B17 Flying Fortress 44-8444 and 44-38635 Boeing WW2 USAAF Heavy Bomber

My aggressive museum visiting schedule has me seeing a vast amount of remains of WW2 aircraft. I have now seen about half of the remaining B-17 Flying Fortresses that are scattered about. There are about 45 remaining from 12,731 built. I have decided to make a show on each one and make a dedicated B-17 playlist. It would serve researchers and historians to find them all in one place. It would seem that there is a major interest in saving and preserving these important artifacts. There are specialized interest groups just for the Flying Fortresses. Over the next couple of years I will be making it a project to get them all here.
This one is at Castle Air Museum in Atwater California. It wears to insignia of aircraft 44-48444 that General Castle was flying on his 30th and last mission. On the 24th of December 1944, he was leading the largest air raid ever assembled. Over 2000 bombers and 800 fighters were going to attack Germany. General Castle was at 23,000' at the front of the formation when they were attacked by German fighters over Belgium. His aircraft had already lost one engine from an oil leak and now two more engines were hit and his plane caught fire. He dropped from formation and ordered his crew to bail out. He would not let the bombardier salvo the bombs because they were over American troops behind the front line. Instead he stayed with the airplane and steered it away from his own ground forces. At 12,000 feet another fighter attack hit his right wing outer fuel tank. It blew up and the wing left the aircraft. That caused the B-17 to enter a left spin that tore the already damaged rear fuselage to tear apart. The tail of the plane was found one half mile from the main wreckage. General Castle and Lt Harriman rode the plane all the way down. After the crash the bomb load went off in the fire.
This aircraft is actually serial 43-38635. It was built by Boeing in 1944 and it never went overseas. It was used for flight research until 1952 then the USAF retired it to the Tucson desert boneyard at Davis-Monthan. In 1959 it was decommissioned and sold to a private owner. The aircraft was sold a few times then it became a fire fighting water bomber until 1979. It worked in California based at Chino and Tulare. When it retired, the USAF had a big interest in accumulating and saving WW2 aircraft for historical preservation. They were offering trades of more modern retired USAF aircraft. 38635 was traded for a C-54 that went on to commercially operate until 2006. The aircraft is at Castle AFB on the national museum loan program. It is still owned by the UFAS.
I hope you enjoy my amateur documenting attempts as I pursue this passion hobby. Please hit subscribe if you would like to help the channel. Thank-you for watching and reading this all the way to the end. Over the next couple of years I will be making it a project to get them all here and on my other aviation channel, HOMEMADE AVIATION MOVIES.
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"On The Road With Norm" is about travelling with friends and family and investigating history with passion. We like pretty much anything with an engine. Come along for the ride. Leave a comment. Please help out with a LIKE and SUBSCRIBE. It would help very much thanks.