His mental condition slowly deteriorated. Consumed by guilt he attempted suicide by drugs in a hotel in New Orleans, but he survived and was treated in Waco, Texas in a psychiatric hospital for soldiers. He left the Air Force in 1947 and worked at an oil company in Houston, Texas where he became a sales manager for a mobile station. It departed Tinian Island at approximately 0137 hours on the morning of August 6, 1945, a little more than an hour ahead of the Enola Gay (which carried the bomb) and flew over Hiroshima with the task of reporting the weather conditions. Main article: Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and NagasakiĮatherly was the pilot of Straight Flush, one of seven B-29s of the 393rd Bomb Squadron of the 509th Composite Group that took part in the Hiroshima mission, which was the culmination of ten months of training during World War II.
