I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to photograph the Liberty Belle, one of the 15 remaining Boeing  B-17 bombers that is still flying, when it visited Fort Lauderdale’s Executive Airport this last weekend. Awesome, would be a good way to describe it.

A bit of history; On September 9, 1944 the 390th Bomb Group sent 12 aircraft to take part in a bombing raid on Dusseldorf, Germany. Over the target, one plane was hit in the bomb bay by flack, detonating the 1000 pound bombs it was carrying and destroying or knocking out of formation 9 of the 12 aircraft in the squadron. Six of those went down over the target, 2 flew on a single engine and landed in Paris, one made it to Belgium. The lone damaged plane to make it back to its home base was the Liberty Belle. After that raid, the Liberty Belle went on to complete 64 more combat missions before being salvaged.

Liberty Bell Foundation Website