Take a ride in history – B-17 visits Hillsboro | Events

HILLSBORO, Ore. - It's something most of us have only seen in books and in movies - a B-17 Flying Fortress. Now, you can get a view of the World War II fighting machine like never before.

 One of the 14 bombers that still fly will be in Hillsboro this weekend (April 17 and 18), and the public can even take a ride in it.

 The rides on the restored Liberty Belle are a little expensive - $430 – but when the flights are over at about 4 p.m., the public can take a ground tour and climb into the plane to see what it was like for the men and women who built the planes and flew them into combat.

 An army of volunteers worked to restore the Liberty Belle and Bob Hill is one of five volunteer pilots touring it around the country.

 “It’s a rare privilege. I enjoy it and enjoy sharing the airplane with the public,” said Hill. “And of course educating the public on the Greatest Generation, if you will.”

 It costs about $4,500 an hour to put the plane in the air. The Liberty Belle is one of just three B-17s that take the public for rides. The ride is part scenic tour and part history lesson.

 Inside the plane, visitors can walk across the 500-pound bomb-bay doors, get a panoramic view from the nose cone, sit in the cockpit, handle the gun turrets, and get a feeling for what it was like to be at war defending freedom in the 1940s.

 World War II flying ace, Kelly Gross, never flew in the B-17 during the war but he escorted hundreds of them deep into enemy territory.

 “I get tears thinking about these guys, when you see them go down - and there were ten men on that thing. Every time one went down, there’s another ten men gone,” he said.

 The plane will be at Aero Air on Saturday and Sunday.