW2 a Ford production plant was able to put together a B24 every 55 minutes and roll it off the assemble line. Amazing.
my dear grandpa used to fly on B-24; he used to be the navigator and who was in charge of dropping bombs to the ground. i am glad the buzzing sound did not damage his hearing; i only need to talk louder to grandpa until recent years. :)
Thanks for the tag along. Imagine flying in one for 10-12 hours at altitude while being shot at. Greatest generation indeed
my dad was a top turrent gunner on a B-24 called the R Bar--dad passed away Jan 18, 2011 this is a great video thanks.
While reading the book "Unbroken" this video has helped me to better envision the experiences the crew must have had while conducting operations. In the book, the B-24 named "Super-Man", had 594 bullet and shrapnel holes in it while conducting a bombing mission. Incredible. Thanks for the video!
May 26, 2016. This Bomber was Northbound up the San Francisco Peninsula @ 5:30 p.m. P.S.T. What a stunning sight to see and take in. A most beautiful and sexy bird. Watched it till it banked West into the ocean breezes. "Fine Showing" to all involved.
Thanks for sharing this footage. I'm currently reading a book about a crew who flew in this type of bomber. Watching this video adds a new dimension and empathy to the book.
Thx again.
Flew this ship out of Orlando Executive Airport in Dec. 1996; at the time, it was called "Golden Girl" with Schlitz Beer logos. Fabulous. My dad completed 30 combat missions over occupied Europe in Liberators, and survived a mid-air collision in the Briney Marlin over the English Channel. He is doing well to this day in Orlando; 458th BG, Heavy; Horsham-St. Faith. I have lots of archival info. Bob Craig, Jr., Vero Beach, FL
Flying in a B-17G is like flying in an airliner; the waist-gunner positions are closed by Plexiglass and it is relatively quiet inside. In the B-24 there is wind blowing through the fuselage from around the nose turret, the big waist-gunner doors are wide open to the elements and it is REALLY noisy inside. From a historical standpoint both were a REAL thrill to ride in but I liked the B-24 much more.
My grandfather flew on these over France and Germany at night as the navigator; unfortunately he took all his stories with him to the grave before I was born, but I still revere the Liberator as one of the most badass bombers to fly since it brought my dad's dad and his crew home every time. Miss you, Major Jack Perry
I've flown in a b-17 (texas raiders)...felt as safe as can be. These big birds and their airmen deserve praise for saving us....thank you!
What a Beautiful Piece of history... A salute to the all the heroes of WW2 and the machines that concurred tyranny!
B-24's are so husky! Gotta love 'em.
Thanks for this. It gave me a chance to experience small amount of what my Dad must have seen and heard the few times he flew into France during WWII on one of these. Once they flew in after dark, landed in a grass field and unloaded supplies for the French Resistance. He said they were on the ground less than 5 minutes. A second time they flew in alone, low over Paris throwing propaganda pamphlets out the bomb bays to the French Civilians. What courage young men have! Never Forget
Excellent video, it give us the opportunity to virtually fly inside of that beauty, it is just amazing. Could you imagine being part of the crew and while flying a mission being attacked by flak and german fighters at 35000 ft or higher? All our admiration and respect for those heroes!
The B-24 NEVER received the credit it deserved! It was not as pretty as the B-17 nor could it take the same amount of battle damage but as a bomber it was the better aircraft. It could fly higher, farther , faster and carry more bombs and it was the most mass produced american combat aircraft ever! LONG LIVE THE LIBERATOR!!!
Hawkin's Dog I do recall a story from WWII where the crew of a B 24 were almost shot down by a wing of Zeros in the pacific. If I remember correctly, after they returned to base and counted the holes in the plane there were over 500
frederick davis I seem to recall that story as well, I think it was an older D model. That was a rugged plane. There are countless stories like that from that war and we'll never hear them all.
+frederick davis Thanks for sharing can't tell you what it means to me to see this video and read all these comments about this B 24 my dad flew the B24 and B25 Mitchell love hearing and learning more about this.
+Hawkin's Dog Thanks for sharing I appreciate all these posts I'm just now finding these video's never could find anything on this I always thought it was only the B25 Mitchell plane my dad flew but was informed by my brother it was actually the B24 So now I'm doing some research on this plane as well.
No. It is far prettier!
We went to Republic Fields, L.I. from England to fly on Witchraft in 2009 - FANTASTIC PLANE!! See our B24 Beast Of Bourbon crew memorial dedication weekend 9th May 2011
Yeah, I just want to clarify that I was speaking from my several flight experiences in both the B-24 and the B-17G at LOW altitude. It was a much different and brutal environment for the aircrew of both aircraft under wartime conditions at high altitude. No pressurization, sub-zero temperatures and if you lost your oxygen supply, you were dead. I salute, thank and appreciate all of the US aircrew of WWII (my Dad was one too).
Great video, wonderfull to see all different views from inside. Great filming the engines from the nose. Thanks!
As a Pilot of a B-24 over Tarawa Kwajalein and Guam with the 7th air force. I am disappointed that there is no mention of our area of combat . All over water!!!
Thanks for the video. Very nice photography and sound. I'm in the middle of Laura Hillenbrand's "UNBROKEN." It is a crew of a B-24 in the Pacific Theater during WWII. It is an amazing account of faith and survival. I highly recommend it. Charlie
Great video. Thanks a lot! Nice of shot of engines a-purring away.
Awsome plane!.. Back in the days one b-24 made a soft landing in the meadows (the crew jumped earlyer!!!) nearby a farm between "Balkbrug - and Dedemsvaart" in the Netherlands.
Her name was "Portland anne"
Keep up the good work guys!!!
Great job on the 'splices', and very realistic idea of the flights. My first flight in 'Witchcraft' (as 'Dragon and his tail') I got forward so fast after takeoff that the retracted landing gear was still spinning, and I had to wait for it to stop. The waist positions are awesome, and so is the top gunner, which I'd like to have seen in your video. If I want someone to 'experience' the ride, I'll show this video! Bravo-Zulu!
I saw a b-17 fly over my school today it was awesome
precioso video de este bombardero en vuelo hasta el sonido de los motores es fantastico. gracias por subirlo.
Very cool video. Nice cutting back-and-forth between inside and out. The Collings Foundation planes come to Burbank Airport here in California every Mother's Day weekend and I always go see the 24, 17, 25 and 51. I buy a lot of stuff (coffee cups, shirts, etc.) but I haven't had the money to do a flight yet. I'd really like to fly in their B-25.
beautiful.., beautiful.., flight in a B-24 libertador.
Man, that was fantastic! Keep them coming!
Two people were on the "receiving" end of this beautiful aircraft.
Very nicely done. Enjoyed it, cannot wait till I go
+sfbfriend Would you know where I could go see this plane B24 my dad flew those in the air force in 1942-1944 I believe my dad passed away over 18 years and I wish we could of talked more about his service in the war. I've been to the Air Force Base Museum in Florida a couple times they have a B25 Mitchell which I believe my dad trained in that plane.
0:29 wonderful sound
I've ridden Witchcraft, what an amazing experience!! Those WWII flyboys were brave!
Fantastic! Thanks for sharing, and greets from the Netherlands!
It was one ungainly-looking bird, but it could do the job. What a narrow fuselage it had! I feel for the brave men who flew these to Ploesti at low altitude. One of the most haunting newsreel clips of the war showed a Liberator taking a hit right at the wing root. The wing folded, caught fire, and down it went. No way for the crew to bail out at that low an altitude.
liberators sank the last u boat too. it was sunk near norway. the u boat right now is in a museum i believe or maybe the u boat itself became a museum cause it was so huge.
Nice knowing that our soldiers in WWII had that GPS equipment to guide them.
lol, nice video.
Thanks for sharing is video...Incredible plane, I rode a B-17 a few weeks ago. Can't wait to ride the B-24.
@barmtrail Certainly true. My grandfather was a B-24 radioman; I only just recently found out it was in an gun-nose B-25J (the .50cal ones, not the 75mm G version). He even described seeing the earliest 75mm installations come home damaged from the recoil and blast. He can hear okay, but hearing loss is common in all sorts of veterans, whether aviators from the engines, or infantry from the gunfire and artillery, or even tankers from taking hits on armor plate. They gave an awful lot for us.
Beauty! Thank you for showing... Am little greedy, want more and long of that showing.
Can't wait to go up in one of these next month! Grandfather flew them in WWII and fiancé's was an aerial gunner in one in WWII.
She is a great bird!
@ThunderAppeal: Yeah, that ringing bell is actually the original "bail-out bell." When crew members heard that, it was time to jump! No kidding. Today, that bell means to lucky riders on this B-24 that you can unlock your take-off and landing lap belt and you are free to roam the aircraft from nose to tail. Absolutely awesome flight, much more exciting than the B-17.
I ended up landing behing the "Nine-o-Nine" on my FAA checkride. Boy....talk about an interesting ending to my PPSEL checkride!
great video, thanks for posting..
Beautiful. It's too bad that there are so few B-24's today.
Actually, they had enclosed waist gunner positions on the later B-24's as well. That was a fix on the B-17 G and the B-24-H and J. The casualties from frostbite led to this improvement later in the war.
That must have been so fun...
When the British left Indian the RAF left a lot of Liberators from it's WW2 Far Eastern forces in storage in India. The then new Indian Air force took them out of storage, converted them into anti submarine and maritime reconnaissance aircraft and used them in this role until the late 1960's. A very large number of surviving B-24's are these ex IAF/RAF machines.
Great ship! I flew on her, but always remember the sadness of war.
Just imagine , hot steel chards, cannon and machine rounds, tearing at your crafts hydraulic, fuel, oil, oxygen, electrical lines, crew men, and control cables, flight control surfaces and air frame
You might be excused if you were a bit frightened about this whole flying game.
Brilliant.. I enjoyed that..
Great Job!
Great video!
Very, very well done! Thank you.
I like those long slim wings ! ...
man I can't imagine what its like to fly in a prop plane, but a B24 is certainly an interesting one
bautiful, beautiful, fly in a b-24
I've ridden on Witchcraft, what a fun ride!!
Beauty
@justforever96 Thanks for the info. My friend who is 92 flew the C47 in the south pacific in WW2 and he cant hear a damn thing!..lol My father fought in the south pacific island hopping in WW2 and he is also deaf!..We just need to take time out of our lives now and again and realize what these brave young(older now) did for their country.
@barmtrail Opps...I meant to say "B-25 radioman", not B-24. I remember him showing me a picture of the B-25 "Heavenly Bodies", and telling me that "this was the plane I flew in". I took him literally, so when I found out that "Heavenly Bodies" was in the Smithsonian, I told all my friends that his plane was famous. LOL, I found out later that he didn't mean THAT plane, just the B-25 in general. Still very impressive, IMHO.
Thats Torrance AP isnt it? I was a kid who got to fly in some Stearmans out of there back in '80 and also worked for and got to fly Grumman Gooses out of Long Beach for Catalina Airlines. Man that seems like a couple of lifetimes ago!
@barmtrail They sure were that loud! Thin aluminum, 4,800hp, and 215mph slipstream = loud. B-17 (and probably B-24) pilots would usually remove their inner earphones, and just shout to each other when they had to say something, rather than use the interphone...the joke was you could tell a pilot from a co-pilot from which ear they were deaf in. Sad thing is, that was probably only half joking! But the B-25 was the official loudest.plane; the exhaust stubs were just feet away from the cockpit.
Thanks for this video. I have just finished reading "Wild Blue" by Stephen E. Ambrose. Please read this book if you haven't. All I can say is 'WOW' and btw the B24 > B17 (which got all the attention)
Thanks for uploading this video. All the best.
Great plane and great video.
Thanks Octane130
Loved all of those "steam gauges"! The engine instruments, on the right side, were surely the Magnesyn Style type of gauges; didn't see any of the Autosyn Synchro style indicators - I'm sure they were there somewhere. Nice little J-8 Attitude Indicator (pull to cage). Noticed there was no Compass correction card installed; needs a compass swing! :-) N-6395T
Hey, great video! I've been trying to find ones like this for a while; it's hard to visualize how one got around inside the plane from drawings, and no-one ever takes the right photos! How do you get up onto the radio room floor? Is there ladder steps in the side of the wall? Only thing missing, is I wish you'd showed what it was like climbing through the nosewheel well to get to the forward section. But oh well; I guess someday I'll have to try riding in a B-24 myself! How much did it cost?
beautiful film and beautiful sounds enginers pratt&whithney R-1830-62
would love to see this beast over here in the UK...but i doubt that would happen
AWESOME... not a big fan of the bird but .. GREAT flight video of a prime vintage war bird. If i ever get my chance in the B-111 Lancaster thoes are exactly the agles i want =-)
Fantastic Octane! Thanke~
D~
Dont be too doubtfull after all they did send "Liberty Bell" across the Atlantic and would be a great way to promote their cause plus I visited the aircraft recently when they were here in Arizona and at that time they were having dificulties filling the seats one flight was cancelled due to that and I seriously doubt that would be the case if the did visit England
lucky you, dude,
great video !!!
Thank you verry much for shareing with B 24 flight :) (too bad, that I can't fly for real) I really ejoy it!.... I hear that Pratt and Whitney engines are really loud... I belive you :)
Also; notice that the Pratt and Whitney's did not leak anywhere near the amount of oil that the Wright engines did....
The wing design was called the Davis airfoil and the design was something of an accident. It had good lift and lower drag, but not for the reasons that the designers thought. Wind tunnel testing after the war lead to improved designs and this wing shape was dropped.
@MartinLeMalin Yeah, that "Davis airfoil," which I don't know anything about, but apparently gave those slim wings more lift that the B-17. Maybe someone will tell us something pithy about it.
Larger payload and longer distance than B-17.... but harder to fly in formation. The pilots wrestled with the B-24 every minute they were on strategic missions in formations.
its amazing how small of a payload these airplanes could carry back in the day. now a days, fighters and bombers can carry 1 single bomb weighing the equivalent of the total amount of bombs these bombers could carrry. guess thats all to due with more powerful engines
Awsome vid thanks for sharing :)
Great video. Maybe for future videos, try a head mounted gopro so you can move about with free hands!
Happy new year 2009!
Do they use the brakes to slow after landing? Might seem like an obvious answer but the B-25s do not (brakes are no longer in production) so that's why I'm wondering.
Well, as far as I know that the B-24 Liberator bomber plane was used against Japan and Germany during World War 2, but the Germans captured one of the B-24 bombers and named it "Beuteflugzeug". They know that the Beuteflugzeug was not their plane, but they used it against the Americans. The B-24 was and still is an American bomber plane.
Thanks you, Videos very nice, ５★★★★★
@TheHacKEDnetwork cool thanks
@octane130 - my dad flew these for RAF coastal command - U boat killers - i would pay v good money to go up in her - great footage
was these the planes ben afleck flew in the movie peral harbor towards the end
Wait. If you were riding inside the Liberator, who was filming outside?
Is that how loud they were thru the whole flight?!!! are you kidding me!!!!
@pasley21 I talked to some of the staff at Duxford air museum when I was there and they said that they can't take people up in these aircraft due to gov't regulations......something to do w/insurance I think. Too bad, 'cause they have many nice airworthy warbirds over there.
how did they get in the top turret?
@acc2108 thanks a lot
no Ball turret?
2:51 right in front of the throttle, dont suppose that came standard! And those two dislikes must be German or Japanese! Glad to see it flying, the world is running criticly low on vintage aircraft like these.
you forgot the tail turret ball turret and bomber station