Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Aces High General Discussion => Topic started by: rod367th on February 03, 2004, 10:42:11 AM
-
(http://www.onpoi.net/ah/pics/users/ah_260_1075826454.jpg)
-
can you tell us more about that
i never heard of the ballon bombs before
-
I believe only 1 of them ever actually made it to the continental U.S. and killed people. There is a memorial in the town where it hit, but I can't remember name.
-
Japanese balloon bombs yep... They found out that at higher alts there actually is a layer of strong wind blowing from the direction of asia towards the US. So they were putting bombs under the balloons and were launching them into that windy layer through which they travelled at high speed over the US territory.
Actually all the round the world trips these days in the balloons use the same wind layers...
-
many found there way to usa but most just started forest fires. will post short story on them from USAAF site. no bomb hit people. but some found bomb started to take home and it went off. it just happen again in 1998 i believe were 2 young kids found one and it Went off and killed them both......
-
One of the best kept secrets of the war involved the Japanese balloon bomb offensive, prompted by the Doolittle raid on Tokyo on April 18, 1942 as a means of direct reprisal against the U.S. mainland. Some 9,000 balloons made of paper or rubberized silk and carrying anti-personnel and incendiary bombs were launched from Japan during a five-month period, to be carried by high altitude winds more than 6,000 miles eastward across the Pacific to North America. Perhaps a thousand of these reached this continent, but there were only about 285 reported incidents. Most were reported in the northwest U.S., but some balloons traveled as far east as Michigan.
The first operational launches took place on Nov. 3, 1944 and two days later a U.S. Navy patrol boat spotted a balloon floating on the water 66 miles southwest of San Pedro, California. As more sightings occurred, the government, with the cooperation of the news media, adopted a policy of silence to reduce the chance of panic among U.S. residents and to deny the Japanese any information on the success of the launches. Discouraged by the apparent failure of their effort, the Japanese halted their balloon attacks in April 1945.
On May 5, 1945, six picnickers were killed in Oregon when a balloon bomb they dragged from the woods exploded. The U.S. Government quickly publicized the balloon bombs, warning people not to tamper with them. These were the only known fatalities occurring within the U.S. during WWII as a direct result of enemy action.
Actual damage caused by the balloon bombs was minor. However, the incendiaries which they carried did pose a serious threat to the forests of the northwestern U.S. during the dry months. These balloons also offered a vehicle for germ warfare had the Japanese decided to use this weapon.
The balloon attack began after U.S. air defense facilities had been deactivated. To counter this threat, AAF and Navy fighters flew intercept missions to shoot down balloons when sighted and AAF aircraft and Army personnel were stationed at critical points to combat any forest fires which might occur. Also, supplies of decontamination chemicals and sprays to counter any possible use of germ warfare were quietly distributed in the western states. Before detailed AAF defensive plans had been put into effect, the attacks ceased.
Japanese bomb-carrying balloons were 32 feet in diameter and when fully inflated, held about 19,000 cubic feet of hydrogen. Launch sites were located on the east coast of the main Japanese island of Honshu.
Gun camera photos showing balloons being shot down by 11th Air Force fighters near Attu in the Aleutians on April 11, 1945. Nine balloons were downed in two hours. (Note P-38 in lower right frame).
-
tnx rod
:aok
-
Originally posted by rod367th
many found there way to usa but most just started forest fires. will post short story on them from USAAF site. no bomb hit people. but some found bomb started to take home and it went off. it just happen again in 1998 i believe were 2 young kids found one and it Went off and killed them both......
From the Seattle Times, June 1, 1945.
LAKEVIEW, Ore. --- (UP) --- A minister, still dazed by the shock of seeing his wife and five church children killed by a Japanese balloon-borne bomb a month ago [May 5], had War Department approval Friday to tell of the tragic picnic in southern Oregon.
The six deaths are the only known fatalities on the United States mainland from enemy attack. Full details were released after a month of secrecy as national officials expanded their warning program against Japanese balloons in western states.
The Rev. Archie Mitchell, minister of the Christian Alliance church in Bly, Ore., was the only survivor from the church picnic. He and Mrs. Mitchell took five children in their car and picked out a shaded spot for lunch about 16 miles in the mountains.
While Mitchell drove the car around by a road, the others hiked through the woods.
"As I got out of my car to bring the lunch, the others were not far away and called to me they had found something that looked like a balloon," Mitchell related. "I had heard of Japanese balloons so I shouted a warning not to touch it.
"But just then there was a big explosion. I ran up there -- and they were all dead."
The clergyman was so dazed from the blast and the shock of seeing everyone killed that he hardly realized two forest service employees had heard the explosion and joined him. They covered the bodies, verified that it was a big balloon which had carried the bomb to the isolated spot, and took Mitchell to Bly, the nearest town.
In addition to Mrs. Mitchell, the others killed were Sherman Shoemaker, 12, Jay Gifford, 12, Eddie Engen, 13, Joan Patzke, 11, and Dick Patzke, 13.
The forest men said it appeared that the victims had clustered around the balloon and someone curiously tugged it enough to detonate one of the bombs carried underneath. The blast plowed up the ground and virtually destroyed the balloon.
The only publicity [first] permitted on the incident was that an unidentified object had exploded, killing six people. Then it was revealed a week ago that the Japanese were releasing free balloons into the wind currents, carrying them across the Pacific, and the public was warned against touching them.
Undersecretary of War Patterson made the first mention of a balloon bomb causing six deaths and the office of censorship permitted the location and details to be given in this one case only.
Patterson said it was the only known casualty or damage from the paper balloons and added that any further damage must be kept under strict censorship to prevent the Japanese from learning how effective or ineffective they may become.
Balloons have been found over most of the western mainland. They are of gray, white, or greenish-blue paper, about 33 feet in diameter, and carry a few ball bombs suspended beneath the balloon. It was one of these bombs which had failed to explode when the balloon landed about 30 miles north of the California - Oregon border, more than 200 miles from the ocean in the Fremont National Forest.
Patterson said it had lain undiscovered for some time in the woods and warned there would be others found as snow melts and vacationers go into the mountains and back country.
The Rev. and Mrs. Mitchell lived in Ellensburg, Wash., before taking the Lake county pastorate in Bly.
On a side note, the only African-American airborne unit was tasked to put out the forest fires started from the ballon bombs. This kept them from seeing action in Europe.
ack-ack
-
What were they filled with? Helium? Looks like one of them is losing vapor of some sort from the balloon itself rather than the payload.
-
hydrogen ballon when hit by tracer make big colored vapor allright.
-
The one big mistake the Japanese made was that they launched their balloon bombs in the middle of winter. If they had waited until the height of the fire season, they probably would have had much greater success of starting fires.
:rolleyes:
-
Those balloons also helped us map the jet stream.
ack-ack
-
I heard on a recent BBC programme that the majority of these balloons never made it to US soil - and that most of the balloons that did make make it across the water actually ended up detonating or being shot down over Canadian territory...
-
sure hope none of them terrorist read these boards.. seems like a easy way to drop bio-chemical weapons on the usa with out fear ... :(
Prow831 < HAMMERHEADS>
-
Originally posted by Prow831
sure hope none of them terrorist read these boards.. seems like a easy way to drop bio-chemical weapons on the usa with out fear ... :(
Prow831 < HAMMERHEADS>
I'm pretty sure that the Mid East is downwind of us.
TBolt
-
I remember hearing about one of them when I was growing up. It landed in downtown omaha nebraska. All it did was dent the street a bit.