Boeing YB-40 Flying Fortress March 1944. All of the aircraft were sent to reclamation, mostly at RFC Ontario in May 1945, being broken up and smelted. (A couple of the YB-40s can be seen in the 1946 movie "The Best Years of Our Lives", in the famous scene shot at the Ontario "graveyard".) No airframes were sold on the civil market. Boeing YB-40 Flying Fortress The Boeing YB-40 Flying Fortress was a modification for operational testing purposes of the B-17 Flying Fortress bomber aircraft, converted to act as a heavily armed gunship for other bombers during World War II. At the time of its
B-17 Flying Fortress units of the United States Army Air Forces the most experienced B-17 units, and their departure from England slowed down the development of the Eighth Air Force’s offensive. Later, two newly trained II Bomber Command groups (2d, 99th) deployed from the United States. The four B-17E groups formed the heavy bomber component of XII Bomber Command (and Northwest African Strategic Air Force). In North Africa Flying Fortresses were used against German and Italian military targets in Algeria and Tunisia, and to attack German shipping in the Mediterranean. Flying Fortresses took part in the bombardment of the Italian stronghold of Pantelleria, the invasion of Sicily and the invasion of