June 17, 2011 at 2:19 pm
I have the following article on my WW2 site and have had doubts expressed as to its authenticity. It refers to a bombing raid on ‘Tunis docks’ and the range involved. I am wondering if the docks are indeed called Tunis Docks, but located elsewhere or the bomber did not fly out from England at all??? Here is my article:
A mid-air collision on 1FEB1943 between a B-17 and a German fighter over the Tunis dock area became the subject of some of the most famous photographs of World War II.
An enemy fighter attacking a 97th Bomb Group formation went out of control, probably with a wounded pilot, then continued its crashing descent into the rear of the fuselage of a Fortress named All American, piloted by Lt. Kendrick R. Bragg, of the 414th Bomb Squadron.
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When it struck, the fighter broke apart, but left some pieces in the B-17. The left horizontal stabilizer and elevator of the Fortress were completely torn away.The two right engines were out and one on the left had a serious oil pump leak. The vertical fin and the rudder had been damaged, the fuselage had been cut almost completely through – connected only at two small parts of the frame and the radios, electrical and oxygen systems were damaged. There was also a hole in the top that was over 16 feet long and 4 feet wide at its widest and the split in the fuselage went all the way to the top gunner’s turret. Although the tail actually bounced and swayed in the wind and twisted when the plane turned and all the control cables were severed , except one single elevator cable still worked, and the aircraft still flew-miraculously!*
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The tail gunner was trapped because there was no floor connecting the tail to the rest of the plane. The waist and tail gunners used parts of the German fighter and their own parachute harnesses in an attempt to keep the tail from ripping off and the two sides of the fuselage from splitting apart. While the crew was trying to keep the bomber from coming apart, the pilot continued on his bomb run and released his bombs over the target.
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When the Bombay doors were opened, the wind turbulence was so great that it blew one of the waist gunners into the broken tail section. It took several minutes and four crew members to pass him ropes from parachutes and haul him back into the forward part of the plane. When they tried to do the same for the tail gunner, the tail began flapping so hard that it began to break off. The weight of the gunner was adding some stability to the tail section, so he went back to his position.
The turn back toward England had to be very slow to keep the tail from twisting off. They actually covered almost 70 miles to make the turn home. The bomber was so badly damaged that it was losing altitude and speed and was soon alone in the sky.*
For a brief time, two more Me109 German fighters attacked the All American. Despite the extensive damage, all of the machine gunners were able to respond to these attacks and soon drove off the fighters. The two waist gunners stood up with their heads sticking out through the hole in the top of the fuselage to aim and fire their machine guns. The tail gunner had to shoot in short bursts because the recoil was actually causing the plane to turn.*
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Allied P51 fighters intercepted the All American as it crossed over the Channel and took one of the pictures shown below. They also radioed to the base describing the empennage was “waving like a fish tail” and that the plane would not make it and to send out boats to rescue the crew when they bailed out. The fighters stayed with the Fortress taking hand signals from the Lt. Bragg and relaying them to the base. Lt. Bragg signalled that 5 parachutes and the spare had been “used” so five of the crew could not bail out.*
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He made the decision that if they could not bail out safely, then he would stay with the plane and land it. Two and a half hours after being hit, the aircraft made its final turn to line up with the runway while it was still over 40 miles away. It descended into an emergency landing and a normal roll-out on its landing gear. When the ambulance pulled alongside, it was waved off because not a single member of the crew had been injured.
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No one could believe that the aircraft could still fly in such a condition. The Fortress sat placidly until the crew all exited through the door in the fuselage and the tail gunner had climbed down a ladder, at which time the entire rear section of the aircraft collapsed onto the ground. The rugged old bird had done its job .
I was not the author, but it was sent to me in good faith.
By: Steve Birdsall - 3rd July 2011 at 06:42
41-24406 All American
And here’s the bit they threw away.

The fighter attack that caused the damage took place “about five minutes” after bombs away, according to Jack Davenport, pilot of Flying Flit Gun.
Why anyone thought this story needed enhancing is totally beyond me.
By: Steve Birdsall - 3rd July 2011 at 02:37
Ian Hunt covered this well, but I thought I’d add that this B-17F, 41-24406, actually flew again . . . I’ll quote from the book Ian mentioned, Pride of Seattle.
The centre rear section of All American was removed and replaced with a matching section from another wreck. This work took the 50th Service Squadron nearly three months, and the repaired aircraft was then assigned to the 353rd Squadron, 301st BG. M/Sgt Virgil E. “Hock” Annala was her ground crew chief and he says, “For all intents and purposes the marriage of the forward section and the after section made her look like a B-17. The flight characteristics were something else. . . her service with the 301st in a combat role was short-lived. She was extremely slow and plagued with problems”. All American’s last combat mission was to Bo Rizzo on May 10, 1943. All turrets, guns and armor plate were then removed and she was used as a utility aircraft until she was salvaged overseas in March 1945.
There’s a fuller version of the story in Claims to Fame: The B-17 Flying Fortress, a book I wrote with Roger Freeman.
By: pistonrob - 18th June 2011 at 20:04
just so everyone can see without hunting around
By: red devil - 18th June 2011 at 17:17
Actually, Biskra is in Algeria… although not too far from the Tunisian border.
mucho grassy ass
By: Dan Johnson - 18th June 2011 at 09:44
When I was in college back in 1980 or so I was working in a nursing home. A man visiting his mother there turned out to be a B17 navigator and when we got talking it turned out he’d been navigator on that particular bird.
Later in the mid 90s a co-worker told me that her Dad had been involved with Army photography in the Med during WW2. I got a chance to look at his scrap book and there was a copy of that photo, but not cropped as the well known version is. The original image shows the 17 a lot further away then the cropped version would suggest.
By: Ian Hunt - 18th June 2011 at 07:32
All American
Steve Birdsall’s “Pride of Seattle – The Story of the first 300 B-17F’s” recounts some details of this incident and says that the target was indeed Tunis but the a/c wasn’t flying from England. It contains details of the incident by the crew including how, upon landing upon the “levelled earth” of their home base, the tail wheel grated and dragged “along the desert sands”. Doesn’t sound like England to me!
It also says on a caption to the the photograph, that it was taken by the Navigator of another Fortress, ‘Flying Flit Gun’ (41-24412). Nothing about any P-51’s.
A very simple check should be to look up where the 97th BG (414th BS) was based at the time of this op, 1st Feb 1943?
Looks like your original article had been embellished along the way, or someone’s made some incorrect assumptions.
Ian
By: Bager1968 - 17th June 2011 at 23:16
Actually, Biskra is in Algeria… although not too far from the Tunisian border.
By: red devil - 17th June 2011 at 14:42
Many thanks for your quick response. I think the bone of contention was the fact that, originally, the text said that the plane flew back to England and that P51s converged on her over the channel, taking the famous photo. This is apparently incorrect as the planes home base was Biskra also in Tunisia. I have since changed my text to suit the ‘new’ results’.
By: JDK - 17th June 2011 at 14:30
Photo No.14 of 27 here is your subject, Boeing B-17F 41-24406, here on the website of the National Museum of the USAF.
http://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/factsheets/factsheet.asp?id=2453
A very famous photo and story, although I’m not personally familiar with the details.