I was lucky enough to be there on the day to see it fly in. It took about a week to fly it across the Atlantic via Newfoundland, Greenland and Iceland restricted not so much by fuel consumption but oil consumption! it did leak a bit. There are some good pictures on-line showing it in it's real dilapidated state at China Lake California. A week after it arrived I managed to talk my way in for a good look around, I remember thinking at the time that I wouldn't have fancied being in it if it was taxiing let alone crossing an ocean. It was only ever destined to be a static exhibit so it was made airworthy for just that one flight.
Hi Andy, they certainly wouldn't be able to do that now, health and safety and all that. I've added a photo of it just at the start of making it airworthy in California.
It could fly again in the UK providing it attained an Certificate of Airworthiness plus mandatory insurance... a great deal of investment required to make it fit for flying and maintain it's upkeep. The East Kirkby Lancaster NX 611 "Just Jane" has been working towards a C of A for many years but there appears to be little progress so far. Certificates of Airworthiness | UK Civil Aviation Authority
unfortunately I don't think the B29 will ever fly again, just too expensive to make airworthy and probably way too costly to keep running. It would be fantastic to see Just Jane flying, she seems to have been work in progress for 20 plus years.
A good database here of surviving B29s including a list of known wrecks. List of surviving Boeing B-29 Superfortresses - Wikipedia Interestingly the bombing radar was H2X a development from Bomber Command's H2S and was designated as AN/APQ13.
I'm hoping that if I have done this correctly there should be a link to the story of the flight across from America by the crew who flew her over. www.twinbeech.com/B-29HawgWild.htm
And a documentary made by a reporter on board shown in America at the time. B 29 Its Hawg Wild Documentary