Chris Gattman: “It was the first time I swore.” Every show about B-17s suggests it but this crew lived it: Landing gear up and jammed, gunner stuck in the ball turret. Minutes of fuel remaining. They didn’t know anything about splitting atoms. They just knew that the Germans were working on something called “heavy water” in Gdynia and that they had to go bomb it. The entire squadron opened fire on the first wave of fighters. For the crew of Captain Bye, this was their first direct contact with the actual Luftwaffe. The group opened up on the final wave of fighters only to discover that they were friendly Spitfires, Polish pilots, coming up to escort them. Apparently there was no loss of life in that exchange. “It was beautiful for a second.” That morning they had watched the fiery metallic black blossom of two fortresses colliding in midair. In the stunned instant before the reality set in, they found the fireball spectacular to watch, as if somehow all of the crewmen survived and would be waiting for them at the pub that night to tell the tale. Unfortunately for Ray Bye’s crew, a flak burst crippled an inboard engine and the wheel it housed. The fortress could made it home on three engines easily as long as the Luftwaffe didn’t pounce them over the channel, but, by then they had no remaining ammunition and the gunners and engineer were desperately trying to get Sgt Fred Holt out of the ball before they had to land with him in it. They landed gear-up in the grass at Snetterton Heath. On their way to debrief they were diverted by the PIO to go stand in front of the airplane for a crew photo. When they said “It’s over there in the grass” the officer said “Well, go stand in front of different one.” The defiant bare-headed gunner standing in the back, who looks like he could eat a PIO for breakfast, is ball turret gunner Fred Holt. The gunners beside him, including my grandfather and tail gunner Alton Baer, got him out by unmangling the airplane so badly with whatever tool they had that the ball became unstuck enough to squeeze him out only moments before they crash landed. For perspective of the height of the average crewman, my grandfather was 6’1” and is the tallest in the back row, standing next to Fred Holt. Although several were wounded and captured returning from Schweinfurt a few days later, thanks to the amazing teamwork of Captain Bye (front left) and the crew all of these men survived the war.