ABLE AND READY

WE STOOD AT THE END OF RUNWAY ABLE at the northern tip of Tinian in the Pacific Ocean’s Mariana Islands and looked at a wooden 2x4, not quite seven feet tall, jutting straight up out of the tarmac. An arrow pointed south, to our left, toward the start of the runway. To our right, 100 feet away, the runway ended. Just beyond, a small patch of vegetation kept us from seeing the ocean lapping at Tinian’s shore.

Nearly 75 years earlier—at 2:45 a.m. on August 6, 1945—Colonel Paul Tibbets’s B-29 Enola Gay began its takeoff roll down this very runway. It was weighted down with 7,000 gallons of fuel, two extra crew members, and a 9,500-pound bomb—“Little Boy,” the world’s first atomic weapon destined for a live target.

The heavy load meant Tibbets had to accelerate longer than usual before