In 1949, the Smithsonian Institution assumed control of the plane, and it is now part of the Air and Space Museum. On August 30, 1946, the Enola Gay was placed in storage and never flew another combat mission. Martin Company delivered the plane to the military on May 18, 1945. Sign describing Enola Gays role in dropping the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. The United States military kept the Enola Gay in use for only a short period of time. Jack Dailey, Director of Smithsonians National Air and Space Museum. Tibbets named the plane after his mother. Captain Paul Tibbets, the Enola Gay's pilot, personally selected this plane to drop the atomic bomb.
The B-29 (also called Superfortress) was a four-engine heavy bomber that was built by Boeing. The aircraft was named after the mother of pilot Paul Warfield Tibbets, Jr. The plane had a 2,200-horsepower engine, with a maximum speed of 360 miles per hour and a range of 3,250 miles. Enola Gay, the B-29bomber that was used by the United States on August 6, 1945, to drop an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, the first time the explosive device had been used on an enemy target. Martin Company assembled it in Omaha, Nebraska, in early 1945. flew the plane to Park Ridge, Illinois, a storage site for the Smithsonian Institution. Boeing Aircraft Company manufactured the plane, and the Glenn L. This atomic bomb, nicknamed Little Boy, along with a second atomic bomb, dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, on August 9, 1945, prompted the Japanese government to surrender, bringing World War II to an end.
For years the Smithsonian Institution had. On August 6, 1945, the crew of the Enola Gay dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. The Enola Gays trip to the northwest corner of the Air and Space Museum has been far more tortuous than the flight it took the morning of Aug.