On the north side of the road.

A white square plaque attached on a rough boulder. The plaque is printed in colors and is inscribed in French and English text. Printed on the top-left corner is the insignia of the US Army Air Forces, flags of Belgium and the US on the top-center and thin metal silhouette of the B-17 airplane below it. The printed badge of the 487^th Bomber Group is on the right. Below the images is the dedication message. The monument was inaugurated on December 19, 2015.

On December 16, 1944, the German Wehrmacht launched an offensive in the weakly occupied sector of the Belgian Ardennes. The target was the port of Antwerp in order to move the Allies to a negotiated end of the war. As we now know, this ended badly for the German army. However, in the days following December 16 there was great concern among the Allies. The Germans had chosen their moment well with bad weather conditions so that the Allied air forces could not use their superiority to counter the German offensive. From December 23, the outlook was slightly better and for December 24, better weather was forecast by the meteorologists. It was therefore decided to make a maximum effort, throwing everything that could fly into battle in order to disrupt the German logistics behind the front and cut off the supply of the advancing German units. Even four-engined RAF bombers were used exceptionally in daylight on this occasion. The Americans sent out more than 2,000 bombers with an escort of 853 fighters. 

The B-17 that crashed at Aywaille was also part of the 487th BG. For this mission, 'newly composed' crews were also deployed, consisting of personnel with an administrative function or of other crews around a core of an incomplete crew. The basic crew of 43-37569 was the pilot and three others who previously flew together regularly: 1 Lt Ira L Ball, Pilot, 1 Lt Gordon R Tomea Jr, Co-pilot, 1 Lt Harold P Sperber, Navigator, and T / Sgt Robert H Lull, Radio Operator. They were completed with: 1Lt John C Broom, Bombardier, T/Sgt Warren H Parks, Flight Engineer, S/Sgt Duffy J Gaudin Jr, Ball Turret Gunner, S/Sgt John J Conery, Waist Gunner, and 1Lt Cuno V Becker, Officer Tail Gunenr. The latter was the armament officer of the 836th Squadron, but would never have taken part in any mission before. On the way to the target, the formations of the 487th BG were attacked by some 40 German fighters. The German attacks soon set fire to three engines of Ball and Tomea's plane and the fire spread to the rest of the plane. Only Broom and Sperber were able to jump out of the plane. The tail broke of the plane crashing into the river Amblève at Aywaille at a place called “Le Gouffre”. The broken rump landed in a meadow between the hamlets of Septroux and Chambralles. Civilians retrieve the seriously injured Lt Becker from the tail but he died of his injuries on December 26. Due to the German offensive, the bodies of the other crew members could not be recovered until January 3, 1945. The bodies of Ball, Tomea and Parks were removed from the wreckage; Lull's body was not found until much later because it had been carried by the current. The other two, Conery and Gaudin, when the plane broke in two, were thrown out and found elsewhere. Three crew members, Ball, Gaudin and Conery, now rest in Henri-Chapelle's American cemetery; the other four victims were transferred to the United States.

Source of information and images: https://www.hangarflying.eu

N'oublions pas le sacrifice des ces amis lointains morts pour notre liberté.

Don't forget the sacrifice of these faraway friends died for our freedom.