Jerry Duran is sitting at his dining room table, explaining what it’s like to man the ball turret of a B-17 bomber, and feignslike he'sgoing to draw his knees to hischest.
At 92, theydon’t bend quite like they used to, so of coursehe doesn’t fully demonstrate. But you get the picture.
The gunner has tocurlup in a fetal position to fitinsidethe ball turret, which is approximately 3 feet in diameter and mounted in the belly of the bomber. For some, the space can be claustrophobic, especially when confined for hours at a time.
“It didn’t really bother me because I’m small,” the5-foot-6 Duran said. “I didn’t feel cramped. I felt comfortable in it, actually.”
Duran served with the 353rd Bombardment Squadron, 301st Bomb Group, 15th Air Forceduring World War II. He completed his50-mission tour in 1944 inFoggia, Italy.
While the ball turret is typically operated by the shortest man of the crew, Duran initially was assigned to be a waist gunner. But when his buddy groused after the first mission that he was going to leave the crew because he couldn’t stand the close quarters, Duran volunteered to switch.
“He was a real nice guy,” Duran said. “I wanted to keep us together.”
Duran was drafted into the U.S. Army Air Forces and did his training in Modoc, California. One of his treasured keepsakes is a photo of his crew, dated February 1944. He’s crouched down in the front row on the far right. The names of all nine airmen are meticulously written on the back, with rank and position.
“I think I’m the only one still alive,” said Duran, who lives in northeast Salem.
One of his closest calls during the war came on the ground. A German plane crash landed across from where his squadron was stationed in tents near an olive grove. As Duran ran toward the fiery scene, the plane’s ammunitionbegan exploding, and he was lucky he didn’t get hit. Others did.
Another time, from the wombof the ball turret, there was a malfunction withhis electricallyheated suit, which plugged into an outlet insidethe turret,He informed the pilot, but nothing could be done until the mission was complete.Duran repeatedly had to kickhis feet against the wall of the turret to keep circulation flowing.
“I could have gotten frostbite, especially in my feet,” he said. “I lucked out on that one, too.”
It was the job of the ball turret gunner, armed with a pair of .50-caliber machine guns,to defend the aircraft from attacks below. Once the B-17 was in the air, the gunner would enter the turret by placing his feet in the heel rests on the front wall, hunkerdown in a fetal position, and then close the hatch. That would position him so his eyes were roughly level with the guns.
There was no room inside for a parachute, which was left in the cabin just above the turret.
“It would have been sort of hairy if I had to get it,” Duran said.
While no one argues that the ball turret offeredthe least comfortable seat in the bomber, many debate whether it was the safest or the most dangerous position. A casualty survey for the 8th Air Force reportsthat the ball turret had the lowest fatality rate of any gunner, but another frequently cited statistic insists the ball turret had double the mortality rate of the rest of the B-17 crew.
“I was a young man and never thought about being afraid or anything,” Duran said. “But I would be now.”
From April through August in 1944, his squadron wenton bombing missions in Italy, Romania, Hungary, Germany and Austria. It helped wipe out important industrial targets that fed the Nazi war machine, such as oil refineries andaircraftfactories.
One of the repeat targets was the Romanian oil fields atPloesti, pronounced PLO-ess-tee.
“When we were told to go to Ploesti, oh wow, you knew it was going to be rough,” Duran said. “We had a heck of a time knocking them out because they were really resilient. Even after we bombed them, they would have it up and going in another week.”
Some missions, such as those to Ploesti, were recorded astwo sorties, or doubles. Of Duran's34 sorties, 16 were doubles.
“We'd get twofor the price of one,” Duran recently told a group of veterans at the B-17 Alliance Restoration & Museum at Salem Municipal Airport.
Earl Kersey, a Navy veteran, convinced Duran to attend the monthly gathering of the Veterans Coffee Club.
“There’s not many of these guys around with as much as he’s done,” Kersey said. “What he did I think was amazing. People need to know about him.”
Duran wasa technical sergeant when he got out of the service.He followed in the footsteps of his father and his older brother and became a longshoreman. After 40 years as a dockworker, jitney driver and crew chief in the Los Angeles area, he retired and moved to Oregon in 1991with his wife, Rusty. She died in 2001.
Their four children, eight grandchildren and 11 great grandchildren are still learning details about Jerry'sWorld War II service.
“It’s only recently we’ve been able to drag anything out of him,” said son Ron Knechtel, visiting from California for his father's 92nd birthday. “He’s our hero.”
Typical of thatgeneration, Duran said he was only doing his job. A highlight for him was finishing histour in Europewith a couple of missions in the top turret.
“That was a lot nicer,” Duran said. “You could stand up and see.”
“Forward This” appears Wednesdays and Sundays and highlights the people, places and organizations of the Mid-Willamette Valley. Contact Capi Lynn at clynn@StatesmanJournal.com or (503) 399-6710, or follow her the rest of the week on Twitter @CapiLynn and Facebook @CapiLynnSJ.
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