World War II Training in the United States The
489th Bombardment Group, Heavy was activated as a
Consolidated B-24 Liberator heavy bomber
group on 1 October 1943 at
Wendover Field, Utah. Its original squadrons were the
844th,
845th,
846th and
847th Bombardment Squadrons. Shortly after organizing, key personnel left for training with the
Army Air Forces School of Applied Tactics in Florida, where it flew simulated combat missions in company with the
491st Bombardment Group leadership, which was at a similar point in its training. The group completed combat training and departed Wendover on 3 April 1944. The group moved to
RAF Halesworth, England in May 1944, where it became part of
Eighth Air Force. On other missions, group aircraft flew into
Orleans/Bricy Airfield to deliver supplies. The 489th began flying strategic bombing missions to Germany in July, and engaged primarily in bombing strategic targets such as factories,
oil refineries and storage areas,
marshalling yards, and
airfields in
Ludwigshafen,
Magdeburg,
Brunswick,
Saarbrücken, and other cities until November 1944. At that time it was the first group in Eighth Air Force selected for redeployment to the Pacific theater and became non-operational on 14 November 1944 and most of its B-24s were assigned to other groups in England. It was relieved of assignment to the theater on 29 November 1944, and returned to the United States.
Redeployment for the Pacific The 489th Bomb Group returned to
Bradley Field Connecticut at the end of December 1944, where most returning personnel were reassigned to other units while the group moved to
Lincoln Army Air Field, Nebraska. At Lincoln it again became part of
Second Air Force on 22 January 1945, they were informed that previous plans for refresher training had been cancelled and instead the group and its associated 369th Air Service Group were retrained as
Boeing B-29 Superfortress combat and support units. However Second Air Force did not receive redesignation orders for the group until 17 March, until which time they were compelled to maintain duplicate rosters and tables of organization, one for a heavy bombardment group of four squadrons, and one for a very heavy bombardment group of three squadrons. The readiness date for the group air echelon was set back from 1 March to 1 August 1945. The group moved to
Great Bend Army Air Field, Kansas in mid-February to re-equip with the B-29, and was redesignated the
489th Bombardment Group, Very Heavy in March. The group was alerted for movement overseas in the summer of 1945, but with the
Japanese surrender, the group was inactivated on 17 October 1945.
Air Force Reserve The Air Force reactivated the group as the
Air Force Reserve Command's
489th Bomb Group on 17 October 2015, exactly 70 years after it was inactivated. The 489th operates from
Dyess Air Force Base near Abilene, Texas, flying
Rockwell B-1 Lancers and is an associate unit of the Regular Air Force's
7th Bomb Wing, operating the same aircraft. The 489th is assigned to the
307th Bomb Wing, a
Boeing B-52 Stratofortress unit at
Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana. Both the 489th and the 307th are "operationally-gained" by
Air Force Global Strike Command when
mobilized. ==Lineage==