website about the SB-17 crashsite in Washington

[gatt]

A friend of mine and I hiked up into the Olympic forest to find this crash
site. He ended up contacting survivors, family of the deceased, etc and
uncovered an amazing amount of information. Last I heard, he went back up
with a GPS to mark the debris field. It's a sad story...SB-17 crashes in
severe IMC returning from a search and rescue mission. The photos at the
site cover the crew being rescued, the aircraft preparing for its final
mission, and the site as it looks today.

It was touching to find the hub, broken prop blades and engines scattered
among the rocks and wildflowers and breathtaking scenery only two years ago.

The biggest issue, which might be a topic for discussion here, is that the
pilot's career was destroyed because the crash was blamed on him despite the
extreme, uncontrollable conditions reported by the other crewmembers.

http://www.peak.org/~mikey/746.htm

[Jay Beckman]

"gatt" > wrote in message
...
>
> A friend of mine and I hiked up into the Olympic forest to find this crash
> site. He ended up contacting survivors, family of the deceased, etc and
> uncovered an amazing amount of information. Last I heard, he went back up
> with a GPS to mark the debris field. It's a sad story...SB-17 crashes in
> severe IMC returning from a search and rescue mission. The photos at the
> site cover the crew being rescued, the aircraft preparing for its final
> mission, and the site as it looks today.
>
> It was touching to find the hub, broken prop blades and engines scattered
> among the rocks and wildflowers and breathtaking scenery only two years
ago.
>
> The biggest issue, which might be a topic for discussion here, is that the
> pilot's career was destroyed because the crash was blamed on him despite
the
> extreme, uncontrollable conditions reported by the other crewmembers.
>
> http://www.peak.org/~mikey/746.htm
>
>

Wow...!

Quite the story, thanks for sharing the link.

Jay B in AZ

[C J Campbell]

"gatt" > wrote in message
...
>
>
> The biggest issue, which might be a topic for discussion here, is that the
> pilot's career was destroyed because the crash was blamed on him despite
the
> extreme, uncontrollable conditions reported by the other crewmembers.

The pilots had no need to be flying on the extreme edge of the airway. There
is no indication in the record that they attempted any sort of course
correction. They misinterpreted where they were, got lost in bad weather,
and hit a mountain.

The old radio ranges were like VORs, only they had only four 'radials.'
Pilots listened for the Morse code letters A and N to determine whether they
were to the right or left of the range. If you were at the edge of the
airway you were likely to lose the signal altogether. You then had no more
idea where you were than a modern pilot has when his CDI is deflected full
scale.

They 'thought' they heard an A, but in fact they already knew that their
radios were marginal and they later lost all their radios to static buildup.
So now they are left wandering about in the mountains in IMC at low level in
extreme turbulence with no communications and having not a clue where they
were. If that isn't the pilots' fault, whose was it?

People get lost in this area all the time. In fact, I have been lost there.
Navigation radio coverage is poor, even today. Low altitude makes the
problem much worse. Most of the time if you get lost you also manage to find
your way out. These pilots were not so lucky, but you cannot fly into a
place where you know the conditions are bad and then blame your problems on
the conditions. Did the B-17 really need to be that low? Did it have to take
that route, or was the crew trying to cut the corner of the airway in order
to get home faster?

[gatt]

"C J Campbell" > wrote in message

> They 'thought' they heard an A, but in fact they already knew that their
> radios were marginal and they later lost all their radios to static
buildup.
> So now they are left wandering about in the mountains in IMC at low level
in
> extreme turbulence with no communications and having not a clue where they
> were. If that isn't the pilots' fault, whose was it?

The navigator's, perhaps, but I explained to Mike (the site author) what
"Pilot in Command" means.

> Did the B-17 really need to be that low? Did it have to take
> that route, or was the crew trying to cut the corner of the airway in
order
> to get home faster?

Good questions. Interviews with the survivors didn't turn up much except
that visibility was zero and the turbulence was so extreme that they had
difficulty just holding the airplane at attitude and altitude and that it
was impossible to move around in the airplane.

The guys producing Monster Garage contacted us about doing a documentary for
the History Channel about it but it doesn't sound like they could sell it to
the networks.
-c