Navigator Tells Story of 1963 Greenville Crash
Bangor Daily News September 23, 1967
It was just another routine training mission. But this one would end in headlines which spoke of disaster and search, joy and tragedy. The story of disaster took place in less than a minute, and in fewer than five seconds of that time seven men were doomed to die while only two of us would live to tell the tale.
The airman often defines flying as hours and hours of boredom punctuated by moments of sheer terror. Flying the B-52, the free world's largest and most potent guarantor of the Strategic Air Command's motto 'Peace is Our Profession' is never really boring, however. The multitude of intricate systems that make this eight million dollar beauty fly are too complex to allow much relaxation. But with knowledge of the airplane, the safest tactical aircraft that the United States has ever had, comes confidence and assurance that its crew will return safely to fly another day.
This mission on the 24th day of January 1963 would be different. An Instructor Pilot and Navigator from the New Mexico base were aboard to check out two Pilot-Navigator Instructor Teams from Westover AFB, Mass. in a new terrain avoidance low level navigation system. It is no secret that Soviet defensive technology has forced low level navigation and bombing on us. But when something goes wrong at 500 feet or less there is not much time to correct it or get out.
There was some apprehension about this flight. It was to be the Wing's first such flight after previous cancellations due to weather and faulty equipment. The new system and the unusually low altitudes to be flown caused some of us on the crew to wear even warmer clothing and carry more survival gear than normal. Because of the unusual crew composition, this was to be my first ride in an upward ejection seat in four and one half years of B-52 flying. Normally, the Navigator-Bombardiers occupy downward-firing seats which require at least 400 feet of altitude for successful operation.
Later I came to ask myself why I wore not only my winter flying suit, thermal underwear, and thermal boots, but also at the last minute I had placed a pile cap, extra warm gloves, matches and a flashlight into my pockets. Why also did I take that upward seat, and study its operation so thoroughly before take off? These like subsequent questions must always go unanswered.
It was scheduled to be only a short flight of some five hours duration. For heavy bomber crews used to 24 hour flights this is like a trip to the corner grocery. But it would end some two and a half hours early near a place called Greenville Me. in the beautiful but rugged Moosehead Lake region.
Maine is a marvelous vacationland abounding in fish and game. But in midwinter it is no place in which to be wandering or even worse in which to be abruptly deposited.
On this particular afternoon with the blue sky dotted with occasional fleecy and intermittent light turbulence the crew was only dimly aware of how cold it was outside. As the treetops skimmed by at 300 miles per hour a few hundred feet below, there was little thought of snow depths beneath.
Starts to Climb
One moment it was blissful, if arduous, training. The next moment came the turbulence as we approached a mountain range on our planned course. To the Air Force, flying safety is paramount in all training situations, and when moderate turbulence is encountered at low level, SAC's instructions are to climb immediately. This is what we did but the turbulence became worse.
Then came that moment of sheer terror.
There was a loud noise from somewhere. The aircraft snapped into a steep right bank, descending at the same time. Nothing that the Pilots could do would bring it out of this attitude. With Westover's most senior standardization instructor pilot at the wheel as crew commander, the airplane was still out of control. Later they found out why.
No pilot can fly the B-52 after its vertical stabilizer (tail fin) snaps off.
Elephant Mountain passed underneath at what appeared to be touching distance. From my seat I could see out a window normally beyond the line of sight. I looked for the signal to go. The abandon light was on. I groped for the handles which would actuate the seat. It seemed an eternity but it could have been only an instant.
Just Curiosity
Every flyer wonders what it is like to eject. He hopes he'll never find out. It is not surprising, therefore, that as the seat fired through the top of the fuselage that I thought was 'so this is what it's like to eject'. There was no fear of dying but just the answer to that old curiosity.
I remember tumbling twice in the seat and held on for dear life to what was my only link with the airplane- an airplane that was already a mere pile of rubble identifiable only by its tires.
I don't remember coming through the trees nor can I recall landing. When I came to after an undetermined period of time the quiet was overwhelming. Ahead of me I could see smoke from what I presumed to be the airplane. And around me were the trees, the snow, and stillness.
And I looked at all this from my throne in the snow, my ejection seat. Now this is theoretically not possible. The book says that when an upward firing seat reaches the top of its arc, man and seat should separate, the parachute will automatically open, and from then on a normal landing is to be expected.
Yet it did not bother me that to still be in the seat was not normal. Nor did the fact that my main parachute was still intact, unopened, in my back pack concern me. As I looked around I could see that the small white pilot 'chute had popped out of the pack but this could only have occurred at impact. After all, I had hit the ground with an estimated force 16 times the normal pull of gravity.
No Place to Go
All that I thought about was that I appeared to be intact, that they would come after me shortly, and that I was probably the only one to get out, and I was mad at the wilderness and snow, not even thinking that it was these trees and deep snow that saved my life. I was just mad that there was no place to go.
However, I wasn't the only one to get out. Within those last five seconds the other occupants of the upward ejection seats had also left. The two downward seats probably never fired. The gunner and other crew members without ejection seats had no time to manually bail out.
My ejection altitude was probably about 100 feet above the ground but only 20 to 40 feet above the trees. The pilots leaving split seconds later had slightly more altitude as the mountain dropped away from us faster than the aircraft was descending.
But at our speed and angles of dive and bank, the experts say that seat separation and parachute deployment cannot occur. Yet it did occur- for the pilots. The 40 knot wind blowing at the time was probably the big factor in initial 'chute blossoming. The surviving pilot said that the concussion from the aircraft's impact and explosion finished the inflation.
Both were blown away from the flames. But the co-pilot was killed when the wind swung him into a tree. The pilot was carried over the mountain top and back along the line of flight. Although still carrying the scars of his ejection injuries, he is back in the cockpit today.
Thus on the other side of the line that we all walk, seven men died in an instant of time. The dreams, hopes, and aspirations of seven families were wiped out. Six women were widowed and nine children orphaned by a routine training flight in this fight to keep the peace that is not quite peace.
My broken watch said 2:52 on that winter afternoon. From then until about 10:30 the next morning was a time for waiting and surviving. They later said that the temperature went from 10 below zero at the time of the crash to 35 below. The snow was some five feet deep on the level with drifts to 20 feet. But this itself would not have been too bad.
Despite my injuries, which were later diagnosed as a fractured skull and three fractured ribs, we were trained and equipped for extreme conditions. But when I worked out of my parachute harness, there lay my survival kit imprisoned in a vise in the bent seat. So near and yet so far was the sleeping bag it contained.
That seat, with what I must believe to have been a Heavenly Copilot had brought me through the trees taking off several thick branches en route and landed me upright in the snow. Perhaps that inaccessible survival kit was my fare for the ride. There wasn't a scratch on me from the trees. Had I landed any way but upright I could not be writing this story.
Darkness Comes
The orange parachute then became my means of providing a marker for searchers as well as forming a bed and shelter throughout the night. As dusk approached and no searching aircraft came in sight, a strange doubt overtook me. The smoke that I had seen was no longer visible. I feared that I had panicked and left a flyable airplane. I didn't know whether upon return I would be welcomed or court-martialed.
Little did I know of the massive search operation that was taking place.
Rescue helicopters and other planes from Labrador, New Hampshire and Massachusetts were brought into play aiding the search parties from Maine based Air Force Units, the Civil Air Patrol, the Maine State Police and Game Department plus many other volunteer civilians.
Some 80 men comprising a ground search party were deploying into the area.
As the evening wore on I thought more often about my family and the anxious hours that I knew would be theirs. I knew that I was all right, but they didn't know that. I thought about our many discussions centering about an Air Force career.; Flying to me was not a dangerous profession. I felt that the hazard pay we received was remuneration for a grueling, demanding job in the air and for the 70-hour work weeks to which SAC limited us. Accidents always happened to the other guy, always, that is, except this time.
During that long Maine winter night I passed out for what must have been hours. I tried to stay awake by thinking about my wife and two little girls, telling myself that I would get back to them fearing to go to sleep. But the shock and injuries proved to be too much.
Frostbite
When I came to, I found one boot in the snow, cold and wet. The other was cold although not in the snow. I tried to stand up to attempt once more to light a fire in the wet snow-covered branches. But I couldn't stand. The frostbite later took its toll of one leg and the toes on the other foot.
Finally the planes started coming during the night. I knew that it would only be a matter of time now. I was sure that a searching tanker plane had spotted my flashlight's SOS. Weeks later I found out that it had not, Nevertheless, the thought buoyed my hopes during the night.
Help Arrives
With full daylight came more search aircraft. A Maine Game Warden's plane first spotted me. By now I was only strong enough to wave one arm as I lay wrapped in the folds of my parachute. A helicopter from Otis AFB, Mass hovered at treetop level in that I am told was exceedingly difficult maneuver and dropped a man down to me in a sling.
That paramedic was the most welcome sights I have ever seen. I'll never forget his incredible handlebar mustache. This was my first helicopter ride and I couldn't have enjoyed it more.
I later became unconscious for five days with double pneumonia. This was the worst time of all. I guess the at Eastern Maine General Hospital in Bangor did all they could and then said that it was out of their hand. But God stayed with me.
After an experience of this sort, the unanswerable questions remain. Why me? Why was I tapped on the shoulder? Why was my ejection successful despite an undeployed parachute? Why was I in the upward seat at that particular moment for the first time in all my flying?
So may imponderables remain. Each separately can be answered logically. But can logic explain the combination of all the factors?
Eventually the questions became dimmer in the mind. I am reminded, however, every morning when I strap on my new leg. Perhaps we should all be reminded more often of that very thin line that we all tread and of the right way to live while we are on this side of it.
BACK BACK TO VISIT SOME CRASH SITES HOME