Reprinted by permission of the 773rd Hostiles and Chuck "Creamo" Kremer.

  This story was originally sent to Central of the 773rd Hostiles by one of the American Heroes from W.W.II, Willard "HAP" Reese: Pilot of B17 flying fortress. This article has been reposted here by permission of the 773rd Hostiles and Chuck "Creamo" Kremer.

Many stories have been written about the gallant defenses and the huge losses that were sustained by the Eighth Air Force as a result of Luftwaffe attacks on our bomber formations. And, to be sure, they were especially devastating and very often resulted in major losses of bombers and crews.

303rd Bomb Drop

Aircrew gunners have written time and again of the exchanges between their 50 caliber guns and the 20 millimeter cannons of the enemy and how bomber crews had fought off enemy planes and persisted in spite of the attacks. The "Memphis Belle" and "Twelve O'clock High" films are testaments to the tenacity of aerial combat.

I'm sure, however, that when the records are finalized and one looks closely at the losses, it will be determined that more B-17's were lost to antiaircraft fire than to FW190's or ME109's. One could not shoot back at "Flak" so it tended to be less glorious -- but nonetheless deadly.

Whenever there was heavy overcast we would encounter barrage type flak, that is, all antiaircraft guns were controlled by a central radar unit and all fired simultaneously causing hundreds of shell bursts in one general area and at one specific altitude. This was the kind of flak that was described as "heavy enough to walk on" -- and was the most deadly if it happened to be accurately placed.

On a clear day, when the antiaircraft gunners could see our formation, they were cleared to fire at any plane which they might pick out and adjust the direction and altitude of their shell bursts as they fired and as might be necessary. The quality of the German antiaircraft guns and the skill of their gunners made life miserable for those of us who had to fly straight and level through a sea of bursting flak and flying shrapnel. If "practice makes perfect", then the German gun crews were the best. Here is a typical German battery of four 88 milimeter antiaircraft guns and their crews firing in unison (barrage).

The following is about one of our many encounters with flak. It's about a German gun crew firing at a plane almost five miles above them. A gun crew whose accuracy and persistence almost brought to an end the tour of one crew of ten men in a B17 named "That's My Baby".

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303rd BG

That's My Baby: February 16, 1945

This particular encounter occurred on Feb. 16th, 1945. It was our twenty-fourth mission and our target on this date was the synthetic oil facilities at Gelsenkirchen, Germany. The route of the 457th was on course and on schedule. The visibility in the target area was crystal clear with only light cloud cover at about 5000 feet. From the initial point to the target the flak was extremely heavy and accurate, something we had come to expect on a clear day such as this.

But this day, moreso than others, it seemed that each shell was bursting immediately adjacent to us and with each burst our plane shuddered a little as if fatally hit. Every plane in the squadron was taking a murderous beating from the flak.

Midway on the bomb run the deputy lead plane in the low box sustained a direct hit in his port wing between the number two engine and the fuselage. Almost immediately the wing folded up and broke off, almost colliding with another plane. The two parts of the plane spiraled out of control with fire billowing from each part as it fell. No one in our crew saw any parachutes. The intercom was ominously quiet. Weeks later we learned that six of the crewmen did not survive.

It was not unusual, after a visual bomb run with heavy flak, for the formation to break after dropping its bombs. Each plane would take its own evasive action to try to avoid the flak and then later reassemble with the squadron after leaving the target area. We felt safe from Luftwaffe fighters at this time since any attack while we were in the target area would also expose them to their own friendly flak fire.

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