“Coming in on a Wing and a Prayer” — This was a popular song back in World War II, and this is where my story begins:
My crew was on our way from France into Germany on a bombing mission. The flak was very heavy. We lost some of our planes on this mission. Our plane, a B-26, was hit bad, but our pilot was able to fly the plane. The pilot and co-pilot noticed the gas gauges were going down. Some of the flak hit the fuel tanks, so we had to land at an alternate field. We knew the alternate field was nearby but couldn’t see ... because of the snow.
We thought we were going to have to parachute out, but it quit snowing and the clouds cleared away enough to see and below was the airstrip. The pilot made a quick approach, and as we were landing, we ran out of fuel. We landed safely.
God was certainly with us on this mission as well as the many other bombing missions we flew. Certainly, that was “coming in on a wing and a prayer.”
Submitted by Jay A. Hendricks, 83, of Owasso on the oklahomawwii.org Web site
