Masters of the Air with an Aviator turned Historian (a Watch with History episode)

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Welcome to Talk With History.

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I'm your host Scott here with my wife and historian, Jen.

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Hello.

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Today's podcast is part of our series We are Calling Watch With History.

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The Watch with History series will focus on your favorite historical

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films where Jen and I will review the Hollywood historic classics we all

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know and love, while also discussing the history behind these films

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along with some interesting facts.

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We hope you enjoy watch with history.

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3, 2, 1.

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Here we go.

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And real quick, before we get into our main topic, I just

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wanna give a shout out to.

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VA jam over.

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They gave us five star review on Apple podcasts.

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That's awesome.

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So I really appreciate that.

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The title of the five Star review is Bedford Boys.

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I was incredibly moved by this episode.

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Thank you for sharing.

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We have received a lot of really great feedback on that episode.

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If you're watching this and you're curious, the Bedford Boys, we talk about.

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The National World War II Monument Monument in Bedford,

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Virginia that we got to visit.

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It's an amazing, it's probably one of the best episodes that

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I've done for the podcast.

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Um, and I, I've re received some incredible feedback on that.

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It's a very good sister episode to this since we're about World War II today.

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Call Lincoln in the show notes.

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Uh, Bedford Boyce is about D-Day, and it's about per capita, Bedford

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Virginia took the highest loss of life.

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Than any other city or town in the United States of America.

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That's right.

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So again, thank you for the feedback.

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Uh, we we're getting more stars, I guess on Spotify.

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They don't do reviews.

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We've got seven, five star reviews over on Spotify.

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So if you're listening, thank you so much.

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Leave us a review on Apple Podcasts, five star reviews, positive or negative.

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We will read them.

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And also kind give us a drop us some stars on Spotify as well.

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Today's episode is for the history buffs and the aviation enthusiasts.

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Because we're taking off on a deep dive into the skies of World War ii,

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we are zeroing in on the Apple TV plus mini series Masters of the Air.

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A show that's captivated audiences with its portrayal of the eighth

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Air Force's B 17 Bomber Crews.

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But how close does Masters of the air actually fly to the historical

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realities of those missions?

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And more importantly, what is it really like to be strapped into

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one of those metal beasts hurdling towards flack filled German skies?

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Now as a naval aviator, Jen spent countless hours in cockpits facing down

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G-forces and the ever present threat of that pesky thing called gravity.

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But I'm sure nothing compares to the pressure cooker of a B 17 on

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a daylight raid over Nazi Germany.

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These young Americans, barely out of their teens faced unimaginable dangers, icy

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temperatures, oxygen deprivation, and the constant dance with death that came from

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German fighters and anti-aircraft fire.

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So in this episode, we're gonna pull back the curtain on masses of the air.

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We'll separate the Hollywood heroics from the.

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Gut wrenching reality by examining the decisions the characters

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make in the heat of the moment and why they do what they do.

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From the Bombardiers agonizing choices to the pilot's split.

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Second reactions, we'll explore the psychology and the tactics that

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keep these planes in their crews in the air mission after mission.

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So strap yourselves in, folks.

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We're about to take off on a journey through history.

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A flight into the heart of what it meant to be a master of the air.

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Alright, Jen here, here we are talking about Masters of the Air.

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Ugh.

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I'm so excited to do this episode.

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I'm so honored to do this episode and to talk about this because oh, we always.

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We laugh about it because the running joke is, how do you know

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who the pilots are in the room?

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Don't worry.

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They'll tell you.

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That's right.

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And I, Scott says, I always seem to work into a conversation that I'm a pilot.

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I always seem to work it in somehow.

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And if you're a pilot, you understand that you've worked really hard, you've

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mastered an aircraft, you've mastered something, you've gotten your wings.

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It's it's accomplishment that you're really proud of.

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I always say there's two egotistical people you want in your life,

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your surgeon and your pilot.

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That's right.

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So this is where we start to see, uh, in, in this episode.

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I really appreciate those kind of characteristics, those types of

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characters, those types of people, and.

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There are people on here who, who we surprisingly don't know

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that I'm a pilot, so yeah.

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She wears a hat with little aviator wings on it.

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She wears a flight jacket in multiple videos.

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Yes.

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But if for, for those who who aren't familiar with, this is the first time

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you're seeing one of our, our episodes.

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So Jen was a naval ator.

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She flew in the Navy for about seven years.

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She got the chance to fly all sorts of different aircraft.

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I mean, even as a midshipman, she got to fly in an F 14, F 14, so

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she flew T 30 fours, which is F three, t3, all all those aircraft.

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Mm-Hmm.

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She, she got to fly.

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Now, her primary aircraft was.

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Helicopter Helicopter B, black Hawk paint silver.

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Yeah.

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Seahawk.

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So, so, but she flew combat missions right after nine 11.

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I mean, she's legit.

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And so I, I like to kind of put that out there and me put that out there

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so that people kind of understand where we're going in this podcast.

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'cause not only are we gonna talk about the show, some of it's.

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Historical kind of inaccuracies, but you're also gonna talk about kind of the

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mindset of pilots that fly into combat.

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Mm-Hmm.

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And kind of why, especially in these first couple episodes

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they're doing what they're doing.

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Yes.

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And I like to stress too, that I, I was winged 20 something years

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ago, so my call sign was Yoko.

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I broke up the band, one of the first females.

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So proving yourself a lot as a woman.

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But first in my class at a flight school and always rated one of

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the best pilots in the squadron.

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And I had great comradery with all the guys I flew with because.

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You will see, just like in Masters of the Air personalities can be very different,

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but when you start to build the trust that you're good at your job, then that

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love comes shining through and it really doesn't matter when you're in the cockpit.

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It's you two in your crew and you've got each other and you're in this together.

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So that really is the camaraderie you feel as a pilot.

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So that's what I think they're really trying to show in the first couple

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episodes is these hodgepodge crews, these hodgepodge people coming from

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all around the US and they stress out with the dots on the map.

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Yep.

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That these men are coming from all different areas.

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So this very different personalities and they're showing.

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These two really good characters who are gonna have this deep seated love for

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each other that are very different and love, I mean the brotherhood love, they

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are gonna really rely on each other to get each other through this together.

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And that's GaN and Cleven.

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Yeah.

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And.

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They couldn't be more different.

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When you really think about it, they, they, they really are.

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And they, I think they do a good job as we record this.

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We've only seen the, the first two episodes.

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Mm-Hmm.

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But Jen's been reading the book and, and so we've kind

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of making our way through it.

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We're looking forward to the next episode coming out.

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And, you know, kind of one last thing that, that Jen wanted to stress

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before we kind of really dive into the show and the characters was kind of

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the, you know, the, you know, you've acknowledged kind of your own bias here.

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Yeah.

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So I wanted to talk about that.

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As a historian, and I am a historian, academic historian, you have to

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acknowledge your bias, and my bias will definitely be on the side of

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these pilots because I know what it takes to go through this training.

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It's hard training.

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It's academic, it's fast paced, it's high level, and then you have to fly at

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high efficiency and be very good at it.

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And what they don't show is what it takes to make it through flight school.

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And how many people actually wash out a flight school?

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'cause you have to be both.

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You have to be good at knowing their aircraft and schematics and what

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an aircraft is doing, but you also have to fly the aircraft and be

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good at understanding aerodynamics.

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And so.

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What you're gonna see a lot of, and they've already stressed it in these

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first couple episodes, and we'll talk more about this is the high learning curve

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that all of these men are going through.

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This type of bombing is new.

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This type of flying is new for them.

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This bomb site is new, even though they've gotten very proficient of it in America.

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They're not proficient using it in Europe.

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Different weather conditions.

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Even when you see GaN listen to Crosby who's giving him

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details about how to fly back.

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He's, I, I suggest we go 2, 4 4 and then turn south when we hit Scotland.

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And then you see GaN think about it.

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Let's do that.

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That's not what normally happens.

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Your plans are all done before you even leave.

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Right.

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But they're adjusting on the fly.

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They're adjusting on the fly.

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Yeah.

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And you're gonna see this, you're gonna see the, this is

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unknown territory for these men.

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This is new.

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They're making it up as they go.

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So you're gonna see error, you're gonna see human error and

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you're so, you're gonna see me.

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Really feel for them and, and making their decisions in the cockpit and making

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them quickly, under a lot of pressure.

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And because I know what that feels like, I'm going to be biased and really

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side with them and, and forgive them a lot of their errors where there will

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be a lot of that probably happening.

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Yeah.

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And, and I think that's good to acknowledge so.

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Let's dive in.

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Yes.

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Let's dive into the show.

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So we've watched the first couple episodes, so why don't you kinda lay

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the groundwork for us and, and for the audience about where we're at,

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kind of the general setting, and then let's, let's just kind of dive in.

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So we're gonna talk about the bloody 100th.

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So you have to think of the eighth Air Force.

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We've seen Banded brothers.

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They're giving you the infantry of the Army.

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You've seen the Pacific.

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They're giving you the Marines.

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This is gonna be the Army Air Corps.

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So we're getting the third chapter, and this is the eighth Air Force.

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This is the hundredth bomber group.

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Bombardment group, and it's made up of four squadrons, which the

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numbers are weird and crazy.

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Because I never understood how squadron numbers are made

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up anyway, in the military.

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You know what, it's kind of like a classic, it's a running joke on any

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military base that two buildings that are next to each other, their

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numbers could be two and then 217, it's probably the same thing.

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Right?

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The numbering just doesn't really make sense.

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It doesn't.

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So the, the four squadrons that are part of the hundred that are there at Thorpe

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Abbott's airfield is 3 49, 3 53 51, and.

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Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:12</time>
So those are the four groups you're gonna get.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:14</time>
And you have Egan's in one, CLS in another.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:17</time>
And so you're gonna get, they're making up these four groups now.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:21</time>
They're in, um, nor Norfolk, England, and we're in Norfolk, Virginia.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:25</time>
Oh yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:26</time>
That's interesting.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:26</time>
So it's very interesting.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:27</time>
It's about an hour and a half north of London.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:30</time>
It's by Norridge.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:31</time>
So they're, they're kind of close to the, like a little

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:34</time>
city, but away from the big city.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:37</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:37</time>
And this is another kind of change.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:39</time>
You're gonna see from like Band of Brothers or Pacific.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:42</time>
You're gonna see.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:44</time>
Hot meals, you're gonna see warm showers, you're gonna see them being

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:48</time>
woken up from nice, warm bunks.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:50</time>
So this is a different type of warfare these air crew are fighting, right?

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:54</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:54</time>
Because they're, they're, they're flying back.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:56</time>
You know, those that make it back, they're flying back from their mission.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:58</time>
Mm-Hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:11:59</time>
To a spot that is well behind.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:01</time>
Enemy line, they're flying back to England, north of London.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:05</time>
Yes.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:05</time>
And these airfields, because there's hundreds of these airfields that

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:09</time>
basically were put up in London and surrounding areas, they're kind

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:12</time>
of squeezed into village areas.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:15</time>
So what you also see is a lot of civilians that are kind of like on the airfield with

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:21</time>
them and kind of watching and and farming.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:24</time>
As they're landing aircraft, which you don't get stateside here in

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:28</time>
America, our airfields are, are bases.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:31</time>
So they're, they're, they're fenced off.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:32</time>
Fenced off.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:33</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:33</time>
And so you're not gonna see that here.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:35</time>
So you're getting this understanding that this war fighting during

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:38</time>
World War II was very much immersed into the whole civilian lifestyle.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:43</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:43</time>
I mean, it was all hands on deck.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:45</time>
You know, for in the Navy, that means that everybody's fighting.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:47</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:47</time>
And so the local people built these places for them.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:51</time>
So.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:52</time>
Even if you visit Thorpe Abbott today, there's a real sense of community there.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:55</time>
People are very protective of their history.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:58</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:12:58</time>
That these men came and did.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:00</time>
So there's a lot of comradery there, and I.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:03</time>
There is a little, kind of the spoiler alert, there is a kind of little

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:06</time>
animosity scene between the British pilots and the American pilots.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:10</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:11</time>
It was episode one, I think, and I think people have a little hard time with

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:13</time>
that because they're like, well, there really wasn't this kind of animosity,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:16</time>
but you and I spoke about this in this Hollywood ease that gets done.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:20</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:20</time>
And we really believe.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:23</time>
Spielberg doesn't just throw characters in for no reason, and there is gonna be a

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:26</time>
moment where there's like a full circle.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:28</time>
The hundredth is gonna become the bloody hundredth and these men are

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:31</time>
going to these British men Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:33</time>
Are really gonna appreciate.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:33</time>
Nope.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:34</time>
Uh, my, my only guess is that those, these, these Brits are

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:37</time>
gonna, uh, make a second appearance somewhere during the show.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:39</time>
We haven't seen it yet.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:40</time>
We haven't seen it yet, but, so we kind of open up the beginning of

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:46</time>
June and so you have to think Thorpe Abbott flew its first mission.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:50</time>
June 25th, and that's, we're gonna, they're gonna lo lose those

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:53</time>
three bombers and that was 44.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:55</time>
43.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:56</time>
43 43.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:57</time>
And so they're gonna fly their last mission in 45.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:13:59</time>
So you got 8 22 months.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:01</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:01</time>
Right.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:01</time>
So in 22 months, you're going to see a lot, and I stress this to people.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:07</time>
When America entered the war, we were like sixth in creating

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:11</time>
aircraft, making aircraft.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:12</time>
We were sixth in a, in military wise.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:15</time>
By the end of the war, we're number one.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:17</time>
Yeah, that's crazy.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:17</time>
We're be rolling off aircraft like crazy.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:20</time>
We're gonna, the whole country comes together and starts building.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:23</time>
When they're losing these aircraft, they're replacing these aircraft.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:27</time>
And the 17 is the third most built bomber, but the 24, the liberator is

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:32</time>
gonna be the first most built bomber.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:34</time>
So you can imagine they're just turning out these aircraft, the 17 that you

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:39</time>
see on there in the, in the show.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:41</time>
It's pretty authentic.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:42</time>
It's hard because it's not a lot of seventeens that fly now.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:45</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:45</time>
B seventeens.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:46</time>
B seventeens.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:47</time>
So.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:48</time>
It's CGI i'd, but remember this is, I think it's before they got the

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:52</time>
chin turt on the front, but it's called the Flying Fortress because

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:56</time>
the first time somebody looked at it and saw all these guns, they're

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:14:59</time>
like, wow, that's a flying fortress.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:02</time>
And that's how it got its nickname has the ball turt underneath it

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:06</time>
has what they call a square D.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:07</time>
So they have a D on the tail that's painted with a white square behind it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:12</time>
Oh, okay.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:12</time>
And that's the hundredth.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:14</time>
So when you see the square D on the tail.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:17</time>
And each bomber has 10 people on it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:21</time>
So when you start to have these losses of aircraft, that's something

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:25</time>
that is very different than you're gonna see at Band of Brothers.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:28</time>
And Well, and I was thinking about, I was thinking about the 10 people in this

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:33</time>
aircraft, because I think it's about the same amount of people in a B 29 mm-Hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:37</time>
B 29 is much, much bigger, bigger aircraft.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:39</time>
Mm-Hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:40</time>
Pressurized ca, you know, cabin and all that stuff.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:44</time>
Our Masters of the air video, we have a master of the air video where we go

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:47</time>
to the National Air and Space Museum.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:49</time>
Mm-Hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:49</time>
Um, as well as Arlington National Cemetery and visit some of these real masters

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:53</time>
there, real masters of the air and they have the fuselage of a B 17 there.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:15:58</time>
And I'm thinking you're walking next to it and it's not like it's towering over you.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:03</time>
10 men in this aircraft.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:06</time>
I mean, a lot of 'em are just kinda.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:09</time>
They, they can't stand up all the way.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:11</time>
It, it's, that's a, that's 10 men in this aircraft.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:14</time>
That's a lot, that's a lot for the, for the size of, of the aircraft.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:17</time>
It's you, you kind of have to, if you ever get a chance to be in the DC

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:21</time>
area and you go to National Air Space Museum, try to go see that it's, right

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:23</time>
now it's off kind of in the back.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:25</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:26</time>
I have a feeling once this show gets more popular, it will kind

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:29</time>
of, it might be brought out.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:31</time>
So I wanna stress some things because again, I, my heart belongs to the

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:36</time>
air crew and the people who are on this aircraft and the people who

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:39</time>
are keeping this aircraft flying.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:41</time>
10 men in this aircraft, most of them are not gonna wear seat belts.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:46</time>
Most of them might be strapped into their gun, the ball tour guy, but other

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:49</time>
people are doing two or three jobs.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:51</time>
Navigator is not only navigating, he's working a gun.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:54</time>
They're in freezing temperatures, and I'm not joking.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:16:57</time>
Negative 60, negative 40, negative 20 degrees.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:02</time>
It's an un pressurized cabin.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:04</time>
So what does that mean?

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:05</time>
It means they have to be on oxygen and there's no heat.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:08</time>
There's no air conditioning.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:10</time>
It's because the air's thinner.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:11</time>
Your hair's thinner up there.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:12</time>
No, which means you can go faster.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:15</time>
But it's also colder, but it's also colder.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:17</time>
A lot colder, and there's no oxygen.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:19</time>
So you have to wear the oxygen mask anytime you're above 10,000 feet.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:23</time>
Now, as a helicopter pilot, we stayed below.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:25</time>
Anytime you go above 10,000 feet, you have to put on oxygen or you become hypoxic.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:29</time>
So hypoxia is where there's not enough oxygen molecules and you

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:33</time>
basically just suffocate your brain.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:34</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:35</time>
You don't realize it's happening.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:36</time>
You'll pass out.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:36</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:36</time>
Mm-Hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:37</time>
And that's why you have to catch your own hypoxia.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:39</time>
You don't realize it's ha you, you don't, you get kind of euphoric.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:42</time>
So.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:43</time>
They, they said filming this masters of the air, that was the hardest part.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:48</time>
To portray drama because most of this drama's gonna happen above 10,000 feet.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:52</time>
Most of this drama's gonna happen, right?

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:53</time>
They all, they all have to wear masks, masks realistic,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:55</time>
so you won't see them talk.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:57</time>
It's hard to see inflection.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:17:58</time>
It's hard to see ization of their, their, their lines.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:02</time>
Facial, facial expression, facial expression.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:03</time>
So all you see is eyes.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:04</time>
So you'll see a lot of interaction happen below 10,000 feet.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:07</time>
That's where you see Crosby grow up and stuff, get air sick.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:10</time>
And he actually said, Crosby said once he put the oxygen on, he was fine.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:13</time>
Mm-hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:14</time>
And they're really not below 10,000 feet for very long,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:17</time>
but they do it for the show.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:19</time>
Sure.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:19</time>
So they can have more of that interaction and talking.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:22</time>
But these air crew are wearing these flight jackets and we get these

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:27</time>
flight jackets now more ceremonial.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:28</time>
I did wear mine over the Rocky Mountains in a T 34.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:31</time>
That's un pressurized.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:32</time>
Because I was freezing my butt off over the Rocky Mountains.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:35</time>
But that's where the flight jacket comes from.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:37</time>
'cause it actually was a purposeful gear you were issued.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:41</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:41</time>
I mean that's why they have, that's where they have the thick collars.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:43</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:44</time>
And all this stuff.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:44</time>
And we still have some remnants of a thick collar, but they were much thicker.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:48</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:48</time>
Then And they had the pants and they had a heated suit underneath.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:52</time>
Kind of like an electric blanket they would wear that you could plug in.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:55</time>
Oh wow.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:55</time>
Now this is 1940s.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:57</time>
Electric technology.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:18:58</time>
So those didn't always work so great.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:19:00</time>
But.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:19:01</time>
This is where you get the issue of men peeing because they don't have access

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:19:05</time>
to a toilet and then it's freezing and then they're getting frostbite.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:19:08</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:19:09</time>
That's where that's coming from.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:19:11</time>
And so this crew on an aircraft, these hours are like four hour missions.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:19:19</time>
Three hours of nothing.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:19:20</time>
One hour of complete chaos.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:19:23</time>
And so even when they're flying back with injured people, it's

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:19:26</time>
usually an hour to get back and everybody has to be their own medic.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:19:31</time>
So if someone's hurt, another person's coming off a gun or coming off of

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:19:35</time>
something to help somebody, and you're gonna see, this is what I think you're

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:19:40</time>
gonna see a lot more of as it progresses.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:19:42</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:19:42</time>
Is these crews are gonna get tighter.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:19:45</time>
They're gonna overcome a lot of their differences because of what

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:19:48</time>
you have to do to get through a mission when it's just 10 of you.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:19:52</time>
Also, if something happens to your aircraft, the 10 of you go down together

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:19:58</time>
and that's why you lose 10 at a time.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:00</time>
That's what's different about the Pacific and Band of Brothers is there's no cover.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:06</time>
If something happens, that's it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:08</time>
You go, you're all going.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:09</time>
You go down or the airplane explodes.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:12</time>
I mean that's, yeah, and they have parachutes and they have life preservers.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:16</time>
But I want to remind everybody, these men did not go to jump school.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:19</time>
Now in a helicopter.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:21</time>
I.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:22</time>
You got nothing.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:23</time>
You're not, you're not wearing a parachute in he, you're not

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:25</time>
wearing a parachute in helicopter.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:26</time>
Right?

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:26</time>
You're going down with the aircraft.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:27</time>
You're going down with the aircraft.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:28</time>
So I know kind of what that feels like.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:29</time>
But I have flown an aircraft where you are strapped into the parachute.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:32</time>
Usually they're strapped into your ejection seat or the seat you're in.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:35</time>
But the T 34 was a bail out where you had to open the cockpit,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:39</time>
get on the wing, and bail out.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:40</time>
So I went to school.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:41</time>
Before you did that, they prepared you for it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:44</time>
These men were not prepared for that.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:46</time>
So if.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:47</time>
There was an instance where they are gonna bail out.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:49</time>
They're that's they're learning on the fly.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:52</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:52</time>
This is, here we go.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:53</time>
I'm gonna pull this.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:54</time>
Shoot.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:55</time>
I hope it opens and it is the best I can do.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:57</time>
'cause I never got trained in this.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:20:59</time>
And this is probably one of my biggest problems with this, uh, depiction,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:05</time>
this Hollywood depiction of this.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:06</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:06</time>
'cause this is true as well, is when eagan first goes through the flack field, flack

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:12</time>
is where they fire up metal that hits you.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:16</time>
And it just disperses.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:17</time>
It could hit you like a hundred miles an hour.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:18</time>
So you don't know.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:19</time>
It's little pieces of metal.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:20</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:20</time>
It's basically like a anti-aircraft.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:22</time>
Shotgun.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:23</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:23</time>
And you don't know where it's gonna hit.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:25</time>
And so flack fields, people just flew through them.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:28</time>
One of the hardest thing for pilots to do, because you can't do anything for flack.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:32</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:32</time>
You have to, can't fight back.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:33</time>
You just have to hope for flack.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:34</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:35</time>
You just, that's what a wing and a prayer comes from with flack.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:38</time>
You just go and so.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:41</time>
When GaN first flies through the flag field and they make it back, and

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:44</time>
the other pilot says to him, don't tell them, they'll figure it out.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:47</time>
I think it's the worst thing you can do.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:49</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:49</time>
That, that was, that was an interesting kind of mentorship that, that they gave.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:55</time>
That someone more senior gave to Egan before.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:58</time>
Mm-Hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:21:58</time>
And that was even cl Even's response at the end of that episode.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:00</time>
Why didn't you tell me?

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:01</time>
Yeah, so I think what they're getting into there is that these

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:03</time>
men weren't trained for this because there was no way to train for this.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:09</time>
And this is where my loyalty comes to these guys is as a pilot, you realize

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:14</time>
everything you learn, everything you train on is written in blood.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:18</time>
Someone has learned from this and done this and more than likely died from it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:22</time>
And so you learned the emergency procedure or how to?

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:27</time>
Survive something like this.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:29</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:29</time>
Well, in aviation, mistakes are fatal and you learn from your mistakes.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:33</time>
And so if you've learned from someone else's mistakes, you've

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:36</time>
learned from someone else's fatality.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:38</time>
Exactly.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:39</time>
That's why they say natops is is is written blood.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:41</time>
Written blood.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:41</time>
Mm-Hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:42</time>
So, and Natops is kind of the, the Navy's aviation Bible aviation Bible

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:46</time>
that we carry on our, and that's why our, our emergency procedures.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:51</time>
Are all learned because someone else has learned what to do to save themselves.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:55</time>
But I think you always prepare someone by telling 'em what to expect, because

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:22:59</time>
what you're doing as a pilot is you're aviate, navigate, communicate.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:03</time>
And if you can't even do that because you're experiencing something you've never

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:06</time>
seen before, it's hard to do your job.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:09</time>
So if someone can at least prepare you, hey, they're gonna

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:12</time>
fire this flack up at you.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:13</time>
It's gonna be metal.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:15</time>
There's nothing you can do.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:16</time>
Be prepared for not being able to do anything.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:18</time>
Now, I'm not sure if you would look this up ahead of time, but I know

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:22</time>
you've, you've talked now, every now and then about going to SEER School.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:25</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:25</time>
So they search, evade, rescue and Escape.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:28</time>
Rescue and Escape.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:29</time>
So, PPW Camp.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:31</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:31</time>
POW.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:31</time>
They, they train pilots kind of how, if they go down behind enemy lines, how to

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:37</time>
basically escape or if they get caught.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:39</time>
Mm-Hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:39</time>
How to be a POW.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:41</time>
Did they train this be during World War ii or was this kind

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:44</time>
of a lesson learned after?

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:46</time>
This was, again, it's all baptism by fire.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:49</time>
Right.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:49</time>
That's kind of what I think episode one and two is really

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:51</time>
showing you at baptism by fire.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:53</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:53</time>
POW Sears School comes out of Vietnam.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:56</time>
Okay.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:56</time>
All right.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:57</time>
So that's, that's where it came from, comes out of, so everything we

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:23:59</time>
learn, because pilots, we learned, we learned from the, from World War

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:03</time>
II and Vietnam because pilots who were captured during Vietnam Yep.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:05</time>
Didn't know how to take the.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:10</time>
Being captured.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:11</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:11</time>
And being tortured.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:12</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:12</time>
And so they teach us now how to do that.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:15</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:15</time>
Which is what I think you always tell if you learn something, you

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:19</time>
always tell, we call it the gouge

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:27</time>
in flight school.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:28</time>
You learn something.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:29</time>
You learn something that they're gonna ask.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:30</time>
You learned a little piece of information.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:32</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:32</time>
Gimme the goe.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:33</time>
You always give the goe.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:34</time>
I think that's probably why I was, I was.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:35</time>
First in my class out of flight school, as I always gave the gouge,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:38</time>
if I learned goe, I would tell you.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:40</time>
So if I'm learning something on a flight, I'm gonna come back and

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:44</time>
be like, this is what happened.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:45</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:45</time>
Be prepared for this because it, it just allows you to have a mental

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:49</time>
preparedness, which I think is pilots is the biggest thing you need.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:52</time>
So as far as the, the TV show so far is, is concerned, I mean, how

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:24:57</time>
are they doing with, as far as the characters and their accuracy there?

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:00</time>
I know you've been kind of hunting down some other interviews and

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:03</time>
stuff like that about why they kind of focused so much on some of the

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:07</time>
aviation scenes that they showed.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:08</time>
Sure.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:16</time>
I wanna stress they, they.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:17</time>
So focus on the hundredth because of its reputation as the bloody hundredth.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:20</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:20</time>
Although statistically, it's not gonna be more losses than any other aircrew.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:25</time>
Every other, if you joined the eighth, it's a 50% chance.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:29</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:29</time>
So that's gonna be the same.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:31</time>
It's just that these, a couple missions that the A hundredth

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:34</time>
had, they had catastrophic losses.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:37</time>
There's gonna be some missions that come back unscathed.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:39</time>
But a couple missions, they're gonna have just one aircraft come

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:43</time>
back, two, and you're gonna learn.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:45</time>
There's a couple things that kind of add to this, and again, baptisms

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:50</time>
by fire, things are written in blood formation flying bombing.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:54</time>
So let's talk a little bit about formation.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:56</time>
They, and they actually stress that quite a bit.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:57</time>
Mm-Hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:25:58</time>
So when you fly in formation, it is safer as a group because

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:04</time>
it's just like anything else.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:05</time>
There's safety in numbers, right?

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:07</time>
But.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:08</time>
Where you end up in formation can make you much more vulnerable.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:13</time>
And they talk about that.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:14</time>
So there were times when the hundredth would be a part of a group and they

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:18</time>
would get, uh, I think it's called Purple Heart Corner, where they would

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:22</time>
be at the back corner of a formation.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:24</time>
So when the, the lo HFA would come, that's what they call

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:27</time>
the mil, the German Air Force.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:29</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:30</time>
That's, they pick off the back left and they work their way in.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:34</time>
And so.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:36</time>
You knew if you were sitting in that part of the formation, your easy pickings.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:40</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:40</time>
So it, it, it was interesting because they'd be kind of in, in

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:43</time>
like, I'll call it the ready room.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:45</time>
Mm-Hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:45</time>
So the, the pilots would be getting their briefings and the colonel

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:49</time>
would be up front saying, okay, we're going on this mission.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:51</time>
This is where we're going, and this is the spot we have.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:54</time>
And you would either see them just completely dejected, oh no, this is,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:26:58</time>
this is, we do not wanna be there.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:00</time>
Or just.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:01</time>
Overly joyous saying Yeah, they're basically out in front.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:04</time>
They're gonna be the ones dropping the bomb and and they're not

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:06</time>
gonna be picked off from the back.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:08</time>
Yes.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:09</time>
So for, I love formation flying.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:11</time>
It's my favorite flying to do.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:13</time>
And the closer you are tucked into somebody, the, the more fun it is.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:18</time>
But it's also dangerous because thank God B seventeens are dual piloted.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:23</time>
Because if you are flying formation, you really do not take your eyes off the

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:26</time>
aircraft because you're tucked into them.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:28</time>
Now they're not quite as close, but they are pretty tight.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:31</time>
But you can't take your eyes off them.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:32</time>
'cause as you see, you could fly into them.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:35</time>
All it takes is through a cloud, a second to glance away, and you could

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:39</time>
tilt into another aircraft, hit another aircraft because you're so close.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:42</time>
So one pilot's looking at the controls, making sure you're not losing air

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:45</time>
pressure or gas a fuel or is leaking.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:50</time>
And the other pilots sting in formation

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:27:58</time>
now as.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:01</time>
They start to fire as the they engage of the German attacker

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:04</time>
fighters and they engage and they start to fire their machine guns.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:07</time>
People ask, well, do they hit each other by mistake?

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:09</time>
Now they fire a stream of bullets.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:11</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:11</time>
And they're so close in formation.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:13</time>
The answer is yes.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:15</time>
So I always tell people, situ situational awareness is the most

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:19</time>
effective thing in combat, and usually the first thing to leave, yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:22</time>
And you don't realize it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:24</time>
You're engaging the enemy and you're firing, and then all of

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:27</time>
a sudden you're firing right to the aircraft right beside you.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:29</time>
So the friendly fire did happen.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:32</time>
Bombs were dropped on our own aircraft.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:35</time>
Oh wow.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:36</time>
By our own aircraft.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:37</time>
Again, I give these air crew big leeway because this is so much.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:42</time>
An experiment.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:44</time>
These men are learning this, this is new.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:46</time>
So, well, and, and you, if you ever talk to someone that's been through

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:50</time>
combat situations, so there's, there's, there's, I, I've, there's people

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:54</time>
that I've, I've worked with or worked with, uh, that have done deployments

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:58</time>
of Afghanistan and stuff like that.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:28:59</time>
And I, I heard someone talk about one time a situation where, you know, they go

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:03</time>
through all this training, they're doing convoys and this, that, and the other.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:07</time>
And this, this chief gets out of, of a Humvee because they're stopping.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:10</time>
'cause they thought they saw an IED.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:11</time>
Mm-Hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:12</time>
And then they, you know, someone starts approaching their convoy

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:17</time>
and my chief said his, uh, he got so amped up and so locked in.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:21</time>
Like he almost shot this guy.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:23</time>
Mm-Hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:23</time>
Because he couldn't hear anything.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:26</time>
This is, this is him telling, he couldn't hear anything.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:28</time>
All he saw was this person and he almost pulled the trigger.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:33</time>
And luckily his buddies were there.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:35</time>
No, no, no.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:35</time>
He's a friendly.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:37</time>
And so I can only imagine flying through the air over Nazi Germany

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:42</time>
and all of a sudden you've got enemy aircraft attacking you.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:45</time>
The same exact thing's gonna happen.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:47</time>
You get locked in trying to shoot that aircraft to protect your own and the

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:51</time>
like you said, the first thing that goes away is that situational awareness.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:29:55</time>
And, and the unfortunate happened.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:04</time>
The commanding officer that you see, um, Harding was a big drinker.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:10</time>
He encouraged his men to drink.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:12</time>
So you see that a little bit of that.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:13</time>
An Egan Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:14</time>
Is a big drinker.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:15</time>
And this is how men will deal with this kind of stress.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:18</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:19</time>
He encouraged it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:20</time>
He encouraged them to fight.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:21</time>
You see the fighting, this is all from real life because this helps you alleviate

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:26</time>
that stress and the next day, 'cause you're doing it all again and, and you

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:31</time>
don't know who's coming back every time.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:34</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:35</time>
And there would be months where you'd have no casualties and then all of a

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:39</time>
sudden you'd lose 50% of everybody.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:41</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:43</time>
So.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:44</time>
Superstitions are big and they show a lot of that, uh, in the first

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:47</time>
couple episodes with the salt.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:49</time>
Yep.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:49</time>
With uh, which is fun.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:51</time>
Which is also funny.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:52</time>
It was funny.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:52</time>
I love that Cleven took the card even though GaN this is my lucky card.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:56</time>
Take the card and Cleven.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:57</time>
No, but you see Cleven eventually take the card.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:58</time>
I'll tell you why.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:30:59</time>
'cause every pilot is superstitious.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:01</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:02</time>
I don't care who you are.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:04</time>
We do believe that there is, it's, everybody's got their own thing.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:07</time>
It's, we believe it's a bit of luck and a bit of skill.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:11</time>
Is luck again where you end up in formation.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:15</time>
If the fighters come out that day, if they don't come out that day.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:18</time>
If you have good weather, if you don't have good weather.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:21</time>
And then the skill of the pilot when it's needed.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:24</time>
Yeah, it really is a bit of both.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:26</time>
And I also wanna stress you're not flying with the same crew all the time.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:29</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:30</time>
And I think that's a good thing to remember.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:31</time>
'cause a lot of people think, and we talked about this in our Arlington video

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:35</time>
about mess with the air at Arlington, about how a lot of people will assume

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:39</time>
that the same pilots are flying with the aircraft because of the nose art and they

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:43</time>
painted it and this, that, and the other.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:45</time>
And that is absolutely not the case.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:46</time>
No, because you gotta think people are getting injured, people are getting

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:50</time>
what they call, they have PTSD, I think they call it flack fire or something

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:54</time>
where they give 'em a little break.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:55</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:55</time>
And same thing with aircraft.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:57</time>
Aircraft would get damaged aircraft and you'd be down for

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:31:59</time>
a while, go down for a while.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:00</time>
And so you would do a hodgepodge crew and you almost see that with Crosby

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:03</time>
being pulled in this navigator 'cause the navigator's sick and you're flying

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:06</time>
with different people all the time.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:08</time>
So you have to really learn this camaraderie.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:10</time>
With everybody.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:11</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:12</time>
You kind of build this camaraderie with everyone.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:14</time>
Everyone.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:15</time>
And Crosby, I really appreciate he, I think he writes a book, I think he

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:20</time>
wrote Wing and a prayer, but he talks about how that first mission, how

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:25</time>
he's, let's fight this, this, this, and this, and then as if flying back.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:29</time>
He forgets to make radio calls about the change that they made and

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:34</time>
they land and he's given an award.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:37</time>
He thinks he's gonna be court-martialed.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:38</time>
'cause he didn't tell them that he changed the plan.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:41</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:41</time>
And they give him an award because they think he didn't make

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:43</time>
radio calls for radio silence.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:45</time>
Oh.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:45</time>
That's, which kept the fighters from coming.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:47</time>
And it, it saved, they only lost three planes everybody made.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:50</time>
But it's really just because he forgot Really?

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:51</time>
'cause he forgot.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:53</time>
And again, all this baptism by fire, sometimes it's luck.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:56</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:56</time>
So then you learn, oh, maybe I shouldn't make radio calls.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:32:59</time>
Maybe we'll learn.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:00</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:00</time>
That now on, on the other side.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:02</time>
Mm-Hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:02</time>
One of the things that you actually appreciated.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:04</time>
With some of the pre-flight scenes.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:06</time>
Yes.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:12</time>
So I love the checklist.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:13</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:14</time>
I loved that scene.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:16</time>
And did, and they, I think, was it you, we had either seen a video or you

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:20</time>
were listening to a, a, another podcast that they intentionally put those,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:25</time>
check those check listings in there.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:26</time>
I, I listened to Tom Hanks talk about it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:28</time>
So Tom Hanks loves the B 17.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:31</time>
I mean, he, he executive producer of Master of the Air, he wanted

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:36</time>
to stress how just measured pilots are and how we are so rigorous with

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:43</time>
rules and regulation, and we do those checklists every time, every step.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:49</time>
You do not skip a step.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:50</time>
You do not half as it, you're gonna do the whole thing and.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:56</time>
I think it builds trust because you're doing it together and you're zeroing

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:33:59</time>
things out and you're setting things up and you're getting ready and it just

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:02</time>
shows how attention to detail you both are and you're not gonna skip anything.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:06</time>
Well, and it's the same for the rest of the crew and every crew is doing it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:09</time>
Mm-hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:10</time>
It is a normal thing and that's because you're not flying with the same crew.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:13</time>
So you do it every time and every aircraft you have your checklist

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:17</time>
that's usually on your knee board, which is a, a board you strapped

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:20</time>
to your leg and you go through it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:22</time>
And he showed explicitly in that scene.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:25</time>
Each cockpit was doing it, and they, he showed a different part of the checklist

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:30</time>
as each cockpit's going through it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:31</time>
They're all doing the same one.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:32</time>
They're all doing the same one.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:33</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:33</time>
They're all doing it the same way.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:34</time>
And I just really appreciate that.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:36</time>
As a pilot, you're gonna do a pre takeoff checklist, a takeoff

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:40</time>
checklist, and after takeoff checklist.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:41</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:42</time>
And, and, and, and for, for those watching the video, Jen had secretly watched

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:46</time>
the two episodes the night before.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:49</time>
And then told me in the morning, Hey, it came out Thursday night.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:52</time>
I watched it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:53</time>
I'll watch it with you again tonight.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:55</time>
And then when we were going through the checklist scene,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:57</time>
I've never seen her so happy.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:34:59</time>
She's checklist, checklist, she's so excited about these checklists because

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:35:02</time>
it is such an important part of what, what pilots do and that piece of it,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:35:06</time>
right, that it was, was so realistic and kind of, again, showing that true

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:35:11</time>
pilot nature and, and what the crews do and, and all the steps that it takes.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:35:17</time>
Every single time they're taking off, every single time, they're

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:35:19</time>
not just jumping in and cowboying off the runway every single time.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:35:23</time>
And if something fails on that checklist and the aircraft can't

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:35:26</time>
fly, okay, we're gonna get out.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:35:28</time>
We're gonna go to the next one.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:35:29</time>
Mm-Hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:35:30</time>
I want people to know.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:35:31</time>
We know every switch, every circuit breaker, every instrument on that panel.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:35:38</time>
Every single.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:35:39</time>
I know what everyone does.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:35:40</time>
I know what electrical source it's connected to.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:35:42</time>
I know what it's showing you.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:35:43</time>
I know if I lose power, what I'm gonna keep, what I'm gonna lose.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:35:46</time>
I know if a circuit breaker gets unset, if I can reset it, if I can't.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:35:50</time>
I know everything about that panel of every aircraft I have ever flown in.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:35:56</time>
It's not just the one you're assigned to, it's every aircraft you fly in.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:01</time>
You know everything about it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:03</time>
That's why pilots are not dumb.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:05</time>
I tell people all the time, we're not, it is like cowboy.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:08</time>
It is a little bit of that, but you also have to be pretty smart when,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:11</time>
and just like you said earlier, right, there's, there's kind of

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:14</time>
two people, overly confident slash cocky people you want in your life.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:18</time>
It's a pilot and your surgeon.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:19</time>
And both require incredible intelligence following procedure.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:25</time>
Mm-hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:25</time>
And, and knowing this stuff blind, but also following those checklists.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:29</time>
I mean, I'm, I'm not a doctor.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:31</time>
I don't know too many that are surgeons.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:33</time>
I.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:34</time>
But I'm sure they have their own checklist that they do every time when they're

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:37</time>
prepping a patient or doing Mm-Hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:38</time>
Everything, all that stuff before they cut somebody open, similar kind of thing.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:49</time>
So bloody 100th gets, its.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:52</time>
Its name, let's say one character we haven't seen yet.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:55</time>
You're gonna see Rosie Rosenthal.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:36:57</time>
Uh, he's gonna be in this, he, he's a big part of Masters of the Air.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:00</time>
Yes.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:00</time>
You were talking about him.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:02</time>
Rosie Rosenthal is considered the old man because he's 25.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:05</time>
Oh my gosh.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:07</time>
To a military college.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:08</time>
Mm-Hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:08</time>
And I was 1920, and I remember there was, we had someone who had

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:13</time>
been in the Navy for a few years before he came to the Naval Academy.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:16</time>
He was 25 years old and we call him the old man.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:19</time>
So I've, I've absolutely, I've absolutely been there, but now it makes me roll

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:23</time>
my eyes and wish I was 25 again.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:25</time>
I know.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:25</time>
So Rosie Rosenthal is a lawyer.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:27</time>
Uh, he's Jewish.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:28</time>
So for the him, this is, you know, means a lot.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:31</time>
And he comes there and he's amazing pilot.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:34</time>
He does two combat tours.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:36</time>
He doesn't have to fly as many missions as he does he, I think.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:39</time>
At first you had to do 25 before you got sent home, but then it changed.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:42</time>
They changed it to 35.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:43</time>
He ended up doing 50, but he survived them all.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:47</time>
And being a lawyer, he's part of the Nuremberg Trials and he's gonna,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:50</time>
actually, I think he interviews the second in command of the Nazi party.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:54</time>
Oh, wow.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:54</time>
So after Hitler commits suicide, he's the next guy who's interrogated

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:37:59</time>
during the Berg trials and he's in, he's in charge of the Lou Hoffa.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:38:03</time>
Rosie Rosenthal's interviewing the man who's responsible for killing his.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:38:07</time>
Fellow air crewman, his velo pilots and who tried to kill him, and he's

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:38:13</time>
part of the whole, his execution and, and he follows through with all of it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:38:17</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:38:18</time>
And he's just a very unassuming guy.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:38:20</time>
And you're gonna see, he's definitely gonna be a character in Master of the Air.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:38:23</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:38:23</time>
That I, people like that just absolutely blow my mind.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:38:26</time>
And, and usually those people, if you ever meet someone like that.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:38:31</time>
Are the most kind of just understated.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:38:33</time>
You would never know it by just passing 'em on the subway or, or whatever.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:38:43</time>
August 17th, 1943.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:38:45</time>
We haven't gotten to this mission yet, but we'll see it Regensburg, they

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:38:49</time>
have a, they're flying in formation.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:38:51</time>
They're flying in that purple heart corner.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:38:53</time>
Mm-Hmm.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:38:53</time>
Like we talked about before, of.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:38:56</time>
22 planes that go up of the hundred, they, they lose nine, so they have a 40% loss,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:02</time>
but the big one is October 10th, 1943.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:06</time>
It's a monster raid.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:07</time>
They're, I think they're dropping bombs on a worker camp.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:09</time>
So think about war economics.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:12</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:12</time>
That's what they're, they're trying to hit centers of gravity targets on,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:14</time>
they're, they're hitting steel mills.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:17</time>
They're hitting gasoline.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:18</time>
They're hitting oil rigs.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:19</time>
They're hitting, they're hitting places that kill the war.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:21</time>
Economics.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:22</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:22</time>
Which they eventually do in Germany.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:24</time>
We'll talk more about how the technology's gonna shift here from the Germans

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:28</time>
being the better pilots with the better aircraft to the Americans being the

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:32</time>
better pilots with the better aircraft.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:35</time>
But they're gonna launch 13 planes.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:38</time>
Only one will make it back, and that will be Rosie Rosenthal's plane.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:42</time>
That's where they get the reputation of the bloody 100th.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:45</time>
That's ab Absolutely wild.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:46</time>
Mm-Hmm, absolutely wild.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:47</time>
I, I can't even, he's gonna land after losing two engines.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:51</time>
I.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:52</time>
He's gonna lose his intercom system and they're gonna lose this supplemental

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:55</time>
oxygen and he still gets the plane back.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:39:58</time>
I know he's badass.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:40:06</time>
This is what we're gonna see depicted.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:40:09</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:40:09</time>
This is what this drama sensation's gonna show.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:40:12</time>
And so it's different than Band of brothers.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:40:14</time>
It's different than the Pacific.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:40:16</time>
You're gonna see this a massive loss.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:40:18</time>
In a short period of time, and that's the gut punch of being an aviator.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:40:24</time>
And you and I know you can see someone in the hallway one day

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:40:28</time>
and then lose them the next.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:40:29</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:40:29</time>
And when it happens to 50% or the guys you've been hanging out, all the guys

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:40:35</time>
you've been in hanging out with for the last couple months, this is why

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:40:38</time>
they have this amazing reputation.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:40:41</time>
The reason why this book exists in.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:40:45</time>
Masters there is about them is because they have more documentation

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:40:49</time>
than any other bomber group.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:40:50</time>
Okay.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:40:51</time>
And when Ronald Miller was teaching at Oxford, he had gone over to Thorpe

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:40:56</time>
Abbotts and they had so much, uh.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:00</time>
Stories and they had captured so much of people's interactions.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:04</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:04</time>
And he found this really great relationship between GaN and Cleven.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:08</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:08</time>
And he was able to pull so much accuracy from That's cool.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:12</time>
These stories that he could write this.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:14</time>
So saving all of that is also important.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:17</time>
Saving these stories is also important.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:19</time>
So I just wanted to stress that as well.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:21</time>
But you're gonna get these colorful personalities.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:23</time>
You're gonna get.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:24</time>
The survivalism of surviving things like this Sure.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:28</time>
And what it takes and how people do it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:30</time>
Medicate with alcohol.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:31</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:31</time>
Fighting.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:32</time>
They, they don't know.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:33</time>
They didn't know then what we know now.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:34</time>
Exactly.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:35</time>
Another myth that's kind of created, I don't know if they're gonna show

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:38</time>
it in this because people don't know if it's exactly accurate, but

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:44</time>
the four 18 is a captain where.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:48</time>
The loof Hoffa have basically taken over the plane and they wanna

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:52</time>
capture the plane and to kind of surrender, you would drop your gear.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:41:57</time>
So they're, they're, he's dropped his gear and they're taking him into a, a landing

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:01</time>
field, and he ends up right before he lands shooting, he has them shoot both

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:07</time>
the planes and then raises his gear.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:08</time>
And flies back And takes off.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:09</time>
Yes.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:10</time>
And so they claim that the Lu Hoffa now has a vendetta against the square D.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:16</time>
Interesting.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:16</time>
They're looking for the squared.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:17</time>
They're looking for the bloody 100th.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:19</time>
No one knows if that's exactly what happened.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:21</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:21</time>
If maybe somes claim he had lost an engine, so he had surrendered,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:26</time>
but then got the engine back.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:27</time>
Oh.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:28</time>
And then knew, and then was like, was like, all right, here we go.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:31</time>
Let's buckle up boys.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:32</time>
But people don't also think that the loof are like, had it out for one.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:37</time>
Sure.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:37</time>
Because like they're not gonna waste their time to fly to these B

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:39</time>
seventeens when they can pick up these best B seventeens that are closer.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:42</time>
Sure.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:43</time>
So it just might be a lot of myth and folklore, which you

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:46</time>
get a lot of in aviation anyway.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:47</time>
Sure.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:48</time>
Avi Aviator stories, they get better every time and there's a reason for that.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:53</time>
Right.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:53</time>
They start off here and they end up way over here.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:42:56</time>
So one thing I will say that's kind of funny is you see him bring the dog.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:01</time>
On the plane.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:02</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:02</time>
So at one point this is true, they're in Africa and they somehow

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:06</time>
get like this little donkey onto the, just another aviator thing.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:11</time>
Of course they do, aviators do stupid things.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:15</time>
And so they get this and they bring the little donkey back to England and

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:20</time>
they have it in the base for a while.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:22</time>
Show up bringing back a donkey.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:24</time>
But I do wanna, I wanted to say there is a, a really good quote.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:29</time>
Here,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:35</time>
the hundredth bomber group major, John Bennett, he summed

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:38</time>
it up as what the hundred lacks.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:40</time>
In luck, it makes up foreign courage.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:42</time>
The men of the century have fighting hearts and they were called the men

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:46</time>
of the century 'cause of the one.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:48</time>
Oh yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:48</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:49</time>
That's awesome.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:49</time>
I really love that.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:50</time>
There is a lot more, they're wearing their.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:53</time>
Their survival vests and their parachutes.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:56</time>
We still wear life vests when we fly.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:43:58</time>
That stuff has all kind of just been innovated, but we still wear it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:03</time>
And parachutes, they usually are, like I said, in the ejection seats.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:09</time>
And if you do bail out, sometimes seals wear 'em before they bail out.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:12</time>
But you're not bailing out in a helicopter.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:13</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:14</time>
So we don't have 'em.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:15</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:15</time>
But a lot of the stuff that they have and they're wearing has just evolved.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:19</time>
And we still do the same things today.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:21</time>
We still have the same things today.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:23</time>
Things that, like I said, born in blood, but we still have the flight jacket.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:28</time>
We still have a lot of things that are born of aviation that

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:31</time>
we still follow through because we are very much about tradition.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:34</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:35</time>
And loyalty.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:36</time>
And once a pilot, always a pilot.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:38</time>
There is a comradery with us and I just, I just really appreciate watching this.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:43</time>
I do love it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:44</time>
I see peoples.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:46</time>
Criticisms online, and I do know that there is some historical

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:50</time>
accuracies that aren't there, but as far as I'm concerned, I love seeing.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:54</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:55</time>
And we would love to hear from you guys watching this video and

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:44:58</time>
kind of what you thought of the show, any experience you may have,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:02</time>
whether you're an aviator yourself.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:05</time>
Or kind of just what you thought of this compared to Band of Brothers or your

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:08</time>
favorite character, your favorite lines.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:10</time>
Uh, we, we wanna hear from you guys because we, we've had other videos

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:14</time>
that are growing in popularity and, and we love having these conversations.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:17</time>
Sure.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:18</time>
And as we close, I just wanna touch on one last thing.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:20</time>
Sure.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:21</time>
No art.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:22</time>
Yes.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:23</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:24</time>
So if you know me, I love No Art, and we actually have an episode

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:28</time>
coming out tomorrow on No Art because I, I love it so much and I.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:34</time>
I appreciate again.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:37</time>
What these men are going through and what it takes to reinspire

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:41</time>
yourself to get out there every day.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:43</time>
And the superstition that kind of comes with it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:46</time>
So there's, there's aircraft names that are famous.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:48</time>
Ola Gay and Memphis Bell.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:51</time>
Right?

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:51</time>
And the Memphis Bell was the girlfriend of the pilot and she was from

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:54</time>
Memphis, so he painted her on board.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:56</time>
Their names are like, lady Luck.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:45:58</time>
You saw Alice from Dallas in the episode.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:46:02</time>
Uh, boss Lady Denver Doll, Liberty Bell.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:46:05</time>
Pickle puss, which I love.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:46:08</time>
But there's one really famous one and I, I want Scott to put the

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:46:11</time>
picture on here, Mason and Dixon.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:46:13</time>
And it is full on.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:46:16</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:46:17</time>
And it's named after the pilot, Floyd, Floyd Mason, and the

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:46:21</time>
navigator, William Dixon.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:46:23</time>
And it's a ranches semi nude, painted by Sergeant Frank Stevens of the three 51st.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:46:29</time>
And.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:46:31</time>
I just love that this is what it took them to really get behind each other.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:46:36</time>
Sure.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:46:36</time>
And believe in their, believe in themselves, believe in their aircraft,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:46:39</time>
and it's also an o to the air crew.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:46:41</time>
Well, and and one of the things I think you said in, in the no art video,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:46:44</time>
that's, if you're watching this, then that video has already been released.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:46:48</time>
But you said that the, the no ark gets more risque the further away that these

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:46:52</time>
squadrons are basically from the wherever the DC main DC the DC is, or the further

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:46:57</time>
they are away, the more risque they get and the closer you are to death, I think.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:02</time>
And like I said, the commanding officer kind of encourages drinking.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:05</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:05</time>
And I think he probably encouraged whatever it takes to make you

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:08</time>
laugh, to bring a smile on your face to make you believe.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:12</time>
I think he probably really encouraged in them.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:15</time>
So it's just really something that I, I love nos art because of

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:19</time>
what it means and what it means to these men and the history of it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:23</time>
So I just wanted to talk about that as well.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:25</time>
Yeah, it, it's a ton of fun.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:26</time>
We're enjoying the show, and again, we wanna hear from you guys.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:30</time>
So if you guys have anything else that you kind of wanna contribute or, or, or talk

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:34</time>
about in the comments, please let us know.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:35</time>
Uh, we, we wanna hear from you.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:37</time>
Oh, one last thing.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:38</time>
Jude Law's son is at air crewman.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:42</time>
Oh, is he the, that's the head air crewman, like the crew chief.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:44</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:44</time>
Oh, that's why he's so cute.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:46</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:46</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:46</time>
And good looking.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:46</time>
That's chief law's son, so I love an air crewman.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:50</time>
The, the crew chief who's in charge of the aircraft.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:54</time>
That's his aircraft.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:55</time>
Yeah.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:55</time>
And they, they actually talk very specifically about crew chiefs.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:58</time>
Yes.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:58</time>
And kind of give him a lot of props on the show.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:47:59</time>
I, as a pilot, that's not your aircraft, it's his aircraft

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:48:03</time>
or her aircraft, and they.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:48:05</time>
Treat that like their baby.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:48:07</time>
They take care of it.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:48:08</time>
They make sure everything is great before you go up, and it's just a real

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:48:13</time>
team spirit when you're, you're taking care of an aircraft in the military.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:48:17</time>
So I, I really appreciate that.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:48:18</time>
Yeah, that's cool.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:48:19</time>
Good for him.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:48:26</time>
Well, folks, we've just landed back on Terra firma.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:48:31</time>
After a throwing tour through the skies of World War II with Masters of the Air.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:48:35</time>
I hope you enjoyed exploring the shows.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:48:38</time>
Portrayal of B 17 missions with us separating the Hollywood dog fights

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:48:43</time>
from the bone chilling reality of those young American bomber crews.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:48:47</time>
Remember, this wasn't just about historical accuracy.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:48:49</time>
It was about getting inside the heads of these guys, understanding

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:48:53</time>
the why behind their actions in the face of unimaginable danger.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:48:58</time>
We explored their moral quandaries, the pilot's lightning fast decisions,

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:49:02</time>
and the navigator's unwavering focus.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:49:05</time>
Amidst flack bursts in fighter attacks.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:49:08</time>
And what did we learned that these masters of the air weren't just

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:49:12</time>
daredevils in flying machines.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:49:13</time>
They were strategists, psychologists, and sometimes reluctance warriors

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:49:18</time>
all bound together by a shared mission and a brotherhood forged

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:49:22</time>
in the crucible of combat.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:49:25</time>
We also remember the comradery, the humor.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:49:28</time>
That kept them sane and the sheer awe of soaring through the

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:49:31</time>
clouds towards a distant target.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:49:33</time>
We explored the bond between crew mates, the trust they placed in each

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:49:36</time>
other's skills and courage, knowing that one misstep could doune them all.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:49:41</time>
Masters of the air may not be a.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:49:43</time>
Perfect historical document, but it captured the essence of what

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:49:46</time>
it meant to be a B 17 crewman.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:49:49</time>
It reminded us of the extraordinary sacrifices made by these ordinary

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:49:53</time>
men, their bravery, etched in the skies over Nazi Germany.

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<time>00:49:57</time>
So as the engines cool down and the landing gear for tracks,

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let's carry that memory with us.

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Let's remember the roar of the engines, the sting of the cold,

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and the unyielding courage of those who dared to be masters of the air.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:50:12</time>
Thank you for listening to Talk with History podcast and please

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:50:15</time>
reach out to [email protected].

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:50:17</time>
More importantly, if you know someone else that may enjoy this episode or

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:50:20</time>
that loves Masters of the Year as much as we do, please share it with them.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:50:24</time>
We rely on you, our community to grow, and we appreciate you all every day.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:50:29</time>
We'll talk to you next time.

<cite>Speaker:</cite>
<time>00:50:30</time>
Thank you.

The Story