Tibbets, Jr.), took off from Tinian, a North Pacific island in the Marianas, only 1,450 miles from Tokyo, carrying the bomb.
At 2:45 AM on Monday, 6 August 1945, a B-29 Superfortress bomber 'Enola Gay' (named after the mother of pilot Colonel Paul W. Hiroshima, a military center and the seventh largest city in Japan at the time, was selected as the first target for the 509th Composite Group bombers. Morris Jeppson (Weapon Test Officer, electronics specialist), finished the assembly and arming in the bomb bay after takeoff, out of fear that an armed bomb could explode on Tinian or in a crash during take-off. Navy Captain Deak Parsons (Ordnance Chief and Associate Director at Los Alamos, on board Enola Gay as Weapon Officer), assisted by Lt. The photo to the right shows Little Boy in the loading pit, directly under the Enola Gay, ready to be hoisted into its bomb bay.
When assembled, the uranium bomb, called 'Little Boy' weighed 9,700 lbs, was ten feet long, with a diameter of 28 inches. Indianapolis delivered the components of the atomic bomb to the 509th on Tinian.
