At 12,000 feet, they were losing 400 feet a minute. With his “Flying Fortress” so badly damaged it could scarcely reach the speed of a fast car, Willis and his co-pilot took turns nursing the aptly-dubbed Heavy plane home using only one engine.



Personal Communication: After September 1944, and 10 successful missions in the B-24, Willis flew 25 missions in Boeing’s B-17. His bomber named “Shiloskilofras” was part of strategic missions during the Battle of the Bulge, and struck enemy oil plants, tank factories, and airfields in such cities as Berlin, Hamburg, Munster, Kassel, Hanover, Cologne, and Merseburg.



It was during an attack on German oil supplies over Merseburg in December of 1944 when his plane became the 57th American plane struck by anti-aircraft. According to news reports, 56 bombers and 30 fighter planes were downed that day in flak so heavy that surviving pilots could not see their formation. With holes all over the plane as well as in the Plexiglas nose and top turret, Captain Willis went into a steep dive to avoid hitting another crippled B-17. After that, “It was just impossible for us to get any altitude.” At 12,000 feet, they were losing 400 feet a minute. With his “Flying Fortress” so badly damaged it could scarcely reach the speed of a fast car, Willis and his co-pilot took turns nursing the aptly-dubbed Heavy plane home using only one engine.



“The trouble began when flak hit the left wing between the Number 1 and Number 2 engines,” Willis told a reporter during the War; “Flak got the Number One engine over the target and we lost Number Two west of the Channel.” They were quickly joined by two Fighter planes, escorting the B-17 to protect her it in its vulnerable state. Willis told the Fighter pilots, “not to get below us or behind us, because we were going to throw stuff out.”



“Then I said [to my crew] ‘Throw everything out, all your guns, the ammunition, anything that weighs a pound. Throw out everything but your parachute.’”



After ballast was tossed, they encountered more problems. Because of damage to the rudder controls, it was impossible to turn the plane to the left. By the time they crossed the so-called Siegfreid line, (the German wall of defense, located on the German/French border;) the plane was making only 90 miles per hour.



The crippled bomber was the last of its group to return, to an airfield so littered with other damaged planes (“Many crash-landed;”) that bull-dozers were needed to clear the strip, illuminated only by flares. Down to 400 feet and still sinking, the bomber came in so low on approach that a high tension wire was sliced, sending up a flash the control tower misread as a fatal crash. Willis circled again and landed successfully. “I didn’t put my landing gear down until the last ten seconds,” Willis said. A Boeing official, told that a B-17 had returned from Germany on one engine, initially dismissed the feat, saying it was impossible. In addition to citation letters from FDR, Willis was awarded the Air Medal with three Oak Leaf Clusters and promoted to Captain.