On August 6, 1945, a seismic event occurred that would forever change the course of history and warfare. At the controls of the Boeing B-29 Superfortress, Enola Gay, was Colonel Paul W. Tibbets, Jr. and his crew, who dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. This one act destroyed one city and caused Japan to surrender, ending World War II in the Pacific, but it also transformed aerial combat and ushered in the age of the atom.
The Enola Gay was not a typical plane; it was the epitome of technology of its generation. The Boeing B-29 Superfortress was a work of engineering, a design and weapons innovation that overshadowed all that had come before it. “Boeing installed very advanced armament, propulsion, and avionics systems into the Superfortress,” pointing to its status as the most advanced propeller-driven bomber of World War II.
With pressurized cabins, this plane enabled its crew to withstand the high altitudes required of strategic bombing without the discomforts of low-pressure atmospheres. It featured computerized target systems and remotely controlled turrets that were beyond its time in terms of automation.
The Superfortress was equipped with powerful radar devices, including the AN/APQ-13 and AN/APQ-7 Eagle, which allowed for accurate bombing even through layers of cloud covering targets from visual sight. It was due to such advanced devices that the B-29 was the most suitable aircraft for a mission of this magnitude.
For the airplane that was to be christened Enola Gay, there was a special “silverplate modification” it received for its ill-fated mission. In order to transport the gargantuan atomic bomb, all of the armor that protects the crew was removed to save weight, and the remote-controlled gun turrets were even de-equipped to further enhance speed, with only the tail gun position remaining for defense.
The Enola Gay, aircraft No. 82, had its name newly repainted by Private Nelson Miller below the pilot’s window at the command of Tibbets. It was a personalistic move, with the aircraft being named after Tibbets’s mother.
The atomic mission itself was a highly organized operation, involving the coordination of several aircraft. The one that would become historic in releasing the “Little Boy” bomb was the Enola Gay. It yielded an explosive force of 15,000 tons ofTNT and resulted in the deaths of about 135,000 to 200,000 people.
Following on from this mission, the Enola Gay flew as a weather reconnaissance for the second atomic bombing of Nagasaki by another B-29, the Bockscar. These activities would lead to the Japanese surrender and the end of the Second World War. After the war, the Enola Gay would rest in the Smithsonian Institution after serving in the Operation Crossroads atomic test program and while in storage.
