All this time you could hear the steady roar of the bombers taking off. When there were about a 1,000 four engine bombers taking off you could hear it all over southeastern England. It took a good hour for all the bombers in a squadron to get into the air and another half hour for them to get to the right altitude where they would circle until in formation and ready to head for the target in Europe. They used a lot of gasoline and time just getting ready to go. After our briefing we would all make our trip to the bathroom and then to the equipment room to get our parachutes and other equipment. We didn't have to leave the field until about two hours after the bombers because we were so much faster. We would catch up with them soon after they crossed the coastline of Europe and it was a very pretty sight to see the formations of B-17s in the sky for miles ahead, especially on a sunny day. Some days there would be big white clouds and the B-17s would create their own clouds from vapor trails. The bomber vapor trails would be straight and the fighter trails would be above them back and forth across the blue sky. When escorting the bombers we had to fly as slowly as we could and weave back and forth so as to not outdistance them. The closer to the target the heavier the flak and we would see the black bursts all around the bombers and once in a while one would go down. The bombers had to fly straight and level with no chance of taking evasive action and we would think how brave they were all the time never considering changing places with them. We were above them and when we saw the flak bursts could go up or down 500 feet, flying safely there for several minutes until the German guns could correct for our altitude. We never worried about the flak much because we could normally avoid it. Once in awhile we lost a fighter plane to flak, but usually it was to enemy fighters. After the bombers had dropped their loads they could take some evasive action.