A Citizen Soldier in the Air - a B-24 Liberator pilot's story.

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A Citizen Soldier in the Air.

Ditching the B-24

I noted that there weren’t too many landing spots out there, and Charlie said, "sure there were, they were just pretty wet, that’s all!".

I asked him if they were trained on how to ditch.

"Yes, and the B-24 ditches very nicely, like a big, round rock, straight to the bottom."

I thought he was joking, but when I looked into this, it seems that the B-24’s bomb bay doors were rather flimsy and would collapse on impact with the water, allowing the plane to fill rapidly with water - so you didn’t ditch a B-24 if you could avoid it! And did they wear life jackets for flights over water? Charlie doesn’t recall having them - at least they never wore them!

Details of the front nacelles.

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