Bathed in floodlights, the B-29 Enola Gay awaits the start of its historic mission: to drop the first atomic bomb on Japan. Leslie Groves, the head of the Manhattan Project, had warned the Enola Gay's commander, Col.
Paul Tibbets, to expect 'a little publicity,' but Tibbets and his crew are surprised by the scene on the tarmac. Movie cameramen and photographers surround the crew. Groves is determined that this moment in history will not go unrecorded. Soon, at 2:45 a.m., the aircraft takes off.
The beginning of the Enola Gay's mission was the culmination of over a year's work.
