Memorial

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F/O Ely Berenson was a clerk before he joined the U.S. Army Reserve Air Corps in Newark, New Jersey, on 5 November 1942.

During the seventh and last shuttle mission of Operation Frantic, 107 B-17s were sent out to drop 12,484 containers of supplies to the Polish resistance forces in Warsaw, Poland. One B-17 was lost. At about 1242 hours, the airplane was hit by flak and attacked by fighters and peeled out of formation to the right, with #1 engine afire. Also, the left horizontal stabilizer began to disintegrate. The plane dropped its load. The waist escape hatch came off. The plane went down in a controlled glide to 8,000 feet, at which altitude it exploded at about 1246 hours. Two parachutes were reported.

After the war, T/Sgt Marcus L. Shook, the Radio Operator who survived, stated: "The plane crashed at 1250 hours approximately 50 km northwest of Warsaw. One engine caught fire. I bailed out at 10,000 or 14,000 feet. No one was killed or injured before the plane crashed. A wing blew off in midair." It was the crew's 15th mission.