With these changes, the Silverplate B-29s could fly higher and faster than a standard B-29, and the new engines were more reliable. Enola Gay carried 1,000 rounds of ammunition for each of the two remaining Browning AN-M2. Their remote sighting positions were also removed. With the exception of the tail gunner’s position, all defensive armament-four powered remotely operated gun turrets with ten. The engines drove four-bladed Curtiss Electric reversible-pitch propellers with a diameter of 16 feet, 8 inches (5.080 meters), through a 0.35:1 gear reduction. at Sea Level, and 2,200 horsepower at 2,800 r.p.m, for take-off. It was rated at 2,000 horsepower at 2,400 r.p.m. The R-3350-41 had a compression ratio of 6.85:1 and required 100/130 aviation gasoline. National Archives and Records Administration)Įnola Gay had four air-cooled, supercharged, 3,347.662-cubic-inch-displacement (54.858 liter) Wright Aeronautical Division R-3350-41 (Cyclone 18 787C18BA3) two-row 18-cylinder radial engines with direct fuel injection. (Sergeant Armen Shamlian, United States Army Air Forces. Tibbets, Jr., waves from the cockpit of the Silverplate Martin-Omaha B-29-45-MO Superfortress Enola Gay, 44-86292, just before starting engines at 02:27 a.m., 6 August 1945. A weaponeer’s control station was added to the cockpit to monitor the special bomb systems. The bomb release mechanism in the forward bomb bay was replaced by a single-point release as was used in special British Lancaster bombers. The bomb bay doors were operated by quick-acting pneumatic systems. Additional fuel tanks were installed in the rear bomb bay. They were approximately 6,000 pounds (2,722 kilograms) lighter. The Silverplate B-29s differed from the standard production bombers in many ways. The standard B-29 had an empty weight of 74,500 pounds (33,793 kilograms) and gross weight of 120,000 pounds (54.431 kilograms). The B-29 Superfortress was 99 feet, 0 inches (30.175 meters) long with a wingspan of 141 feet, 3 inches (43.053 meters) and an overall height of 27 feet, 9 inches (8.458 meters). The B-29 was the most technologically advanced airplane built up to that time, and required an immense effort by American industry to produce. A total of 3,943 Superfortresses were built. Martin Company at Fort Crook (now Offutt Air Force Base, Omaha, Nebraska. Produced in three major version, the B-29, B-29A and B-29B, it was built by Boeing at Wichita, Kansas and Renton, Washington by the Bell Aircraft Corporation at Marietta, Georgia and the Glenn L. The B-29 Superfortress was designed by the Boeing Airplane Company as its Model 345. Lewis, a B-29 aircraft commander who would act as Tibbets’ co-pilot on the atomic bombing mission.
The B-29 was accepted by the Army Air Corps on 15 May and flown to the 509th’s base at Wendover, Utah, by Captain Robert A. Martin Company plant at Bellevue, Nebraska.
He had personally selected this bomber, serial number 44-86292, while it was still on the assembly line at the Glenn L. On the morning before the mission, Colonel Tibbets had his mother’s name painted on the nose of the airplane: Enola Gay.
Code named “Little Boy,” the Mark I bomb unit L-11, prior to loading aboard Enola Gay, 5 August 1945. Although it was a very inefficient weapon, it was considered to be such reliable design that it had not been tested. The bomb was 120 inches (3.048 meters) long with a diameter of 28 inches (0.711 meter). It contained 64 kilograms (141.1 pounds) of highly-enriched uranium.
This was a 9,700-pound (4,400 kilogram) “gun type” fission bomb, the Mark I, code-named Little Boy. Tibbets, Jr., was carrying Bomb Unit L-11, the first nuclear weapon to be used during war. The Martin-Omaha B-29-45-MO Superfortress, 44-86292, under the command of Colonel Paul W. Colonel Paul Warfield Tibbets, Jr., United States Army Air Corps, Commanding Officer, 509th Composite Group, and aircraft commander of the B-29 Superfortress, Enola Gay. Air Force)Ħ August 1945: At 0245 hours, a four-engine, long range heavy bomber of the 509th Composite Group, United States Army Air Forces, took off from North Field on the island of Tinian in the Northern Mariana Islands, on the most secret combat mission of World War II. Silverplate Martin-Omaha B-29-45-MO Superfortress 44-86292, “Dimples 82,” at Tinian, Marshall Islands, August 1945.