Charles Sweeney Major General Charles W . Sweeney ( December 27 , 1919 – July 16 , 2004 ) was an officer in the U . S . Army Air Forces during World War II and the pilot who flew Bocks Car carrying the Fat Man atomic bomb to Nagasaki on August 9 , 1945 . Separating from active duty at the end of World War II , he later became an officer in the Massachusetts Air National Guard as the Army Air Forces transitioned to an independent U . S . Air Force , eventually rising to the rank of Major General . Biography . Sweeney was born in Lowell , Massachusetts and began flying while attending North Quincy High School . After graduating in 1937 , he attended classes at Boston University and Purdue University , then joined the U . S . Army Air Corps on 28 April 1941 as an aviation cadet . After receiving his pilot wings and a commission as a second lieutenant , Sweeney trained for two years at the Jefferson Proving Ground in Indiana . Sweeney served as an operations officer and a test pilot at Eglin Field , Florida . In 1944 he was promoted to major and assigned as a B - 29 Superfortress pilot instructor at Grand Island Army Airfield , Nebraska . 509th Composite Group . Sweeney became an instructor in the atomic missions training project , Project Alberta , at Wendover Army Airfield , Utah . Selected to be part of the 509th Composite Group commanded by Col . Paul Tibbets , he was named commander of the 320th Troop Carrier Squadron on 6 January 1945 . Initially his squadron used C - 47 Skytrain and C - 46 Commando transports on hand to conduct the top secret operations to supply the 509th , but in April 1945 it acquired five C - 54 Skymaster s , which had the range to deliver personnel and materiel to the western Pacific area . On May 4 , 1945 , Sweeney became commander of the 393d Bombardment Squadron , Heavy , the combat element of the 509th , in charge of 15 Silverplate B - 29s and their flight and ground crews , 535 men in all . In June and July Sweeney moved his unit to North Field on the island of Tinian in the Marianas . In addition to supervising the intensive training of his flight crews during July 1945 , Sweeney was slated to command the second atomic bomb mission . He trained with the crew of Captain ( Charles D . ) Don Albury aboard their B - 29 " The Great Artiste " , and was aircraft commander on the training mission of July 11 . He and the crew flew five of the nine rehearsal test drops of inert Little Boy and Fat Man bomb assemblies in preparation for the missions . On 6 August 1945 , Sweeney and Albury piloted " The Great Artiste " as the instrumentation and observation support aircraft for the atomic bomb attack on Hiroshima . The Nagasaki Mission . On 9 August 1945 , Major Sweeney commanded " Bocks Car " , which carried the atomic bomb " Fat Man " from the island of Tinian to Nagasaki . In addition to " Bocks Car " , the mission included two observation and instrumentation support B - 29s , " The Great Artiste " and " The Big Stink " , who would rendezvous with " Bocks Car " over Yakushima Island . At the mission prebriefing , the three planes were ordered to make their rendezvous over Yakushima at 30 , 000 feet due to weather conditions over Iwo Jima ( the Hiroshima mission rendezvous ) . That same morning , on the day of the mission , the ground crew notified Sweeney that a faulty fuel transfer pump made it impossible to utilize some 625 gallons of fuel in the tail , but Sweeney , as aircraft commander , elected to proceed with the mission . Before takeoff , Col . Tibbets warned Sweeney that he had lost at least 45 minutes of flying time because of the fuel pump problem , and to take no more than fifteen minutes at the rendezvous before proceeding directly to the primary target . After takeoff from Tinian , " Bocks Car " reached its rendezvous point and after circling for an extended period , found " The Great Artiste " , but not " The Big Stink " . Climbing to 30 , 000 feet , the assigned rendezvous altitude , both aircraft slowly circled Yakushima Island . Though Sweeney had been ordered not to wait at the rendezvous for the other aircraft longer than fifteen minutes before proceeding to the primary target , Sweeney continued to wait for " The Big Stink " , perhaps at the urging of Commander Frederick Ashworth , the plane ' s weaponeer . After exceeding the original rendezvous time limit by a half - hour , " Bockscar " , accompanied by the " The Great Artiste " , proceeded to the primary target , Kokura . No less than three bomb runs were made , but the delay at the rendezvous had resulted in 7 / 10ths cloud cover over the primary target , and the bombardier was unable to drop . By the time of the third bomb run , Japanese antiaircraft fire was getting close , and Japanese fighter planes could be seen climbing to intercept " Bocks Car " . Poor bombing visibility and an increasingly critical fuel shortage eventually forced " Bockscar " to divert from Kokura and attack the secondary target , Nagasaki . As they approached Nagasaki , the heart of the city ' s downtown was covered by dense cloud , and Sweeney and the plane ' s weaponeer , Commander Ashworth , initially decided to bomb Nagasaki using radar . However , a small opening in the clouds allowed " Bocks Car ' s " bombardier to verify the target as Nagasaki . As the crew had been ordered to drop the bomb visually if possible , Sweeney decided to proceed with a visual bomb run . " Bockscar " then dropped " Fat Man " , with a blast yield equivalent to 21 kilotons of TNT . It exploded 43 seconds later at 469 meters ( 1 , 540 ft ) above the ground , at least 2 . 5 kilometers ( 1 . 5 miles ) northwest of the planned aim point . The failure to drop " Fat Man " at the precise bomb aim point caused the atomic blast to be confined to the Urakami Valley . As a consequence , a major portion of the city was protected by the intervening hills , and only 60 % of Nagasaki was destroyed . Low on fuel , " Bocks Car " barely made it to the runway on Okinawa . With only enough fuel for one landing attempt , Sweeney brought " Bocks Car " in fast and hard , ordering every available distress flare on board to be fired as he did so . The number two engine died from fuel starvation as " Bockscar " began its final approach . Touching the runway hard , the heavy B - 29 slewed left and towards a row of parked B - 24 bombers before the pilots managed to regain control . With both pilots standing on the brake , Sweeney made a swerving 90 - degree turn at the end of the runway to avoid going over the cliff into the ocean . , 2nd Lt . Jacob Beser recalled that at this point , two engines had died from fuel exhaustion , while " the centrifugal force resulting from the turn was almost enough to put us through the side of the airplane . " Japan surrendered six days later . After " Bocks Car " returned to Tinian , Col . Tibbets recorded that he was faced with the dilemma of considering “ if any action should be taken against the airplane commander , Charles Sweeney , for failure to command . ” After meeting on Guam with Col . Tibbets and Major Sweeney , General Curtis LeMay , chief of staff for the Strategic Air Forces , confronted Sweeney , stating " " You fucked up , didn ' t you , Chuck ? " " , to which Sweeney made no reply . LeMay then turned to Tibbets and told him that an investigation into Sweeney ' s conduct of the mission would serve no useful purpose . In November 1945 , Sweeney returned with the 509th Composite Group to Roswell Army Air Base in New Mexico to train aircrews for the atomic testing mission , Operation Crossroads . Post - war activities . Sweeney left active duty with the rank of lieutenant colonel on June 28 , 1946 , but remained active with the Massachusetts Air National Guard . Later promoted to full colonel , on February 21 , 1956 , Col Sweeney was named commander of its 102nd Air Defense Wing and shortly after , on April 6 , was promoted to Brigadier General . He retired in 1976 as a Major General in the Air National Guard . He also appeared in the 1970s television series " World At War " and was seen explaining the USAAF buildup to the mission raids . Throughout his life Sweeney remained convinced of the appropriateness and necessity of the bombing , and near the end of his life , wrote a highly controversial and factually disputed memoir of the atomic bombing and the 509th Composite Group , " War ' s End : An Eyewitness Account of America ' s Last Atomic Mission " . In " War ' s End " , Sweeney defended the decision to drop the atomic bomb in light of subsequent historical questioning . However , it was Sweeney ' s other assertions regarding the Nagasaki atomic mission , along with various anecdotes regarding the 509th and its crews that drew the most criticism . General Paul Tibbets , Major ' Dutch ' Van Kirk , Colonel Thomas Ferebee and others vigorously disputed Sweeney ' s account of events . Partly in response to " War ' s End " , General Tibbets issued a revised version of his own autobiography in 1998 , adding a new section on the Nagasaki attack in which he harshly criticized Sweeney ’ s actions during the mission . In his later years Charles Sweeney performed in various air shows doing many maneuvers to awe crowds . Sweeney died at age 84 on July 16 , 2004 at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston . A short documentary featuring an audio recording of Sweeney describing the Nagasaki mission preparation and execution called " Nagasaki : The Commander ' s Voice " was made in 2005 . The 2002 audio recording was the last one made before his death .