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June 27, 2007

'Lost Squadron' Pilot Recalls Ill-Fated WWII Flight

"We Really Believed We Would Get Off"

In July of 1942, six Lockheed P-38 Lightning fighters and two Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress bombers took off from the United States bound for Duxford, England as part of Operation Bolero, a mission to ferry aircraft across the Atlantic for deployment in the European Theater. Forced to turn around by bad weather, and with insufficient fuel to return home, the entire squadron was forced to land on a Greenland glacier.

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"We slept in the B-17... When you're young, you're 23 or 24 years old, you don't worry about the negatives. We really believed we would get off."

Source: Brad McManus, who at 89 is last surviving member of the famous "Lost Squadron," a flight of P-38 Lightning fighters and B-17 bombers that took off from the United States bound for Duxford, England as part of Operation Bolero, a mission to ferry aircraft across the Atlantic for deployment in the European Theater. Forced to turn around by bad weather, and with insufficient fuel to return home, the entire squadron was forced to land on a Greenland glacier.