My dad flew B17s regularly into the late '60s. He
flew something called the Fulton Skycrane which if you
may recall is the plane used to pick up James Bond and
'Domino' from a raft in the ocean in the movie
Thunderball. Incidentally, the B-17 could actually
only fit one person at a time through the hole (where
they cut off the tail's gun), so when they filmed the
movie the plane landed with the "James Bond" and
"Domino" mannequins jammed in the hole and legs
sticking out the back of the B-17!
Dad was the operational flight commander and flew this
plane in a daring mission called operation Coldfoot in
1962. Coldfoot was an Agency mission to fly into
Arctic Russia and drop two agents to spend a week
doing reconnaissance on a state-of-the-art Russian
listening post that was abandoned when it broke away
from the ice pack and pressure ridges had formed
making it inaccessible by airplane.
If you know anything about aviation navigation at the
time, imagine flying this B-17 for 16-24 hours in the
Arctic (they added fuel tanks in the bomb bays),
finding an unmarked speck in the ocean, and doing this
all without the aid of a compass, GPS, beacons,
landmarks or celestial marks. The navigator for the
mission (who lives in Marin County) should get a
medal. Also imagine the brave insanity of the agents
who volunteered to be picked up from the ice in Arctic
temperatures dangling on a 1,000ft. nylon chord stuck
on one end to the agent, and on the other end to a
B-17... a flying B-17! It is the only mission my
father flew which is officially declassified by the
CIA. You can read about it here:
http://www.cia.gov/csi/studies/95unclass/Leary.html
and my dad is in the cockpit here:
http://www.cia.gov/csi/studies/95unclass/104.gif
Incidentally, my father had worked with Fulton on the
Skyhook system originally to rescue Al Pope who was my
father's wingman when shot down flying a B-26 in 1958
trying to overthrow Sukarno in Indonesia. Al Pope
spent four years in Indonesian prison as a POW.
I flew in this B-17 as a little kid all the time and
flew in it as recently as 2000 ... it is now owned by
Evergreen Aviation in Oregon. It was originally used
by the Agency to fly missions into Communist China in
the 1950s.
Dad also flew B-26s, PBYs, C-46s and C-130s (actually
41 different airplanes in all) first in the Army Air
Corps in WWII then from 1949 - 1975 for the Agency.
If you ever want to know the real truth about any of
the stuff that they did during that time, ask me...
my dad was there!
He also helped me restore my BJ8 ... he learned alot
about working metal when he was building B-24
Liberators in La Jolla prior to him volunteering for
duty in 1943.
Cheers,
Alan Seigrist
'53 BN1 '64 BJ8
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