Lucky Lady II

Lucky Lady II is a United States Air Force Boeing B-50 Superfortress that became the first airplane to circle the world nonstop when it made the journey in 1949, assisted by in-flight refueling. Total time airborne was 94 hours and 1 minute. After an accident, only the fuselage is preserved. (Lucky Lady II was also the name of a B-17 of the 338th Bomb Squadron, which was shot down near Tielrode, Belgium (Temse), on 30 July 1943.)

1949: First circumnavigation of the world

The Lucky Lady II was a functioning B-50 of the 43rd Bombardment Group, equipped with 12x 0.50 calibre (12.7mm) machine guns, with an additional fuel tank added in the bomb bay to provide additional range. The aircraft had a double crew with three pilots, with each crew taking a shift of four to six hours on duty and four to six hours off.

The aircraft started its round-the-world trip with a crew of 14 under the command of Capt. James Gallagher at 12:21 PM on February 26, 1949, from Carswell Air Force Base near Fort Worth, Texas, heading east over the Atlantic Ocean.

Lucky Lady

Lucky Lady is a 1975 American film directed by Stanley Donen and starring Gene Hackman, Liza Minnelli and Burt Reynolds, with Robby Benson. Its story takes place during Prohibition in the United States in the year 1930.

Gene Hackman initially did not want to do the film, but 20th Century Fox kept offering him more and more money. Finally, Fox offered him $1.25 million, and according to talent agent Sue Mengers, "it was almost obscene for him not to do the film."

On February 1, 2011 Shout! Factory released the film on DVD for the first time.

Plot

During the Prohibition era, a young widow, Claire, gets involved in liquor smuggling and romance with two men, Walker and Kibby, off the San Diego coast. Organized crime controls bootlegging back east and wants to do the same here, so a hit man named McTeague is sent to deal with these amateur crooks, as is the Coast Guard, leading to various battles at sea.

Cast