B-17F 42-30359 Tail Gunner Survives Fall In Severed Tail

Date: 29th November 1943 (Monday)

Base: Snetterton Heath (Station #138), Norfolk, England

Unit No: 339th Bombardment Squadron (H), 96th Bombardment Group (H), 8th Air Force

Aircraft: B-17F 42-30359 Rikki Tikki Tavi

Captain: 2nd Lt. Linwood D. Langley

Attack on Bremen, Germany

B-17F 42-30359 Rikki Tikki Tavi

Delivered Cheyenne 21/5/43; Gore 1/6/43; Smoky Hill 2/6/43; Gr Isle 3/6/43; Dow Fd 25/6/43; Assigned 339BS/96BG [QJ-D] Snetterton 27/6/43; Missing in Action Bremen 29/11/43 with Linwood Langley, Co-pilot: Berline Cipresso, Bombardier: Don Curtis, Flight engineer/top turret gunner: Walt Reed, Radio Operator: Sam Amatulli, Ball turret gunner: Wilbert Provost, Waist gunner: Anderson King, Waist gunner: Edmund Swedo (8 Killed in Action); Navigator: Jesse Orrison, Tail gunner: Gene Moran still in tail wreckage (2 Prisoner of War); enemy aircraft, crashed near Syke, 12 miles S of Bremen, Ger; Missing Air Crew Report 1392.

RAF Snetterton 1946

Crashsite at Syke, south of Bremen

Above: S/Sgt. Eugene Moran: Tail Gunner on 'Rikki Tikki Tavi'.

During his fall he had the presence of mind to continue firing at the attacking B109s as they came in for further attacks.

He was unable to exit because of bent metal obstructing his exit.

The German planes mistook the falling tail unit as some unknown Allied aircraft because it looked as though it was sailing along under control. Likewise the AA batteries continued to fire at it.

Imagine Moran's reaction to that! As though he wasn't in enough trouble without getting fired at.

Above: Gene Moran with wife in his later years

96th Bombardment Group (H)

Flew B-17 Flying Fortresses to targets across occupied Europe from May 1943 to April 1945.

The Group was awarded two Distinguished Unit Citations for particularly testing missions. The first was awarded for the bombing of an aircraft factory at Regensburg on 17 August 1943 under intense pressure from enemy fighters.

The second was for leading the 45th Bomb Wing through difficult weather conditions and anti-aircraft fire to drop their payload on aircraft components factories at Poznan on 9 April 1944. (Courtesy American Air Museum)

• John Armbruster's site dedicated to Rikki Tikki Tavi
• Extensive material on USAAF and USAF

Researched by Stefan Youngs (Jan 2022). Thanks to Jens-Michael Brandes for point out the at the image (removed) depicted the tail section of B-17F 42-38056 'Queen Bea’ and not that of the Rikki Tikki Tavi (Sep 2022).

Those who have long enjoyed such privileges as we enjoy forget in time that men have died to win them. Franklin Delano Roosevelt