B-17 Crashes in Ilinois

[Readie]

Irreplaceable piece of flying history. What a shame to end up like this....

 

[TheMustangRider]

Sad news.

 

[Readie]

Oh dear, what a shame.
An irreplaceable piece of history gone.
Well bad
John

 

[v2]

very sad news....

 

[Gnomey]

Very sad to see. At least the crew got out OK.

 

[Shortround6]

I am glad for the crew and sad at the loss of the aircraft.

 

[vikingBerserker]

DAMMIT!

 

[BikerBabe]

Damn! Thank God all aboard survived, but DAMN that's one helluva tragic loss of a beautiful plane!!!

 

[Messy1]

I saw Liberty Bell in Des Moines several years ago. Very sad to hear about it's demise. I am very happy there were no fatalities.

 

[GrauGeist]

She's done...not much left to salvage, really

Great, this new photo uploader is a total pain in the a**...didn't mean to upload the inflight shot...I'll fix the dang thing when I get home from work...

Actually, you know what guys, I think I'll leave that shot up of the 'Belle passing the Golden Gate, because that's the way we should remember her...a magnificent machine that survived against the odds and aged gracefully

 

[ToughOmbre]

My favorite warbird. Like losing a close friend.

TO

 

[ccheese]

One of the so called "witnesses" said an engine caught fire in flight, but if you look at the photo posted by GG, (post #30) none of the engines are burned.

So much for eye witness accounts.....

Charles

 

[Milosh]

Supposedly the a/c had been grounded the day before because of a fuel leak in a tank. Was fixed with epoxy. Bet the epoxy let go and the leaking fuel ignited.

 

[P-40K-5]

here you can see where the fire started...

 

[model299]

Man, I sure am glad everyone is safe. The pilot obviously needed to get the thing onto the ground as quickly as possible.

Sad to see her burn like that.

EDIT: Thinking about it, I remember now taking some video of an engine startup and a take off when it was in the Twin Cities some time ago. I'll try and get them posted when I get the time. pretty busy right now with family issues.

 

[RabidAlien]

Great news, all 7 on board escaped the crash with no injuries. Bad news....the '17 is now spare parts. And, from the looks of it, not too many of those. But, planes can be rebuilt. People cannot.

B-17 Bomber Crashes In Illinois: 'Flying Fortress' Burns In Chicago Suburbs (VIDEO)

 

[T Bolt]

Very sad. I didn't realize it was in the area - only an hour away - or I might have tried to get a ride on it this last weekend.

 

[GrauGeist]

One of the so called "witnesses" said an engine caught fire in flight, but if you look at the photo posted by GG, (post #30) none of the engines are burned.

So much for eye witness accounts.....

Charles

What I heard, was that the skipper had to shut down the engine (seen by the feathered prop on engine #3) and then fire was reported onboard (seen in P-40's post #34).

He made the right decision to set it down instead of trying to make it back to Aurora Muni, that right there most likely saved everyone aboard. A B-17 can handle an engine failure, but not fire

 

[seesul]

One of my darlings has gone...I got tears in my eyes. Right now I´m having Americans on visit here. Their grandpa bailed out over my born town from a burning B-17G.
I was aboard of that plane in 2008 at Duxford. I got no words anymore...
It´s like loosing one of my best friends...

 

[model299]

Looking at P-40K's post. it looks like that fire broke out soon after takeoff. The gear doesn't look quite retracted all the way yet. There's way too much gear exposed. Looks like it happened really really fast.

Once again, I'm really glad the pilot got it on the ground and everyone aboard and on the ground are unhurt,. But boy, as you can tell from my name and avatar, I find this really really sad.