Flying with Fifi

Yesterday we were up for a media ride at the show in Punta Gorda and had to kill a few minutes while the Black Diamond Jet Team arrived. I heard a Boeing call in west of the field and saw Fifi, the Commerative Air Forces B-29 out west. I called the one of a kind bomber and asked if we could close in for the media folks. He said sure, but not too close, so yesterday we were some of a VERY small number of people to get to fly along side of a B-29. The only flying B-29 in the world. Talk about a once in a life time opportunity. The press people liked it too! Sure wish I would of had a free hand for a camera.

Who would have ever thought that a Team of RV's would get to escort a B-29.

If you are in the Punta Gorda area come out and see the show. We are debuting our twilight show this evening.

What tha???

And NOBODY got a picture?????

Boy I Wish

All the backseaters did but they were media and havent shared yet.

Ill share if I get any.

I'm glad that you guys got a warm-up for the IMPORTANT escort you're doing on Monday....

Sounds like the FIFI escort was a heck of a good deal!

Thanks Ironflight

Monday will be just as meaningful and historic.

CAF B-29

We should all be honored that RV's flew with the Super Fort. I used to live in Punta Gorda, but was on the CAF B-29 out West in Oregon. Enjoy proximity to heavy aluminum.

FIFI in Utah

Fifi has been in Utah the past 4 days and it has been fun seeing it. I work near the Provo airport and enjoyed watching it. Saturday and Sunday it has been flying around Salt Lake (where I live) and it has flown over our house along the mountain range away from Class B airspace. I should have tried to talk with the pilot and arranged for a picture in flight. My two girls loved seeing it fly over.
Today is also the 45th anniversary of the moon landing and I really liked this shot.

Hey Jerry, Sorry to miss ya I am sitting in Panama City and Wednesday in Ft Myers.
Sat will fly up to Oshkosh
See ya soon buddy
Jack

I once took off with a B-17 at Boeing field. it was on 13L. I kinda' jumped onto 13R a bit early while the controller was still talking to me, taxiing out at full throttle. at one point the tower says "N3773, you have B-17 traffic at your 9 o'clock". I wanted to say, "no s**t", bit politely replied, "traffic in sight". with the B-17 using sightseeing tour power I was able to barely keep up with it. I SO wanted to tuck in close in escort position.

kjlpdx said:

I once took off with a B-17 at Boeing field. it was on 13L. I kinda' jumped onto 13R a bit early while the controller was still talking to me, taxiing out at full throttle. at one point the tower says "N3773, you have B-17 traffic at your 9 o'clock". I wanted to say, "no s**t", bit politely replied, "traffic in sight". with the B-17 using sightseeing tour power I was able to barely keep up with it. I SO wanted to tuck in close in escort position.

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When Fifi left Harlingen for what I think was the last time, I was the air traffic controller who cleared her for takeoff. I didn't have a camera that day, either. While she was based there, my dad got to go up inside while the crew tested the #3 engine on the ground. The engine noise was impressive from 50 feet away, and I could feel the ramp vibrating under my feet.

Nice!!

I had a walk through tour of FIFI at the Port Charlotte Air Show a couple years ago. It brought back memories of the Boeing KC-97 which was of the same era as the B-29. I was a young 2nd Lt. copilot on the 97 for about 18 months.

IMHO flying either was no fun, especially coming to it by military mandate from the F-86. But it was some improvement over the B-17/24 era of aircraft being pressurized and having a radar controlled tail gun.

But the mechanical complexity of it was exceeded only with the B-36. On the 97 the only person on the crew who knew what was going on with the engines was the flight engineer. And he had to be good.

We shut down an engine on average every forth mission. One night while the aircraft commander was back taking a potty break, the #3 engine exploded. The aircraft lurched violently to the right and as I jammed in as much left rudder as possible thinking the wing had blown off in all the bright orange light coming from it, the engineer was all arms moving and in no time had the prop feathered, the fire bottles shot, and the airplane was still flying. I remember the aircraft commander, a former WWII P-47 pilot named Fred Wahl, coming out of the john with his zipper still undone climbing back into his seat. By then the fire was out and all was relatively calm.

Later we found out an oil scavenge pump had failed and a bottom cylinder locked up, separated from the case rather spectacularly as it departed through the cowling leaving a big fire where it had been.

That was a typical mission in the 97 - I nearly quit flying it was so lacking in fun.

The B-29 was worse in WWII for problems, it was rushed into service before they could be fixed.

My hats off to the guys flying it today, it is a very complex challenge managing all those moving parts in the engines. It was especially so the the 4360's on the 97. I don't think the B-29 had those engines but the B-50 did.