1971 B-52C Lake Michigan crash
Westover Air Force Base | |
Passengers | 0 |
---|---|
Crew | 9 |
Fatalities | 9 (all) |
Injuries | 0 |
Survivors | 0 |
On January 7, 1971, a
Background
B-52C 54-2666
The B-52C used on the mission of Thursday January 7, 1971, with the call sign "Hiram 16", had been built in the summer of 1956 as one of thirty-five B-52C bombers. From 1952 to 1962 a total of 744 B-52s of all models were built. By January 1971, all thirty-one remaining B-52Cs were stationed at
Hiram 16 Crew
The crew that flew Hiram 16 on its final mission on 7 January 1971 were all veterans of the Vietnam War. They had been loaned by the SAC to assist in that war effort and were back stateside by January 1971 to participate in a Cold War training mission that involved a low level flight over northern Lake Michigan at Bay Shore, Michigan's mobile Radar Bomb Scoring Site. Bay Shore was a radar site operated by Air Force technicians using electronic equipment designed to track, plot, score and at the same time jam the capability of bombers using its associated Olive Branch low level route. Olive Branch routes simulated what a bomb crew would experience over enemy territory. The crew members consisted of aircraft commander Lt. Col William Lemmon, co-pilot Lt. Douglas Bachman, radar navigator Cap. John Weaver, electronics warfare officer Cap. Joel Hirsch, tail gunner Tech. Sgt. Gerry Achey. Navigator instructor Maj. John Simonfy on board to recertify navigators and electronic warfare officers Lt. Douglas Ferguson, Maj. Gerald Black, and Maj. Donald Rousseau. The four extra crew members were on board for a SAC required low-level flight recertification.[3]
Accident
After taking off from Westover Air Force Base at 1:30 pm EST, the "Hiram 16" crew completed a mandatory practice refueling procedure with its accompanying
Accident investigation
Recovery of the B-52C T/N 54-2666 was not accomplished until the end of June 1971. Winter weather and lake surface icing did not allow recovery procedures to continue when started in January 1971. Ocean Systems, a salvage company from Florida, retrieved parts of the plane that included all eight engines in four pods, crew and tail sections, landing gear and wheels, and large sections of the massive wings. All recovered parts were taken to the now-closed
Aftermath
Beginning in July 1963, United States Air Force bombers were being scored by Air Force technicians at the mobile radar scoring site in Bay Shore, Michigan. The site was made up of mobile trailers filled with electronic equipment used to track, plot and jam the incoming aircraft and its crew. Each mission was a simulated use of electronics on the bomber to jam enemy radar so that the Cold War mission could be accomplished, while at the same time the ground crew of radar and electronic technicians were doing the same. 5 miles (8.0 km) west of the Bay Shore site was the Big Rock Point Nuclear Power Plant owned by Consumers Power and had gone active in October 1962. The 67 MegaWatt nuclear reactor was encased in concrete under a steel dome that was 5.5 in (140 mm) thick. From July 1963, most low-level training flight bomber crews had been using the large green dome of the nuclear power plant as a sight target since flying directly over the Bay Shore radar site did not give the ground technicians the ability to properly score the planes. The bombers had to be either west or east of the Bay Shore-based site. As early as November 1963 Consumers Power officials were complaining about the overflights stating in one letter that they posed an exceedingly high risk factor in the event of a crash into its facility. The B-52C was traveling at 365 mph (317 kn; 587 km/h) when the main spar in its left wing suffered a major structural failure, causing a complete loss of pilot control. It was 5 mi (8.0 km) due north of Big Rock Point when it went down on a 312-degree trajectory from the Bayshore Bomb Scoring Site. Both the Big Rock Point Nuclear Power Plant and the Bay Shore Bomb Scoring Site have since been closed.
References
- ^ "9 Missing in Bay Shore Crash". Petoskey News Review. 9 January 1971.
- ISBN 978-1-58566-068-1. Archived from the original(PDF) on 10 November 2016. Retrieved 1 June 2015.
- ^ a b Saye, Col. Robert N. "United States Air Force Aircraft Accident Investigative Report-Air Combat Command- B-52C T/N 54-2666 Westover Air Force Base". Westover Air Force Base.
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(help) - ^ "A Great Lakes Accident-Cold War Style". Inland Seas Quarterly Journal of the Great Lakes Historical Society. 70. Spring 2014.
Further reading
- Towery, Major Carl "Tommy" (ed.). We Were Crewdogs, Volumes I, II, II, IV, V. Memphis, Tennessee.
- Gerald R. Ford Congressional PapersFolder B188-35. Ann Arbor, Michigan: Gerald R. Ford Library.
- Big Rock Point Nuclear Power Plant. Charlevoix, Michigan: Atomic Energy Commission-Nuclear Regulatory Commission” - Public Document Room Resources. 1971.
External links
- B-52 Stratofortress
- Listing of B-52 crashes since 1957
- Morris, P. A. (1971). "Big Rock Point: Overflights" (PDF). WASHINGTON. D.C.: UNITED STATES ATOMIC ENERGY COMMISSION. Retrieved June 1, 2015.
- "SAC Bomber tests will be resumed". Chicago Tribune. August 14, 1971. p. 10 - section 1. Retrieved June 1, 2015. - Clipping at Newspapers.com.