Masters of the Air

From my mother’s sleep I fell into the State,

And I hunched in its belly till my wet fur froze.

Six miles from earth, loosed from its dream of life,

I woke to black flak and the nightmare fighters.

When I died they washed me out of the turret with a hose

The ball turret was a spherical, cramped container loaded with two machine guns that was attached to the belly of the B-17. Being a ball turret operator was probably one of the riskiest gigs for an air-force serviceman. Randall Jarrell’s experience as a turret gunner in WWII prompted him to pen these lines in 1945.

The B-17 Superfortress – America’s most lethal bomber aircraft of WWII – was arguably the single piece of military equipment that tilted the European campaign in favor of the Allies. Close to 12,000 of these were produced for the war with almost one-third of them were lost. Images of bombed-out Berlin and Dresden that are so representative of WWII’s bombing campaigns were brought about by the B-17s. Each Flying Fortress had a crew of 10 including the bombardier, navigator, flight engineer, and gunners.  

Spielberg’s and Tom Hanks’ ‘Masters of the Air’ was the third of their trilogy covering the land (Band of Brothers), sea (The Pacific, reviewed here) and air campaigns of the American forces in WWII. MOA was underwhelming for me. The characters failed to leave a lasting imprint. This is understandable since any series on the air war of WWII has to put the spotlight on the battle scenes and this is where MOA doesn’t disappoint. The sheer terror induced by the anti-aircraft flak and the Luftwaffe fighters going after the bombers one by one was captured flawlessly. The bombers suffered heavy casualties in the early part of the campaign. It was only with the arrival of P-51 escorts and the demolition of the Luftwaffe that the tide turned for the bombers.

MOA also covers the fates of the downed pilots. Those who were lucky to bail out alive ended up as German POWs until the war ended and the others who decided to make a run for it, with the help of the Resistance, did so with the fear of execution if captured.

This clip from YouTube is worth checking out to ‘experience’ what it was up there…