4 thoughts on “P-61 Black Widow”

  1. My father was the first commanding officer of the 415th NFS. I have numerous photos of previous reunions as well as his flight log, photos from England and North Africa. Are you interested in any of these to include on this website?

    1. Hi Kelly,

      I will add more information over time. Are the photos from previous reunions in JPEG (.jpg) format? If so, if you could send a file or a CD to my father he can help me to get them onto the site. Note, that the photos must be individual JPEGs rather than a slide show.

      I haven’t decided what to do about flight logs, but if you can send me a .pdf of the log, I will have it handy for posting once I decide how to feature them.

      Cheers – Jackie

  2. I just completed an on-camera interview of my 95 year-old uncle for a documentary. He was an armorer and aerial gunner on B-25s, B-29s and P-61s. Just after the war, he was was a gunner with the 417th NFS based at Fritzlar Army Air Base in Germany. On a training mission over a gunnery range, there was apparently a timing mix-up, and a P-47 of the 366th Fighter Group (also flying out of Fritzlar) accidentally shot the wing off my Uncle’s P-61, which was right down on the deck. He and the radar operator bailed out so low that they got one swing in their parachutes before hitting the ground. My Uncle smashed into a tree and shattered his pelvis. He spent months in the hospital before returning home to Chicago, and eventually became a world-renowned Harley-Davidson mechanic.

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