Ferebee, Thomas

Hiroshima unrolled east to west in the cross hairs of Thomas Ferebee s Norden bombsight. The bomb-bay doors were open. Ferebee had flown sixty-three combat missions in Europe before returning to the United States to instruct and then to join the 509th. Before the war he had wanted to be a baseball player and had got as far as spring tryouts with a major-league team. He was twenty-four years old. 

Little Boy exploded at 8 16 02 Hiroshima time, 43 seconds after it left the Enola Gay, 1,900 feet above the courtyard of Shima Hospital, 550 feet southeast of Thomas Ferebee s aiming point, Aioi Bridge, with a yield equivalent to 12,500 tons of TNT. 

Hiroshima prestrike briefing on Tinian. L. to r., first row, Joseph Buscher, unknown second row, Norman Ramsey, Paul Tibbets third row, Thomas Ferrell, Adm. Parnell, Deke Parsons, Luis Alvarez fourth row, left of Parsons, Charles Sweeney, right of Parsons, Thomas Ferebee, right of Alvarez, Theodore Van Kirk Harold Agnew. 

Just before 8 a.m. the Enola Gay approached Hiroshima. Bombardier Thomas Ferebee opened the bomb bay doors of the plane. At 8 14 a.m. Ferebee released the bomb. While falling 1,900 feet (580 m) over Hiroshima, the trigger mechanism in the bomb activated. The gun inside Little Boy fired, shooting a mass of U-235 and sparking the chain reaction. The actual time of the explosion was recorded at 8 16 a.m. What happened next was described by Robert Caron, the tail gunner aboard the Enola Gay. 

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