Necessary Evil (aircraft)
| Necessary Evil | |
|---|---|
| Type | Boeing B-29-45-MO Superfortress |
| Manufacturer | Glenn L. Martin Company |
| Serial | 44-86291 |
| Radio code | Victor 91 |
| In service | May 18, 1945 - November 1956 |
| Fate | Struck from the Air Force inventory in November 1956, Necessary Evil was transferred to the U.S. Navy and used as a target at the Naval Ordnance Test Station at China Lake, California. |
Necessary Evil, also referred to as Plane #91, was the name of Boeing B-29-45-MO Superfortress 44-86291, (Victor 91), participating in the atomic bomb attack on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945.
Assigned to the 393d Bomb Squadron, 509th Composite Group, it was used as a camera plane to photograph the explosion and effects of the bomb, and to carry scientific observers. At the time of the attack the plane was not named and was known only by its 393d Victor number. The mission was flown by crew B-10, with Captain George Marquardt as aircraft commander.
The crew regularly assigned to this airplane in turn flew on the Nagasaki mission on August 9, 1945, in another B-29; Big Stink, though without their aircraft commander, who was ill.
Built at the Glenn L. Martin Aircraft Plant at Omaha, Nebraska, Necessary Evil was accepted by the Army Air Forces on May 18, 1945, and flown to Wendover Army Air Field, Utah, by its assigned crew C-14 (1st Lt. Norman W. Ray, Aircraft Commander) in June. It departed Wendover for North Field, Tinian on June 27 and arrived on July 2. It was originally assigned the Victor (unit-assigned identification) number 11 but on August 1 was given the Circle-R tail markings of the 6th Bomb Group as a security measure and had its Victor changed to 91 to avoid misidentification with actual 6th BG aircraft. It was named and had its nose art painted after the Nagasaki mission.
In addition to the Hiroshima mission, Necessary Evil's operations history on Tinian included 10 training and practice missions, and three combat missions in which it dropped pumpkin bombs on industrial targets in Kobe, Kashiwazaki, and Koriyama, all flown by 1st Lt. Ray and crew C-14.
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