When they eventually establish radio contact, the pilot tells them that the mission has been a success ("we really hit our target for tonight"), but that the aircraft was badly damaged in combat and has lost one engine.

It is sometimes said to be based on the events of February 26, 1943, when "Southern Comfort", a B-17 Flying Fortress piloted by Hugh G. Ashcraft Jr. of Charlotte, North Carolina, was badly damaged by anti-aircraft fire on a bombing mission over mainland Europe.

[3] The song has also been associated with the similar survival against the odds, despite extensive damage, of another B-17, "Thunderbird", piloted by Lt. John Cronkhite, on a mission from Biskra, Algeria, over Tripoli on January 12, 1943.

[7] The song also became widely known in the Soviet Union in a 1943 adaptation by the popular singer and jazz band leader Leonid Utyosov, titled "Bombers".

[8] This Russian idiom – на честном слове, or na ches[t]nom slove (т is not pronounced) – means "only just managing" or "just holding on".