by Jess Clackum
Debbie King is an experienced pilot who flies the Falcon 900B, C, EX, 50 and 50EX and teaches the 900B and EX for CAE. In 2012, she became the first woman since Dora Dougherty and Dorthea “DeeDee” Moorman in 1944, to become fully qualified to fly the B-29, the most advanced Allied aircraft bomber in WWII.
"I am a huge fan of the WASPs and love your project - they have been overlooked for far, far too long."
When the B-29 was introduced in 1944, male pilots refused to fly it, so the WASP flew it first:
"In 1944 Dougherty and Moorman were selected by Colonel Paul Tibbets to fly the B-29 because it had earned a poor reputation among the male flyers due to teething problems caused mainly by its rush to the production line during the war. Tibbets sought out the women to qualify on the airplane and then tour B-29 training squadrons to show (and maybe shame a little bit) the men how easy the aircraft was to fly. A year later Tibbets would command the B-29 Enola Gay that dropped the first atomic bomb on a civilian population."
More at http://willystreetblog.com/wp/2013/07/26/historic-woman-and-aircraft-land-in-madison/
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