While making the bomb run the plane was hit by flak. Causing the plane to go up and over on its back and into a spin. I saw the Navigator, who did not have on a chute, thrown against the right side of the ship in the nose, when the plane started spinning, and I never did see him leave the position. After some difficulty, due to the spinning plane, I bailed out, opening my chute at about 3,000 or 4,000 feet and laded northeast of Moreni, Rumania. I saw the plane falling about a half a mile away in four pieces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Major Chester R. Haas<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Source: MACR 4712<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Delivered Denver 29\/12\/43; 1SAG Langley 11\/1\/44; Assigned 49BS\/2BG Amendola 2\/3\/44; transferred 32BS\/301BG Lucera 9\/4\/44; transferred 774BS\/463BG Celone 4\/44; Missing in Action Ploesti 5\/5\/44 with Rich Fontaneau, Co-pilot: Nat Drutman, Navigator: Alphonse Adams, Bombardier: Chester Haas [Gp. Bomb.], Waist gunner: Don McDowell (5POW\/ Returned to Duty); Flight engineer\/top turret gunner: Norbert Kemper, Radio Operator: Ray Svatos, Ball turret gunner: John Cullen,Tail gunner: Howard Sippel (4 Killed in Action); flak, crashed Moreni; Missing Air Crew Report 4712. BLUE CHAMPAGNE.","protected":false},"featured_media":10472,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":[],"airplane-status":[136],"status-date":[946],"status-day":[1859],"status-month":[1871],"status-year":[1892],"production-block":[90],"manufacturer":[144],"delivered":[],"project-number":[],"bomb-group":[274,276,499],"bomb-squadron":[493,509,901],"raf-service":[],"b17tags":[],"class_list":["post-4817","b17database","type-b17database","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","airplane-status-lost-by-enemy-aircraft","status-date-05-05-1944","status-day-1859","status-month-may","status-year-1892","production-block-b-17g-20-ve-42-97536-42-97635","manufacturer-lockheed-vega","bomb-group-2nd-bomb-group","bomb-group-301st-bomb-group","bomb-group-463rd-bomb-group","bomb-squadron-32nd-bomb-squadron","bomb-squadron-49th-bomb-squadron","bomb-squadron-774th-bomb-squadron"],"translation":{"provider":"WPGlobus","version":"3.0.0","language":"en","enabled_languages":["de","en"],"languages":{"de":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":true},"en":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":true}}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/b17database\/4817","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/b17database"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/b17database"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4817"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10472"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4817"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"airplane-status","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/airplane-status?post=4817"},{"taxonomy":"status-date","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/status-date?post=4817"},{"taxonomy":"status-day","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/status-day?post=4817"},{"taxonomy":"status-month","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/status-month?post=4817"},{"taxonomy":"status-year","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/status-year?post=4817"},{"taxonomy":"production-block","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/production-block?post=4817"},{"taxonomy":"manufacturer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/manufacturer?post=4817"},{"taxonomy":"delivered","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/delivered?post=4817"},{"taxonomy":"project-number","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/project-number?post=4817"},{"taxonomy":"bomb-group","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bomb-group?post=4817"},{"taxonomy":"bomb-squadron","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bomb-squadron?post=4817"},{"taxonomy":"raf-service","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/raf-service?post=4817"},{"taxonomy":"b17tags","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/b17flyingfortress.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/b17tags?post=4817"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}