I saw this program on Nova back in 97. an amazing story of a team of men who attempted to rescue a down B-29 called Kee Bird in the frozen artic north. i was facinated. could they repair this piece of history on sight in artic weather and fly it home???? part 6 of the vid tells the story. one man lost his life in the rescue attempt In February 1947, a B-29 bomber nicknamed Kee Bird became lost above the Arctic Circle while on a secret Cold War reconnaissance mission. After crash landing in northern Greenland, the crew was rescued, but the Kee Bird was left behind. Although nearly 4,000 B-29s were built in the 1940s, by 1994 the Kee Bird was one of only a few such planes left in the world. Its historical significance and well-preserved condition attracted the attention of Darryl Greenamyer, an experienced salvage pilot. After surveying the plane and its location, Greenamyer decided to repair the Kee Bird and fly it back to the United States. This episode of NOVA follows his team's efforts to rescue the Kee Bird. in 6 original parts and well worth watching. narrated by the late Richard Crenna [YOUTUBE]hFdFo9Yo0LI[/YOUTUBE] [YOUTUBE]DOf2LS5JGM8[/YOUTUBE] [YOUTUBE]qg4cz2Rt8TM[/YOUTUBE] [YOUTUBE]Jan6-LdFdow[/YOUTUBE] [YOUTUBE]-d6yEFhjXXg[/YOUTUBE] part 6. mission accomplished or not??? [YOUTUBE]1tJb-bmgBC0[/YOUTUBE] the only operational B-29 I know of is FIFI. but there are many on static display nation wide. including the 2 that flew with enola gay on the Hiroshima bomb mission
I remember seeing this on TV years ago and was pleased to find a DVD of it at the Duxford May Airshow this year ( it's a US-only DVD and isn't too easy to find here ). It's at times eerie and heartbreaking to watch, and one has to conclude that it's an object lesson in how not to go about the recovery of a historic aviation relic......
i was on the edge of my seat hoping they would pull it off. the old wiring was a concern. in that environment and over a long period of time wiring gets brittle, cracks and shorts. I got an update on this today. from a former navigator who found it in 1969 Below is our aircraft on the ground at Nord. It was really cold there! And here are a couple pics of downtown Nord: what a desolate place to be assigned
Cheers Namvet. There are a couple of B29 wrecks in Scotland, but the emphasis is on wrecks unfortunately.
if you have, or can get any contact info PLEASE send it to me. I may be able to forward it on and get them saved. check and see if they still have nose art as well. B-29's on display here B-29 — The Superfortress Survivors B-29 on display at Whiteman Air Force Base near the town of Knob Noster, Missouri. Whiteman is the home of the 509th Bomb Group, the group that dropped the atomic bombs in Japan during WWII. The 509th currently operates the USAF fleet of B-2 Spirit stealth bombers. This base is higher security than most air force bases, so don't even think of trying to get on base for photography unless you have a military connection. The B-29 on display at Whiteman is painted in the markings of The Great Artiste. The original Great Artiste was lost in an accident in Alaska many years ago. This B-29 is painted to honor the memory of The Great Artiste. The Great Artiste was the only aircraft to fly both atomic bombing missions over Japan. It was the observer aircraft for the Hiroshima mission. It was scheduled to be the bomber aircraft for the Nagasaki mission, but since it was loaded with scientific equipment used to monitor the Hiroshima attack, it was decided at the last minute to keep The Great Artiste as the observer aircraft, and substitute Bockscar as the bombing aircraft. While the aircraft were switched, the crews were not, so Fred Bock and the crew of Bockscar flew the observer mission in The Great Artiste, and Charles Sweeney and his crew flew the bombing mission in Bockscar. ------------------ Whiteman Air Force Base is only about 50 miles from me. I did not know the Great Artiste was lost in alaska PLEASE let know what you find out..............thanks Vet
I stand corrected; I can only find one in Scotland. Sorry, should have said it crashed. Boeing B-29A 44-62276 B-29 44-62276 - Scotland Might be others in England though.
Kee Bird caught fire on the attempted take off by Greenmeyer and his crew. The APU in the aft section shook loose a gas line to it broke off and a fire started in the tail section. The plane was a total loss.
well you can't lose em all. meet glacier girl. a successful recovery from the ice. A World War II US fighter plane once entombed under 100 metres of snow and ice in Greenland is back in the skies to complete a mission it began nearly 65 years ago. Dubbed "Glacier Girl" after being recovered, the P-38 fighter left Teterboro Airport in the United States today for another leg of a journey to Duxford, England, where it is scheduled to land on June 29. The plane was part of a group that became known as the Lost Squadron which was forced by foul weather in 1942 to crash land onto a glacier in Greenland. [YOUTUBE]-4OthQ3td_E[/YOUTUBE]
What a waste! Why didn't they disassemble the plane and shipped it to an appropriate facility where they could do a complete overhaul instead of this makeshift job that ended in a disaster?
Because all it really needed to fly was an engine overhaul (they had these flown out, repaired and, flown back in), new props, reskinning the canvas control surfaces and being raised on its landing gear. The plane was pretty much otherwise intact. Greenmeyer had a small bulldozer flown in (in a hair raising landing) and that made an acceptable runway. It made sense and they very nearly pulled it off.
*bump* for an update. "New imagery has helped U.S. officials find an Army plane that crash landed on Greenland almost 70 years ago at the beginning of the Cold War. The Kee Bird B-29 Superfortress plane was on its way to a top secret mission at the North Pole when it made the emergency landing in 1947 after running out of fuel. The imagery comes from NASA’s Earth Observatory, and shows the plane nearly covered in snow at the remote crash site. The plane’s crew spent three days toughing it out on the ice sheet before they were rescued, according to Huffington Post. They survived, but the plane’s legend only grew. It sat marooned on the hard-packed snow sitting atop a frozen lake, it remained untouched for decades. About 40 years after the landing, a team tried to restore the infamous plane, but they were forced to retreat after it caught fire. It had not been seen since. The photos were taken May 1 by a NASA’s P-3 Orion aircraft while it was on a mission as part of Operation IceBridge." http://www.dailymail.co.uk/mostread/article-2651300/A-Kee-Bird-plane-forced-make-emergency-landing-ice-plane-start-Cold-War-FINALLY-tracked-NASA.html#ixzz33xSnskJ6
I have B-29 frozen in time on VHS from it's original airing. got Glacier Girl on video too btw, you should not have given away the ending for those who had not seen it yet.
This Forum is soooooooooo bad for doing things that that - we did the same with Downfall and World At War..... ( SPOILER ALERT !!!!!! Hitler dies, Germany loses.... )
