wing remained visible. Two crew members trapped in the flight deck were rescued by companions who ignored the danger of a gasoline explosion. Small boats that sped to the crash scene took the ten to shore. R. S. Noble, flight test engineer, was taken to South Baltimore hospital with cuts, bruises and possible internal injuries. A navy announcement in Washington said the plane would be taken to the Martin plant." Noble was the only man injured. "Witnesses said the plane, apparently having trouble with one of her four engines, came down 500 yards offshore, parts of it remaining above water." A Boeing TB-17G Flying Fortress built as a B-17G-70-BO (43-37700) of the 325th Combat Crew Training Squadron, Avon Park Army Airfield, Florida, crashed six miles south of Ridgeland, South Carolina after the number-two (port inner) engine caught fire at 10,000 feet during a flight from Stewart Field in New York to its home base in Florida. Pilot Lieutenant Dewey O. Jones ordered the crew to abandon ship. An announcement released by the Hunter Field, Georgia, public-relations office said that five parachuted safely, three were killed, and two other men were missing. Listed as fatalities were Flight Officer Alfred Ponessa of Newburgh, New York (a passenger) and crew members Sergeant Leo B. Bucharia of Long Island, New York and Technical Sergeant Edwin S. Salas of Haverhill, Massachusetts. The missing were listed as Lieutenant William Cherry and Corporal Sidney Podhoretz (addresses not available). The names of the other four survivors were not given. 6 August All-time high-scoring American flying ace (40 credited kills) Richard Bong was killed trying to bail out of Lockheed P-80A-1-LO Shooting Star jet fighter 44-85048 after a fuel-pump failure during a test flight at Burbank Airport in Burbank, California. News of Bong's death was overshadowed by the dropping of the first nuclear weapon on Hiroshima the same day. The never-completed Richard I. Bong Air Force Base in Wisconsin was named for him. 8 August Off the coast of Cuba, light cruiser lost Curtiss SC-1 Seahawk seaplane BuNo 35555 during an aircraft launch and recovery operation. The aircraft nosed over while taxiing towards the recovery sled, throwing pilot Ens. W. R. Merryman clear of the cockpit, and capsized. Merryman was rescued by the ship's whaleboat, and the airframe sank. Flying over Milton, Florida, B-29-70-BW Superfortress 44-69973 of the 326th CCTS, MacDill Field, Florida, encountered heavy rain. This led to