B-17 in WW II - crew positions and responsibilities

can not write about the B-17 as a bomber without writing about the crew. For in some ways, the crew and their Fortress were as one. So I present this brief overview of crew positions and responsibilities.

A typical B-17 was flown by a pilot and co-pilot with a crew of eight others, including gunners. I say typical because sometimes the numbers of gunners varied. In addition, I understand that later on in WW II, the navigator and bombardier positions were combined into one position done by one man.

• The pilot was the commander of the crew. In addition to being the pilot in command of the B-17, he was responsible for all aspects of crew training, discipline, safety and efficiency 24/7. But he was more than the commander, he was also one of the crew.
• The co-pilot was the executive officer. He must be as familiar as the pilot with all aspects of flying the B-17, ready to take over both as pilot and commander if necessary. The B-17 required a flight crew of two to fly the plane. For example, the co-pilot monitored and adjusted the power systems and performed a number of vital tasks from taxiing to take-off to climbing to flying to flying to and from the bombing target to approaching home base to landing.
• The task of navigating to and from the target was the job of the navigator using one or more of: (1) dead reckoning - using charts and visual references; (2) pilotage - using charts along with time, distance, and speed calculations; (3) use of radio navigation aides; and (4) using the sun observations or at night using stars and planets.
• As the B-17 arrived at the target, the bombardier takes over command of the plane (including flying) as they approached the bomb target. When they arrived at the target he released the bombs. Accurate bombing was crucial and that was the bombardier’s responsibility.
• Communications, working the radios, and keeping the radios in good working order was the job of the radio operator. There was a lot of radio equipment in the B-17 that allowed for both communications and navigation. He maintained a log and was often the photographer of the crew. A good radio operator knew his equipment inside out. He was also a gunner.
• Simply, the flight engineer knew the all equipment on the B-17 better than the pilot and any other crew member from the engines to the radio equipment to the armament to the engines to the electrical system and to anything else. Many flight engineers served as maintenance crew chiefs before moving to the position of a B-17 flight engineer. The flight engineer was also the top turret gunner.
• A typical crew had four gunners, sometimes less. In a configuration of four gunners there were two waist gunners (right and left), a tail gunner, and a ball turret gunner. The two waist gunners station was in the middle of the plane. As the name implies, the tail gunner’s position was in the tail and the ball turret gunner (a small man) position was in a turret underneath the B-17. Each gunner was responsible for their own armament and ensuring that their guns were in working order.

More information on each crew position may be found here. I want to note that I have the same information in excerpts from a WW II era pilots training manual for the B-17 that Jablonski included in an appendix (pp. 324-7) to his 1965 book, Flying Fortress: The Illustrated Biography of the B-17s and the Men Who Flew Them (by Edward Jablonski, Doubleday and Co.: Garden City, NY).

By this time I have read more than a few stories in various books written by WW II veterans who served as crew members on a B-17 (I'll post a list of references later). I have been deeply moved by what I read and along the way I learned about what these various crew members did. I was looking for something on the web that could give you some of what I got through the books I read. Fortunately, I found an excellent interactive graphic of crew positions in the B-17 maintained by the EAA who a restored B-17 Aluminum Overcast. You can click on a crew member in the graphic to hear a story from a surviving crew member. You may find the interactive graphic here as well as their photo gallery showing the interior of a B-17 and historical images. Added on September 4, 2011, the current page on the B-17 from EAA may be found here

Keep in mind that what I provide here and in future articles in this series on the B-17 in WW II is an overview along some websites where you may go for more information. For example, It is not my intent to delve into specifics of formation flying on bombing runs. Nor do I delve into the specific responsibilities of the crew of the plane leading the bombing run in regards to specifics like navigation and sighting the bomb target where the other planes in formation are following the lead plane; however the appropriate crew members of the planes following the lead plane had to know where they were and where the bombing target was in the event that something happened to the lead plane.

There is a wealth of information out there on heavy bombers in WW II, both on the web and in print form. I am barely touching the surface.

Next up - flying the B-17.