Fire balloon
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- The term "fire balloon" can also refer to a small unmanned hot air balloon for festivities; this is also called a sky lantern.
A fire balloon or balloon bomb (Japanese 風船爆弾 fūsen bakudan, lit. "balloon bomb") was an experimental weapon launched by Japan during World War II. A hydrogen balloon with a load varying from a 12 kg (26 lb) incendiary to one 15 kg (33 lb) antipersonnel bomb and four 5 kg (11 lb) incendiary devices attached, they were designed as a cheap weapon intended to make use of the jet stream over the Pacific Ocean and wreak havoc on Canadian and American cities, forests, and farmland.
The balloons were relatively ineffective as weapons, and were used in one of the few attacks on North America during World War II.
Between November 1944 and April 1945 Japan launched over 9,000 fire balloons. About 300 balloon bombs were found or observed in North America, causing six deaths and a small amount of damage.[1]
It remains likely that more balloon bombs lie unexploded in the forests, deserts, lakes and mountains of North America.
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[edit] Overview
From late 1944 until early 1945, the Japanese launched over 9,000 of these fire balloons, of which 300 were found or observed in the U.S. Some guesswork gives the total number that made the trip at about 1,000. Despite the high hopes of their designers, the balloons were relatively ineffective as weapons, causing only six deaths and a small amount of damage, and they survive in memory mostly as an ingenious and dangerous curiosity.
Japanese bomb-carrying balloons were 10 meters (33 ft) in diameter and when fully inflated, held about 540 cubic metres (19,000 ft³) of hydrogen. Their launch sites were located on the east coast of the main Japanese island of Honshū.
Japan released the first of these bomb-bearing balloons on November 3, 1944. They were found in Alaska, Washington, Oregon, California, Arizona, Idaho, Montana, Utah, Wyoming, Colorado, Texas, Kansas, Nebraska, South Dakota, North Dakota, Michigan and Iowa, as well as Mexico and Canada.
The balloon bombs were not very efficient, with a kill rate of 0.067%.
General Kusaba's men launched over 9,000 balloons throughout the course of the project. The Japanese expected 10% (around 900) of them to reach America, which is also what is currently believed by researchers. About 300 balloon bombs were found or observed in America. It remains likely that more balloon bombs lie unexploded in the forests, deserts, lakes and mountains of North America.
The last one was launched in April 1945.
[edit] Origins
The balloon campaign was the fourth attack the Japanese had made on the American mainland. The fūsen bakudan campaign was, however, the most earnest of the attacks. The concept was the brainchild of the Japanese Ninth Army Technical Research Laboratory, under Major General Sueyoshi Kusaba, with work performed by Technical Major Teiji Takada and his colleagues. The balloons were intended to make use of a strong current of winter air that the Japanese had discovered flowing at high altitude and speed over their country, which later became known as the jet stream.
The jet stream blew at altitudes above 9.15 km (30,000 ft) and could carry a large balloon across the Pacific in three days, over a distance of more than 8,000 km (5,000 mi). Such balloons could carry incendiary and high-explosive bombs to the United States and drop them there to kill people, destroy buildings, and start forest fires.
The preparations had consumed much time because the technological problems were acute. A hydrogen balloon expands when warmed by the sunlight, and rises; then it contracts when cooled at night, and falls. The engineers devised a control system driven by an altimeter to discard ballast. When the balloon descended below 9 km (29,500 ft), it electrically fired a charge to cut loose sandbags. The sandbags were carried on a cast-aluminium four-spoked wheel and discarded two at a time to keep the wheel balanced.
Similarly, when the balloon rose above about 11.6 km (38,000 ft), the altimeter activated a valve to vent hydrogen. The hydrogen was also vented if the balloon's pressure reached a critical level.
The control system ran the balloon through three days of flight. At that time, it was likely over the United States, and its ballast was expended. The final flash of gunpowder released the bombs, also carried on the wheel, and lit a 19.5 meter (64 ft) long fuse that hung from the balloon's equator. After 84 minutes, the fuse fired a flash bomb that destroyed the balloon.
The balloon had to carry about 454 kg (1,000 lb) of gear. At first, the balloons were made of conventional rubberized silk, but there was a better way to make an envelope that leaked even less. An order went out for ten thousand balloons made of "washi", a paper derived from mulberry bushes that was impermeable and very tough. It was only available in squares about the size of a road map, so it was glued together in three or four laminations using edible konnyaku (devil's tongue) paste. Hungry workers stole the paste and ate it. Many workers were teen-aged girls, whose fingers were nimbler than any other class of people. They were told to wear gloves, to keep their fingernails short, and not to use hairpins. They assembled the paper in many parts of Japan. They had no idea of the purpose of their work. Large indoor spaces, such as sumo halls, sound stages, and theatres, were required for the envelope assembly.
Similar, but cruder, balloons were also used by Britain to attack Germany between 1942 and 1944.
[edit] Offensive
Initial tests took place in September 1944 and proved satisfactory. However, before preparations were complete, B-29s began their raids on the Japanese home islands. The attacks were somewhat ineffectual at first but still fueled the desire for revenge sparked by the Doolittle Raid.
The first balloon was released in early November 1944. Major Takada watched as the balloon flew upward and over the sea: "The figure of the balloon was visible only for several minutes following its release until it faded away as a spot in the blue sky like a daytime star."
The Japanese chose to launch the campaign in the beginning of fall, when the jet stream is strongest. This limited the chance of the incendiary bombs causing forest fires, as by that time of year, the forests were generally too damp to catch fire easily or covered in snow.
The balloons continued to arrive in Oregon, Kansas, Iowa, British Columbia, Manitoba, Alberta, Northwest Territories, Washington, Idaho, South Dakota, Nevada, Colorado, Texas, Northern Mexico, Michigan, and even the outskirts of Detroit. [2] Fighters scrambled to intercept the balloons, but they had little success; the balloons flew very high and surprisingly fast, and fighters destroyed fewer than 20. Among the US units which fought the fire balloon was the 555th Parachute Infantry Battalion.
By early 1945, Americans were becoming aware that something strange was going on. Balloons had been sighted and explosions heard, from California to Alaska. Something that appeared to witnesses to be like a parachute descended over Thermopolis, Wyoming. A fragmentation bomb exploded, and shrapnel was found around the crater. A P-38 Lightning shot a balloon down near Santa Rosa, California; another was seen over Santa Monica; and bits of washi paper were found in the streets of Los Angeles.
On March 10, 1945, one of the last paper balloons descended in the vicinity of the Manhattan Project's production facility at the Hanford Site. This balloon caused a short circuit in the powerlines supplying electricity for the nuclear reactor cooling pumps, but backup safety devices restored power almost immediately.[3]
Two landed back in Japan but caused no damage.[citation needed] Two paper balloons were recovered in a single day in Modoc National Forest, east of Mount Shasta. Near Medford, Oregon, a balloon bomb exploded in towering flames. The Navy found balloons in the ocean. Balloon envelopes and apparatus were found in Montana, Arizona, Saskatchewan, in the Northwest Territories, and in the Yukon Territory. Eventually, an Army fighter managed to push one of the balloons around in the air and force it to ground intact, where it was examined and filmed. Japanese propaganda broadcasts announced great fires and an American public in panic, declaring casualties as high as 10,000.[citation needed]
[edit] Allied investigation
Despite their low success, the authorities were worried about the balloons anyway. There was the chance that they might get lucky. Much worse, the Americans had some knowledge that the Japanese had been working on biological weapons, most specifically at the infamous Unit 731 site at Pingfan in Manchuria, and a balloon carrying biowarfare agents could be a real threat.
Nobody believed the balloons could have come directly from Japan. It was thought that the balloons must be coming from North American beaches, launched by landing parties from submarines. Wilder theories speculated that they could have been launched from German prisoner of war camps in the U.S., or even from Japanese-American internment centers.
Some of the sandbags dropped by the fusen bakudan were taken to the Military Geology Unit of the US Geological Survey for investigation. Working with Colonel Sidman Poole of U.S. Army Intelligence, the researchers of the Military Geological Unit began microscopic and chemical examination of the sand from the sandbags to determine types and distribution of diatoms and other microscopic sea creatures, and its mineral composition. The sand could not be coming from American beaches, nor from the mid-Pacific. It had to be coming from Japan. The geologists ultimately determined the precise beaches in Japan the sand had been taken from. By this time, it was mostly irrelevant, since by early spring the balloon offensive was almost over.
[edit] Press coverup
The bombs caused little damage, but their potential for destruction and fires was large. The bombs also had a potential psychological effect on the American people. The U.S. strategy was to keep the Japanese from knowing of the balloon bombs' effectiveness. In 1945 Newsweek ran an article titled "Balloon Mystery" in their January 1 issue, and a similar story appeared in a newspaper the next day. The Office of Censorship then sent a message to newspapers and radio stations to ask them to make no mention of balloons and balloon-bomb incidents, lest the enemy get the idea that the balloons might be effective weapons. Cooperating with the desires of the government, the press did not publish any balloon bomb incidents.[4] Perhaps as a result, the Japanese only learned of one bomb's reaching Wyoming, landing and failing to explode, so they stopped the launches after less than six months.
The press blackout in the U.S. was lifted after the first deaths to ensure that the public was warned, though public knowledge of the threat could have possibly prevented it.[4]
[edit] Japanese abandon the project
With no evidence of any effect, General Kusaba was ordered to cease operations in April 1945. The expense was large, and in the meantime the B-29s had destroyed two of the three hydrogen plants needed by the project. The last one was launched in April 1945.
[edit] Single lethal attack
| Killed near Bly, Oregon |
| 1. Elsie Mitchell, age 26 |
| 2. Edward Engen, age 13 |
| 3. Jay Gifford, age 13 |
| 4. Joan Patzke, age 13 |
| 5. Dick Patzke, age 14 |
| 6. Sherman Shoemaker, age 11 |
On May 5, 1945, a balloon bomb that had drifted over the Pacific killed five children and a woman. It exploded when a 13-year-old girl (Joan Patzke) attempted to pull the balloon from a tree during a church group picnic in the woods near Bly, Oregon. Having taken some local children on an outing, Reverend Archie Mitchell watched in horror as his wife, Elsie (or Elyse) Mitchell, and five children who accompanied them (ages 11 to 14) were killed. The minister escaped by luck of being a short distance behind. Those six were the only known victims of the balloon bombs. However, dangers of the balloon bomb still may exist. Hundreds were never found and may still constitute unexploded ordnance. The six who perished were the only known casualties inflicted by Japanese attack on the U.S. mainland during World War II.
The press blackout in the U.S. was lifted after the deaths to ensure that the public was warned.
A memorial, the Mitchell Monument, is located 110 kilometres (70 mi) northeast of Klamath Falls. It was rededicated during a 50-year anniversary service in 1995.
Elsie Mitchell is buried in the Ocean View Cemetery in Port Angeles, Washington.
[edit] Post World War II
The remains of balloons continued to be discovered after the war. Eight were found in the 1940s, three in the 1950s and two in the 1960s. In 1978, a ballast ring, fuses and barometers were found near Agness, Oregon and are now part of the collection of the Coos County Historical Museum[5].
The last known discovery of a functional fire balloon in North America was in 1955 — its payload still lethal after 10 years of corrosion. A non-lethal balloon bomb was discovered in Alaska in 1992.[citation needed]
[edit] See also
- Attacks on North America during World War II
- Battle of Los Angeles
- E77 balloon bomb
- History of Military Ballooning
- Operation Outward - WWII British balloons carrying incendiaries and trailing wires
[edit] References
- ^ The Fire Balloons
- ^ McPhee, John (February 9, 2009), "Checkpoints", The New Yorker: 56-63
- ^ History of the Plutonium Production Facilities at the Hanford Site Historic District, 1943-1990 Retrieved 27 April 2007
- ^ a b Smith, Jeffery Alan (1999). War & Press Freedom: The Problem of Prerogative Power -. Language Arts & Disciplines.
- ^ *Peebles, Curtis (1991). The Moby Dick Project. Smithsonian Books. ISBN 1-56098-025-7.
- The Fire Balloons from Greg Goebel's AIR VECTORS
- Robert C. Mikesh, Japan's World War II Balloon Bomb Attacks on North America, Smithsonian Institution Press, 1973.
- "Balloons Of War" by John McPhee, New Yorker, 29 January 1996, 52-60.
- "Japan At War: An Oral History" by Haruko Taya Cook and Theodore F. Cook, New Press; Reprint edition (October 1993). Includes a personal account by a Japanese woman who worked in one of the fire balloon factories.
- [1]
- Bert Webber, Retaliation: Japanese Attacks and Allied Countermeasures on the Pacific Coast in World War II, Oregon State University Press, 1975.
[edit] External links
- http://www.af.mil/news/airman/0298/bombsb.htm
- http://www.stelzriede.com/ms/html/mshwfug2.htm
- http://www.seanet.com/~johnco/fugo.htm
- http://www.vectorsite.net/avbloon.html
- http://www.triplenickle.com/smjprs.html
- http://www.onawindandaprayer.com/
- http://web.mst.edu/~rogersda/forensic_geology/Japenese%20vengenance%20bombs%20new.htm
- http://www.bookmice.net/darkchilde/japan/balloon.html
- http://www.allworldwars.com/Japanese-Balloon-and-Attached-Devices.html Report by US Technical Air Intelligence Center, May 1945
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