42nd BMW SAC B-36 June 30, 1956.avi

This is short film containing never-before-seen footage of 42nd Bombardment Wing, B-36 Peacemakers, filmed on June 30, 1956. The B-36s portrayed in this never-before-seen footage, were flown from Loring Air Force Base, Maine to Pease Air Force Base, New Hampshire for that bases opening ceremony. Within months of this historical footage being filmed, the B-36 Peacemaker was retired. The largest Nuclear Weapon ever developed by the United States was the Mark-17 Thermonuclear bomb. It weighed 39,000 pounds and ONLY the B-36 could carry it.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• Loring
• Air Force
• Maine
• B36
• Peacemaker
• SAC
• 42nd BMW

[kolbpilot]

Just a big long cigar tube with wings. But man, what a plane. In my brief Air Force career, which happened to be under the Strategic Air Command, I was assigned to the only 2 SAC bases that had an 'arch hangar' built specifically to house a B-36.

[380BMWSAC]

@kolbpilot The two bases were Loring AFB & Ellsworth AFB.

[kolbpilot]

@380BMWSAC Indeed. I enjoyed Ellsworth way more than Loring.

[vonmazur1]

"Carmina Burana" Carl Orff....

Dale

[Dagger82]

Thank you very much for posting this video...brings back so many memories from my childhood. Dad was top turret/flight engineer on B-17 with 398th Bomb Group (Heavy) and completed 28 missions over occupied Europe. While transitioning to B-29s, the war ended yet he stayed in and went to OCS. After Navigator School at Mather AFB in Sacramento, he trained for and flew crew in B-36s. I started school in Salina, KS and remember him flying out of Smokey Hill to Alaska and back before dinner.

[alnot01]

The Cold War at its grimmest starred the B-36, not the B-52. The B-36 is the largest attack aircraft ever built, and the largest piston powered airplane ever mass produced. The engineers who designed it had no idea of anything like the Mark 17. But when it came, the B-36 could carry it.

Is the sound track by Carl Orff?