Amber Gambler: Mission 6

For their sixth mission, the crew of the Gambler welcomed some reinforcements to replace the casualties suffered in their last mission. The new crew members are Bombardier Martin Thorpe and Waist Gunners Steve Johnson and Christian Maude.
The B-17 crews were given some bad news during the mission briefing, there would no longer be dedicated fighter escort for the missions, the crews would have to just rely on whatever fighters were around. To compensate for this the bombers would be travelling in much greater numbers to the targets.
The target for this mission was the industrial area around Lille. The Gambler took to the skies over Northamptonshire and formed up in the middle of their formation which was in the low squadron of the bomber wave and headed for France.
Over the channel they were met by three FW190's but managed to damage two of them and carried on towards the target.
As the bombers flew over France they were met by Me109's but fortunately there were also plenty of friendly Mustangs around which drove the Nazi fighters away. Arriving over the target things started to get a little dicey. The weather had turned quite poor which would make the bomb run difficult and hordes of Luftwaffe fighters waited to greet the American bombers. Flying through the gauntlet of fire from the enemy fighters the Gambler was repeatedly hit by enemy fire which turned the nose of the plane into swiss cheese. One canon shell exploded in the nose compartment wounding both Bombardier Martin Thorpe and Navigator Adam Wright, though neither was overly serious. Another shell destroyed the bomb release mechanism which meant the bombs would have to be dropped manually. This was not an easy process and as a result all the bombs missed the target.
With the bombs gone the Gambler turned round and headed for home. Still the Nazi fighters swarmed round the bombers and Martin Thorpe managed to blow one out of the sky. The Gambler continued her flight home through the hail of enemy shells receiving countless hits, though none that caused any real damage except for a wound to Port Waist Gunner Steve Johnson, again though it wasn't too serious.
Reaching the English Channel the bombers met with some RAF Spitfires that drove away the remaining enemy fighters and they were able to proceed the rest of the way back unmolested.
This is the sixth mission completed for the Gambler and there were three more Purple Hearts awarded to the crew members that got wounded on the flight.