[MEDIA]
And to improve things, Martin increased the wing span to get a lower wing loading. Then the air force , with all their wisdom, thought that was neat and proceeded to increase the bomb load. Back to square one. My late brother in law flew them in the South Pacific theater and said that it was tougher to fly than the B-25 but tougher in action and could take more damage than the B-25. When I was stationed at Hondo we used to see B-26's from Laredo shooting landings when they were used as advanced twin engine trainers. The word, "landings" is a more gentle way to describe the rude arrivals that threatened to crack the concrete Hondo runways. I know that I have mentioned it before but I saw B-26's buzzing the beach in front of our house a few times, maybe at 50 ft altitude. Exciting airplane.
I never imagined that there were so many things to check before flight, and even in flight. I guess it became rote in time, but remembering all that as a rookie pilot must have been tough!
I had a client once who was a trainer out of Fl during the war. He said they were widow makers because if you loss an engine on takeoff it was over. Just what he said.
"A plane a day into Tampa Bay" was the old saw about Marauder training, but it had the lowest combat loss rate of our WW-II bombers.
That's what my brother in law said, " A tough airplane". After the war I flew over the bay at the end of the runway and when the currents and tide removed the sand sometimes you could see the wreckage. After getting in the wake of a dirty B-29 I quit that route. Can't do that now, I suppose.
I was at 3000 when I flew over that end of the runway, well over the traffic and things weren't that strict then. When I got tangled up in the wake of a dirty B-29 I was well south of the field but at the wrong altitude, lower then the B-29, over Tampa Bay. In the late 60's when we were flying from Bellevue airport, east of SEA , we could over-fly SEATAC on our way to Tacoma Aero Plaza. or Tacoma Industrial. We were always over 2500 feet. I guess that things were different then, come to think of it.
