The Airplane that Ended a War

Tuesday, January 10, 2012 at 10:43 PM ET

Verified

The crew of Bockscar, which dropped the atomic
bomb on Nagasaki on Aug. 9, 1945. Maj. Charles
Sweeny is standing in the dark jacket. SSgt. Raymond
Gallagher is in the front row, second from the right.

Key Takeaways:

Many B-29 bombers carried unique names, but confusion exists regarding the aircraft that dropped the atomic bomb on Nagasaki, often mistaken between *Bockscar* and *The Great Artiste*.
*Bockscar* was the B-29 that delivered the "Fat Man" bomb, but it was flown by the crew of *The Great Artiste* because their assigned plane was configured for observation from the earlier Hiroshima mission.
The Nagasaki mission faced numerous critical challenges, including a faulty fuel pump, significant delays, persistent cloud cover over both primary and secondary targets, and dangerously low fuel necessitating an emergency landing.
Despite initial command controversies following the mission's difficulties, *Bockscar* is now recognized and displayed as "The aircraft that ended WWII."

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_Enola Gay. FIFI. The Great Artiste. Kee Bird. The Big Stink.
_

It was an airplane dubbed “Superfortress.” Yet many of the most famous Boeing B-29 bombers that plied the skies during the latter days of World War II carried strangely meek-sounding individual names. Perhaps that’s of benefit to our collective psyche since the airplanes in question were capable of raining such unfathomable destruction from above. After all, attaching a name to a killing machine is merely an attempt to humanize the brutality of war, isn’t it?