The plane on which John Crevitt served got to be the leader of the squadron, ‘and we thought we had it made for a 30-mission tour, but it didn’t happen that way,’ he said. On Nov. 30, 1944, their target was a synthetic oil field at Merseberg, a town near Leipzig. Just before reaching the target, the plane was hit by flak at about 27,000 feet. The doors were blown off, a wing was damaged and only one engine was running.