TSgt Alfred W. Young, Jr. - 514th Squadron Radio Operator/Gunner

by Stuart Young
(San Antonio, TX)

TSgt Young's 15th combat sortie, again with the Ehrenberg crew, targeted the Schwechat Oil Refinery near Vienna, Austria on March 15, 1945. "Went on a 7 hour and 50 minute mission in Carpenter's #76. Target was east of Vienna - Schwechat. Flak was in great barrages of big box concentrations which bounced the ship many times. Got a good view of the blue Danube and the residential section of Vienna, bridges, etc. Red nosed P-38s barrel rolled in pursuit of curved box 77. Our hydraulic line was shot out with a four inch ragged hole of flak. Suction system was out also after hit by flak under the right pitot tube over the navigator's head and out of the left top side, three feet in front of the pilot's windshield. We cranked the main gear down, taking 32.5 turns, then kicked the nose wheel out, then pumped the flaps down. We were the last plane to land after circling the field for 3/4 of an hour. After we landed with two big bounces, I signed the payroll and got a typhus shot." The next day, he noted, "Typhus shot laid me kind of low, but took a shower anyway as I had been flying the past two days."