Enola Gay

Enola Gay is the B-29 Superfortress bomber that dropped "Little Boy", the first atomic bomb ever used in warfare, when the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) attacked Hiroshima, Japan on August 6, 1945, just before the end of World War II. Because of its role in the atomic bombings of Japan, its name has been synonymous with the controversy over the bombings themselves. The plane gained additional national attention in 1994 when an exhibit at the National Air and Space Museum of the Smithsonian Institution was changed due to a controversy over its historical script. In 2003, Enola Gay went on display at NASM's new Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center annex near Dulles International Airport in Virginia.

Bombing of Hiroshima

Enola Gay (B-29-45-MO, serial number 44-86292, victor number 82) was assigned to the USAAF's 393rd Bomb Squadron, 509th Composite Group and flew the August 6 mission out of Tinian, a large island with several USAAF bases in the Mariana Islands chain. The plane was one of 15 B-29s with the "Silver Plate" modifications necessary to deliver nuclear bombs. Enola Gay was modified at Offutt Air Force Base to hold the atomic bomb. Its crew had undergone training at Wendover Army Air Field in Wendover, Utah, as part of Project Alberta during the Manhattan Project.

Colonel Paul W. Tibbets, Jr., of Florida, commander of the composite group, elected to fly the atomic mission himself. Thus, he selected a plane from his group and renamed the plane after his mother, Enola Gay Tibbets (1893–1983, who in turn had been named after the heroine of a novel). According to Gordon Thomas and Max Morgan-Witts (Enola Gay, Stein & Day Pub, 1977), erstwhile lead pilot Robert Lewis was unhappy to be displaced by Tibbets for the important mission, and furious when he arrived at the aircraft on the morning of 6 August to see it festooned with the now-famous nose art. Tibbets himself, interviewed on Tinian later that day by war correspondents, confessed that he was a bit embarrassed at having attached his mother's name to such a fateful mission.

The Hiroshima mission has been described as tactically flawless, and Enola Gay returned safely to its base on Tinian to great fanfare on the base. The first atomic bombing was followed three days later by another B-29 (Bockscar) (piloted by Major Charles W. Sweeney) which dropped a second nuclear weapon, "Fat Man", on Nagasaki. The Nagasaki mission, by contrast, has been described as tactically botched, barely meeting its objectives and with barely enough fuel to return to its base. The two bombs dropped on Japan have so far been the only nuclear weapons used deliberately against populated targets. All further nuclear detonations have been on deserted test sites or underground, with the exception of a very few detonations underwater or in outer space.

Recent developments

Enola Gay became the center of a controversy at the Smithsonian Institution in 1994, when the museum put its fuselage on display as part of an exhibit commemorating the 50th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. The exhibit, "The Crossroads: The End of World War II, the Atomic Bomb and the Cold War" was drafted by the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum and arranged around a restored version of Enola Gay. Critics, especially the American Legion and the Air Force Association, charged that the exhibit focused too much on the casualties wrought by the bomb rather than on the motivations for the bombing or discussion of its role in ending the war. The exhibit brought to national attention many long-standing academic and political issues related to retrospective views of the bombings (see Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki), and in the end, after attempts to revise the exhibit to meet the satisfaction of competing interest groups, the exhibit was cancelled on January 30, 1995, though the fuselage did go on display.

The entire plane has since been restored for static display and is currently a major permanent exhibit at the National Air and Space Museum's Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center near Dulles International Airport outside Washington, D.C. As a result of the earlier controversy, the signage around the plane provides only the same succinct technical data as other aircraft in the museum, without discussion of controversial issues. The aircraft is shielded by various means to prevent a repetition of vandalism attempted against when it first went on display.

The four lightweight aluminum variable pitch propellers that were used on the bombing mission to save weight ended up at Texas A&M University. One of them, trimmed to 12.5 feet, provides the thrust for the Oran W. Nicks Low Speed Wind Tunnel. A 1250 kVA electric motor provides constant revolutions (900 RPM) and the propeller's pitch/yaw is changed to control the wind-speed (up to 200 MPH) in the tunnel

Mission details

Enola Gay's crew on August 6 1945 consisted of twelve men:

Colonel Paul W. Tibbets, Jr. – pilot
Captain Robert Lewis – co-pilot
Major Thomas Ferebee – bombardier
Captain Theodore Van Kirk – navigator
Lieutenant Jacob Beser – radar countermeasures (also the only man to fly on both nuclear bombing missions)
U.S. Navy Captain William Sterling "Deak" Parsons – weaponeer
Second Lieutenant Morris R. Jeppson – assistant weaponeer
Sergeant Joe Stiborik – radar
Staff Sergeant George Caron – tail gunner
Sergeant Robert Shumard – assistant flight engineer
Private First Class Richard Nelson – radio
Technical Sergeant Wayne Duzenberry – flight engineer

External links

Eyewitnesses to Hiroshima Time magazine, August 1 2005
How many died at Hiroshima?, analysis of the conflicting estimates
The Smithsonian's site on Enola Gay includes links to crew lists and other details
Paul Tibbets' web site dedicated to the plane
The reality of A-bomb Disasters
The Enola Gay Smithsonian Controversy
Enola Gay Archive
Annotated bibliography for the Enola Gay from the Alsos Digital Library

Gourt Home::Gourt :: Enola Gay

Bombing of Hiroshima

Recent developments

Mission details

External links

See also