At one point, when we stood near the left wing of Discovery, I thought about the shuttle Columbia.
And how could I blame him? The Space Shuttle Discovery was amazing to see up-close, and we spent a lot of time walking on all sides of it. In this closeup view of Discovery, it’s easy to see some of the nearly 25,000 heat resistant tiles that covered the orbiter and protected it from the high temperatures of re-entry.Įven though I wasn’t photographed inside the Hazy Center, that didn’t stop Tom from posing alongside some of the famous air and space craft while Bob manned the camera. The view of the nose section of Discovery as seen from a viewing platform that was located above the front of the famed Space Shuttle.
As a matter of fact, Discovery spent a cumulative total of almost a full year in space. During Discovery’s 27 years of service, it had been launched and landed 39 times. When we learned more about the retired space ship, I was blown away even more. The top of my camera case was left open so I could see the exhibits and I was blown away by the sheer size of Space Shuttle Discovery. Once we were through the doors of the massive complex, we headed straight for the Space Shuttle. That complex was an annex to the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum. Udvar-Hazy Center that was located near Chantilly, Virginia. Even though there was no plan of me being photographed near any of the exhibits, I was excited that I would see three historic aircraft: The Space Shuttle Discovery, the Enola Gay, and the Gemini 7 space capsule. The Udvar-Hazy Center was home to thousands of aircraft, as well as some famous space craft. Udvar-Hazy Center, an annex of the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum, at around 11:00am on July 19, 2014. After all, I had stood where no bobble head has ever dared to stand – on the grave of President John F. Tibbets hand-selected the Enola GayĪnd the Bockscar, right off of the assembly line.Following our visit to Arlington, my mind was racing during the 45-minute ride to Chantilly, Virginia.
The pressurized cabin was an upgrade to the Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress. The four-engine, propeller-driven plane was used throughout World War II and into the Korean War. The Enola Gay is a handsome plane: a Boeing B-29 Superfortress bomber. Happened - and the plane that did it was named after Paul Tibbets' mother, Enola Gay Tibbets. No matter what the verdict is, the fact remains that it The Japanese were already defeated and ready to surrender because of the effective sea blockade and the successful bombing with conventional weapons. It is my opinion that the use of this barbarous weapon at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war against Japan. Eisenhower had said that it "wasn't necessary to hit them with thatĪwful thing." Admiral William Leahy, the top ranking military official in the United States from 1942 until 1949, said: Not all of the top military officials were in agreement with Tibbets on this. I'm proud that I was able to start with nothing, plan it and have it work as perfectly as it did . While some interviews with the man indicate some degree of remorse, it appears that Tibbets truly believed in the cause of what he was doing. Still, Tibbets went back and forth in regards to the subject for the remainder of his life (he died in 2007).
Mine were, basically, 'this is a tremendous thing. Everybody was thinking, there's no question in my mind about that. When it struck, the bomb immediately took the lives of 80,000 Japanese citizens - when the radiation-related deaths were factored in, the number grew to an estimated 150,000 or more.Īfterwards, I guess you'd call it a quiet and melancholy group going back. Tibbets was the pilot in charge of dropping the first-ever atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. had seen combat he'd seen a war-devastated Germany and his brothers in arms die in front of him-but what he hadn't foreseen was the effect that an atomic bomb could have on an entire country of people. But when I looked at it-when I saw what had taken place, and I saw the city covered, and what appeared to be going on-I knew that I just hadn't even come close to imagining what the effect was.Ĭolonel Paul Warfield Tibbets Jr.