The Bomber Stream

B-17 Flying Fortresses of the Eighth Air Force cross into Germany at altitude, flying the tight stacked formation the crews called a combat box. Above 20,000 feet the exhaust froze into contrails that could be seen for fifty miles — a signpost for every German fighter and flak battery on the route.

The black smudges around the airplanes are flak. Crews flew through it straight and level on the bomb run, unable to turn or climb, while the temperature outside the fuselage fell to forty below. A tour was twenty-five missions in 1943. By 1944 it was thirty-five, and by then a thousand heavy bombers could be sent against a single target.

The Eighth Air Force lost some 26,000 men killed — more than the entire Marine Corps lost in the war.

The picture is almost abstract — diagonal white lines pulled taut across a blue-violet sky, dark shapes moving along them, black flak bursts scattered like ink. The lead formation is close enough to see turrets and open bomb bays; the rest fade toward the horizon until they are specks. A cold sun hangs top right. Below, an unbroken cloud deck hides whatever they are flying over. There is no ground, no target, no enemy in view — only altitude and exposure.