42-31111
Crashes > of the USAAF
After the B-17 "Four Aces-Pat Hand" had dropped its bombs on the target Leverkusen, several eyewitnesses from other aircraft observed that the aircraft fell back and lost altitude. It flew with its bomb bay doors open, but with its engines running and propellers turning, but was unable to keep up with the returning bomber stream at the turning point to the west. It lost more and more altitude until it disappeared in the low-hanging cloud cover. No parachutists were sighted either...
At around 12:30, eyewitnesses on the ground observed that the B-17 crashed into the Rhine at Niederfeld near Büderich at Rhine kilometre 751.9. No survivors were found and no parachutists were sighted. The crash into the Rhine was recorded by the Büderich fire brigade in the war diary, where it is stated that the aircraft was shot down by anti-aircraft fire.
Why the B-17 lost altitude so quickly after the drop will remain a mystery. Allegedly, the aircraft received an anti-aircraft hit near the third engine about two minutes before reaching Leverkusen. We can only speculate whether this early anti-aircraft hit put important parts of the aircraft out of action or hit the oxygen supply in the aircraft. The latter would speak in favour of why nobody left the aircraft by parachute.
The entire crew died in the crash, no one has been found to date and all are still missing.
I have researched intensively whether wreckage of the B-17 was recovered from the Rhine in the first years after the war. There are no or no longer any records of this, nor can eyewitnesses remember such a recovery. The fate of the B-17 42-31111 and its crew will therefore remain forever unsolved.
My special thanks go to Mr. Zimmermann from the Neuss Waterways and Shipping Office, who made a great effort to clarify this crash.
I would also like to thank Mrs Sandra Wittig from the archives in Meerbusch for providing the documents of the Büderich fire brigade.
Above:
The crash area near Büderich
below:
the crash site at Rhine kilometre 751.9
Left:
The pilot, 2nd Lt Donald Noxon
Left:
The co-pilot, 2nd Lt George D. Giovannini