Memorial

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Gustavo Contreras joined the U.S. Army Reserve at fort MacArthur, California on 29 November 1943.

The B-17 had taken off from the airbase in Ridgewell, Essex when an hour after one of the engines failed because of an oil leakage. The pilot, Kyle S. Smith, decided to continue the mission on three engines but couldn´t keep up with the formation.

Near Zwolle the airplane was attacked by a German fighter, but that attack failed and the gunners shot down the German fighter. "Little Guy" probably joined with a different formation which mission was to bomb the railway yard of Osnabruck.

Visibility was now diminished, the land was no longer visible through the clouds and the leading group of bombers had marked the target with colored smoke. Clearly the accuracy of bombing suffered severly and "Little Guy" had to make two runs. Six 1,000 pounders were off but there remained two behind in the bomb bay.

They also lost #3 engine perhaps because of damage caused by shelling by German flak and when they reached the IJssel also #4 engine failed, probably due to overheating.

Because only #1 engine was still running, the airplane started to big turn clockwise. Above the outskirts of Apeldoorn, Kyle Smith gave his crew the order to bail out, which they did. The pilot had a problem though. He flew too low in a right turn and could not adequately correct his plane and flew right above the town of Apeldoorn, with two bombs on board. Although these were not armed, they still remained dangerous. He did his upmost to keep the airplane in the air but it crashed into a pond of the Boschbad

He lost his life, but spared a catastrophe for Apeldoorn.

Six crew members were taken prisoner, three men were killed. They were initially buried at the Heidehof Cemetery in Ugchelen, the Netherlands.

Sgt Contreras was killed after his parachute succesfully deployed but he was shot at by members of the SS while descending.