Description
PYN-up Decals B-17 Fortress Chicks Part 3. Two extremely famous and popular Forts grace this set. First is B-17F-25-DL, 42-3082, “Double Trouble,” Lt William Winnesheik, 333 BS/94 BG, Rougham, England, October 1943. This ship was assigned to the unit from 10 June 1943 to 4 October 1943, when it crash landed at Margate, England, after a combat mission to St. Dizier, France. She was salvaged after the crash and in spite of the amazing nose art never flew again. The bomb group marking on the fin is very interesting! No color photos of this ship’s tail have been found, but there are several black & white photos available. The official 8th Air Force directive required the unit letter (in this case “A”) be painted in Insignia Blue on a white square, but it was DEFINITELY NOT blue on this plane. This is easily seen by comparing the tonal value of the “A” to the tonal value of the national insignia on the fuselage. I’ve seen at least one color photo that proves, amazingly, that in some cases a YELLOW letter was painted on the white square, which is ridiculous. However, this may have been the case for “Double Trouble,” or possibly it could have been a light gray letter-which is also ridiculous. Regardless of how nonsensical it is, there are many documented instances of light-colored letters that are clearly not Insignia Blue or Black on white geometric bases in more than one combat group. Dumbfounding! The second ship is the exceptionally famous B-17G-30-BO “Our Gal Sal” from the 351 BS/100 BG, Thorpe Abbotts, England. Sal was queen of the “Bloody Hundredth” with her 135 combat missions giving her the distinction of being the longest serving plane in the unit. The name “Our Gal Sal” was inspired by the 1942 move of the same name starring Rita Hayworth. At the request of her first crew, captained by Robert J. Shoens, unit artist Frank Stevens painted the “Sal” artwork on standard aircraft canvas-the type used to cover movable control surfaces, and then glued it to the side of the nose. This created the strange “double halo” of olive green color around the artwork. It worked well, however, and the canvas did not blow off in the slipstream! At the time shown here, her 60th mission (the scheme best documented in color and black & white photos), her paintwork was very beat up and her chin turret, originally Neutral Gray, had been replaced by a newer unit in natural metal. Although the 100th is reputed to have used “blue gray” unit codes on the fuselage, color photos absolutely confirm that “Sal” had light gray codes. At least one widely distributed source claims the mission markings began on one side of the plane and continued around to the other side, and the profile painting in that source-while pretty-shows a huge number of mission markings continuing all the way back along the fuselage almost to the tail. The 100th BG historian confirmed for us this is completely bogus and the 100th’s practice was to mirror the mission markings on both sides of the nose. Sal was eventually scrapped at Kingman, Arizona. Interestingly, her bomb mission markings had been completely repainted very late or at the end of the war and in the boneyard she sported a long long line of white mission markings on a dark stripe background (these markings are not included here). We’re especially pleased that Mr Shoens and the 100th BG historian guided us on this project!
