I am in Hampton Virginia attending the 13th Bomb Squadron Association reunion this week.
I am hanging out with pilots and crewmwn who flew A20's, B25's and A26's during World War Two, B26's in Korea and B57 Canberras in SEA.
Today, we had a tour of the 94th Fighter Squadron at Langley AFB and got to spend almost two hours checking out some of the Raptors there. I was pleasantly surprised that they let us check them out so closely, even with most of the compartment hatches open. The only thing they didn't let us do was actually sit in the cockpit....but we did get to "lean" into it and get a nice look.
Then we had lunch the the NCO club and I got to sit next to a gunner who flew in A20's and then B25's (that were earmarked for the Dutch but "stolen" from the flight line by members of the 13th
) in New Guinea. He is a silver star awardee and also happened to be one of the testors of the B25's 75mm gun mod, before it was put into production.
Another gent told me about how, when he was a gunner on the B26's (during Korea the A26's were redesignated B26), he would suppress AA batteries that were firing down on them from the mountain tops. They carried 100% API ammo and he would get secondary explosions when he hit them.
Of course I'm getting some great stories about my dad flying B57's too.
Most of these guys, are in their 80's(even the vietnam era guys are in their early 70's) and I feel like I should be recording everything they say.
They are truely amazing people and I feel very honored to be able to spend time with them.
