The Only American Aircraft to Survive 200 Bombing Missions during WWII

**tn1911** · 03-23-24, 12:04

https://theaviationgeekclub.com/the-...ld-war-ii/amp/

The B-26 Marauder named Flak Bait

Although the Marauder did not make its first flight until Nov. 25, 1940, its design showed such promise that the Air Corps ordered 1,131 B-26s in September 1940. The B-26 began flying combat missions in the Southwest Pacific in the spring of 1942, but most were subsequently assigned to Europe and the Mediterranean.

When World War II ended in 1945, a Martin B-26 Marauder named Flak-Bait had flown 201 combat missions — more than any other US plane in the conflict.

Flak-Bait lived up to its name during the war. It sustained hits on almost every mission, once having its hydraulics shot out, and twice losing its electrical system to German 88mm guns. On two other sorties, it returned home on only a single engine.

By war’s end, the bomber endured more than 1,000 strikes. Not a single panel on it had gone unscathed.

**Johnny Rico** · 03-23-24, 13:58

Sounds like a flying Ship of Theseus.

**SteyrAUG** · 03-23-24, 14:36

It must be a hell of a thing to pray that your plane is well built enough to survive the flight home.

I pretty much have a sunny side up view that thing should be ok and we are gonna be alright but it's hard to put that faith in something from a factory with lots and lots of moving parts.

**Gabriel556** · 03-23-24, 14:43

Originally Posted by SteyrAUG

It must be a hell of a thing to pray that your plane is well built enough to survive the flight home.

I pretty much have a sunny side up view that thing should be ok and we are gonna be alright but it's hard to put that faith in something from a factory with lots and lots of moving parts.

Not to mention the number of external factors that were trying to actively disassemble the plane forcefully. In a plane built in a matter of days because of the efforts to support the war machine.

**SteyrAUG** · 03-23-24, 18:15

Originally Posted by Gabriel556

Not to mention the number of external factors that were trying to actively disassemble the plane forcefully. In a plane built in a matter of days because of the efforts to support the war machine.

Not sure anyone who hasn't done it can imagine. My grandfather talked to me about getting out of a B-24 that was falling out of the sky. He said "You know that carnival ride that spins and keeps everyone pressed against the wall? That is what it was like in the plane but you couldn't see your hand in front of your face because it was full of smoke."

He said the only reason he made it out is because his hand was on a hydraulic cable that he knew ran over the door and he was hoping he was headed in the right direction. He made it out but I think only two others did including a guy who found his way out through the open bomb bay doors.

Unfortunately they were near the Romania / Yugoslavia border having just hit the Ploesti oil fields. My grandfather was fortunate to have grown up on a farm in Iowa and in a house where his father spoke German. Some sympathetic Romanians let him work a farm all summer long while the gestapo was grabbing airmen out of ditches for months. My grandmother was notified that he was MIA and it took him awhile, but eventually an underground network got him through Yugoslavia and back to his base in Italy.

From all the stories told about close calls, that is the one that got him the most. The whole time he was hiding in plain sight in Romania he was terrified of being caught and becoming a POW but he wasn't in a hurry to get back in a bomber again. The very next mission was Schweinfurt and as soon as they made a run for it after dropping bombs fighters ripped them up and they lost three engines so my grandfather bailed out over enemy territory for the second time as soon as the pilot gave the order. He looked up to count parachutes and in his words "then those assholes spun a fan and recovered a second engine and flew home."

He managed to escape again, never spent one day as a POW but this time is was in Germany where there were no sympathetic farms. I heard him say "if ever you go to war, make sure you speak the language" more than a few times.