TWA Flight 8
37°35′46.74″N 119°29′36.53″W / 37.5963167°N 119.4934806°W
Accident | |
---|---|
Date | March 1, 1938 |
Summary | San Francisco, California |
Destination | Winslow, Arizona |
Passengers | 6 |
Crew | 3 |
Fatalities | 9 |
Injuries | 0 |
Survivors | 0 |
The crash of TWA Flight 8 involved a
Flight
The aircraft was
Flight 8 was flying from San Francisco to Winslow, which was a hub connecting TWA's transcontinental
Disappearance
Two hours after takeoff, the flight encountered a building weather front that developed into the most severe storm on the West Coast in 64 years. As the flight neared the Tehachapi Mountains near Bakersfield, California, Captain Graves noticed ice forming on the wings. He advised air traffic controllers, who ordered him to divert to Los Angeles due to the deteriorating weather conditions.[3] Graves replied that he planned to divert to nearby Fresno due to local weather. At 9:28 PM, he requested a weather update; this was his last transmission received by air traffic control.
Search efforts
Officials based their search area on the reports of Mrs. C.G. Landry, who was operating the
Severe storms that lingered throughout the week hampered searches for the missing aircraft. Pelting rain and heavy winds prevented the use of aircraft in the search, forcing searchers to rely on
The general search involved both TWA and government officials, who drove to Fresno from San Francisco and Los Angeles to aid in the search.[3] As days passed, Transcontinental & Western Air grew increasingly desperate to find the aircraft, and eventually offered a $1,000 reward (equivalent to $21,645 in 2023) to anyone who could locate the aircraft.
Hoax call
On March 2, 1938, the day after the flight's disappearance, Transcontinental & Western Air headquarters told reporters that it had received a message purporting to be from United Airlines offices in Fresno, which claimed that the missing aircraft had been found. The telephoned message said that the plane had been found approximately 20 miles from Fresno with "several passengers injured but everybody alive," as later reported in the Ogden Standard Examiner.[4]
Upon investigation, however, the message turned out to be a hoax; the plane had not been found. An outraged TWA spokesman denounced the message as "one of the cruelest hoaxes ever perpetrated."[4] Officials at United Airlines offices in both Fresno and San Francisco denied that their employees had been the ones to call in the hoax.
Discovery
Three months after the crash, the aircraft had still not been located. A private citizen, 23-year-old H.O. Collier of Fresno, began a personal search for the missing plane after interviewing numerous TWA personnel and studying charts of the flight path. In early June, Collier hiked into the snowy terrain northeast of Wawona, California, and discovered the wreckage of the aircraft on June 12, 1938. The crash site was located 32 miles (51 km) northwest of the area searched by investigators.
The aircraft was partially buried in the snow of Buena Vista Crest, within Yosemite National Park. Eight bodies out of 9 occupants were thrown from the plane. Only the body of stewardess Wilson was trapped in the wreckage.
Investigators speculated that the aircraft had been blown off course while attempting to divert to Fresno, and had subsequently lost
Seventy-one years later, Bob Hoskin of Redlands, California discovered a collection of artifacts from the crash in a cedar chest at a yard sale. It included a collection of original crash scene photos, letters from family members & TWA Officials, the TWA $1,000.00 reward check stub, First Officer Salisbury's pilot cap, a detailed manuscript written by Collier himself about how he found the plane, and several rejection letters regarding his composition.[5]
Investigation
On June 13, 1938, after the discovery of the crash site of Flight 8,
See also
References
- ^ "INCIDENT FILES, Box 133, Accident – March 1, 1938 #1 Fresno, CA – Plane #327 AC-III". TWA Museum Archives 1929-2002, K0453. THE STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF MISSOURI RESEARCH CENTER-KANSAS CITY.
- ^ a b ASN Database
- ^ a b c d e f g h i UP (March 2, 1938). "AIRLINER DISAPPEARS -- NINE ABOARD. TRANSPORT MISSING SINCE LAST NIGHT IN HIGH SIERRAS". Ogden Standard Examiner. Ogden, Utah. Archived from the original on March 2, 2012. Retrieved 2009-05-24.
- ^ a b UP (March 2, 1938). "FALSE REPORT OF SAFE LANDING BRANDED BY AIRLINE OFFICIALS AS 'CRUELEST HOAX EVER PERPETRATED'; HUNT DIFFICULT". Ogden Standard Examiner. Ogden, Utah. Archived from the original on March 2, 2012. Retrieved 2009-05-24.
- ^ Hernandez, Kristina (5 January 2014). "Redlands man's collection documents 1938 TWA plane crash in Yosemite". The Sun. Retrieved 30 March 2021.
- ^ a b Source: UP (June 14, 1938). "U. S. NAMES AIR CRASH PROBE BOARD. BODIES OF NINE DEAD ARE BROUGHT TO FRESNO FROM YOSEMITE PEAK". The Fresno Bee Republican. Fresno, California. Archived from the original on March 2, 2012. Retrieved 2009-05-24.
External links
- Video footage of recovery efforts, eFootage.com, Accessed: May 24, 2009.
- Photo of actual aircraft at TWA Chicago hangar circa 1934.