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Around dawn on Feb. 23, 1942, the bomber, after taking off from Australia with a crew of nine, flew into heavy clouds amid an intense tropical storm over Rabaul, a Japanese-held port on New Britain island off the New Guinea coast.

Its mission: to bomb Japanese freighters in the harbor. But the bomb-release mechanism apparently wasn't working, said Glen E. Spieth, whose father piloted another plane on the mission.

As the pilot circled the target, looking for a clearing in the clouds, the bombardier, Richard Oliver, set up a salvo to unload the bombs on the next go-round, which he did, Spieth said.

"In the time it took to go around, they allowed the Japanese fighters to come around and intercept them," Spieth said.

During the next 30 to 40 minutes, Japanese Zeros swooped in and fired at the bomber. "I think there was a frontal attack once or twice," Spieth said. "They came in behind the tail" and strafed the right and left sides of the plane.

The bomber took 33 bullets in its fin, he said.

An antiaircraft shell shot through the plane's right wing from below. It was not clear if it later exploded, but crew members thought it did because they felt something explode above the wing and felt the plane bounce, Spieth said.

An antiaircraft shell also hit the left wing, he said.

The bomber escaped the attack and flew to New Guinea, where it was to refuel in Port Moresby, but the crew soon realized they didn't have enough fuel to climb over the 14,000-foot Owen Stanley Mountains, Spieth said.