Robert N. McLean, Jr. Mission on July 14, 1944

July 14, 1944 – Friday

“Hungarian Goulash”

Mission #30 – target – Marshalling yards at Budapest in Hungary.  Takeoff 0600 Landing 1300 (0700) Total combat hours (156:10) Load – 6000 lbs (6 – 1000) Purpose to stop supplies from pouring into the south Russian front.  Budapest is the focal point of this route.  Remarks:

1)     Fighters (10 Me-109 and 5 Fw-190) attacked our formation at the IP.  That was the one and only pass made against us

2)     Flak was intense and accurate

3)     Ten flak holes in ship.  One particle of flak struck the plexiglass nose and didn’t penetrate

4)     Planes blowing up and colliding in the sky

5)     Target and half of Budapest in flames

6)     No casualties

7)     Statistics – total bomb tonnage (106,800)(53.4 tons)

8)     Squadron lost one plane due to fighter action (Lt. White borrowed from the 512th).  Plane spun in but all men bailed out

9)     As of July 12, 1944, all missions in the Budapest, Bucharest, and Ploesti area will cease to be considered as double missions.  No doubt some armchair general thought this one up.