Aircraft disappearance
On 26 January 1950, the
Douglas C-54 Skymaster
serial number
42-72469
disappeared en route from Alaska to Montana, with 44 people aboard.
[1]
[2]
The aircraft made its last radio contact two hours into its eight-hour flight. Despite one of the largest rescue efforts carried out by a joint effort between Canadian and US military forces, no trace of the aircraft has ever been found.
[2]
Flight
[
edit
]
The aircraft was part of the First Strategic Support Squadron,
Strategic Air Command
, out of
Biggs AFB
, Texas. In addition to its eight-man crew, it was carrying 36 passengers, including two civilians: a woman and her infant son.
[3]
An earlier attempt to depart had been made, but due to trouble with one of its four engines, it was delayed several hours.
[4]
The flight was from
Anchorage, Alaska
, to
Great Falls, Montana
. Two hours after its eventual departure, the flight marked its first scheduled check-in over
Snag, Yukon
, where the pilot reported that the plane was on schedule with no issues to report. However, the flight never checked in with its second destination,
Aishihik, Yukon
, and was never heard from again.
Search
[
edit
]
Great Falls Air Force Base
After the plane failed to arrive in Montana, a
search-and-rescue
effort launched, combining as many as 85 American and Canadian planes, in addition to 7,000 personnel, searching 350,000
square miles
of the Pacific Northwest.
[3]
The search was aided by the fact that soldiers and equipment had already been ferried north for the upcoming Exercise Sweetbriar, a joint Canada?U.S.
war games
scenario.
[5]
The operation confounded searchers, giving many
false positive
reports of
smoke signals
and garbled radio communications.
[6]
Search efforts were hindered by the lack of pilot training in search-and-rescue tactics; defined search patterns were not used, for example.
[6]
Three planes crashed during the search mission; although all crew survived, the incidents reflected the dangers of the Yukon terrain:
[6]
- On 30 January, a C-47, Air Force serial number
45-1015
from the
57th Fighter Wing
, that had been participating in the search, stalled and crashed in the
McClintoc mountains
near
Whitehorse
. Its crew members were injured, but there were no fatalities. The pilot walked 13 km to the
Alaska Highway
and flagged down a truck to call in support for his 5?8 crewmates.
[4]
[7]
- On 7 February, a C-47D,
45-1037
, from
Eielson Air Force Base
employed on the search by the 5010th Wing, crashed on a mountain slope south of
Aishihik Lake
. There were ten crew members on board, but there were no fatalities.
[8]
- On 16 February, a
Royal Canadian Air Force
C-47
,
KJ-936
, crashed near Snag. Again, its four crew members sustained only light injuries.
[9]
Later its wreckage would be temporarily mistaken for the missing C-54.
[10]
On 2 February it was reported that two planes and two radio stations in the Yukon area had heard unintelligible radio signals, including some near the plane's failed second check-in town of Aishihik, but attempts to acquire a source were fruitless. Likewise, an isolated settler had reported seeing a large plane over his cabin at Beaver Lake in the interior of
British Columbia
located 500 miles south of the Yukon boundary-250 miles northeast of Vancouver and 200 miles west of the Alaska Highway air route.
[11]
The operation was indefinitely suspended on 14 February, as the search planes were sent to the
Gulf of Alaska
to search for a
missing B-36 bomber
which had been carrying a
Mark 4 nuclear bomb
, though this bomb did not have a
radioactive core
. (The B-36 wreckage was subsequently located.)
[3]
[12]
Aftermath
[
edit
]
On 20 February 1950, the search was officially cancelled and notifications were sent to
next of kin
informing them that the passengers were
presumed dead
.
[13]
In 2012, the descendants of the missing servicemen started a
petition
to the Federal government, through the
We the People petition system
, seeking to resurrect the search for their families' remains.
[14]
In 2020, Andrew Gregg was named as the director of an upcoming documentary about the search for the aircraft,
Skymaster Down
.
[15]
The documentary was aired in Canada on January 16, 2022, on the
CBC
's
Documentary Channel
.
[16]
In 2022, after the documentary's release, a group in Whitehorse, consisting of a geologist, a historian and a
glaciologist
, among others, formed to conduct a renewed search for the missing aircraft, using
drones
to explore inaccessible locations.
[12]
See also
[
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]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
Ranter, Harro; Lujan, Fabian I. (2008).
"Douglas C-54D-1-DC 42-72469 Snag, YT"
. Retrieved
2011-06-19
.
- ^
a
b
Kennebec, Matt (2010).
"Douglas DC-4 C-54D"
. Archived from
the original
on 2011-09-26
. Retrieved
2011-06-19
.
- ^
a
b
c
"What happened to C-54 Skymaster 42-72469?"
. Ruudleeuw.com
. Retrieved
2017-06-20
.
- ^
a
b
Chase, Sean (February 4, 2010).
"Operation Mike: The disappearance of a Skymaster over the Yukon"
.
The Daily Observer
. Archived from
the original
on June 29, 2018
. Retrieved
October 30,
2016
.
- ^
"Exercise Sweetbriar"
.
Empire Club of Canada
. 1950-03-30
. Retrieved
2017-06-20
.
- ^
a
b
c
Leyland Cecco,
Can a new film help solve Canada's 70-year mystery of vanished US plane?
,
The Guardian
(August 31, 2020).
- ^
A search for answers
,
The Troy Messenger
(April 6, 2012).
- ^
USAF Accident Report 50-02-07-005
- ^
RCAF Investigation No.2618
- ^
"Abandoned Plane Wrecks of the North"
. Ruudleeuw.com
. Retrieved
2017-06-20
.
- ^
"Weather blights big air search"
.
Wilmington Morning Star
. February 2, 1950.
- ^
a
b
New group will search for U.S. military plane that disappeared over the Yukon in 1950
, CBC News (March 31, 2022).
- ^
"Dagle, Donald W., 1928?1950"
. Ns2.iagenweb.org. Archived from
the original
on 2014-07-14
. Retrieved
2017-06-20
.
- ^
"Kathryn's Report: Family of missing West Virginia pilot seeks to reopen search for Air Force plane that vanished in 1950"
. Archived from
the original
on 2012-06-19
. Retrieved
2012-05-23
.
- ^
"Weather blights big air search"
.
The Guardian
. August 31, 2020.
- ^
"Skymaster Down"
.
CBC
. 2022-01-16
. Retrieved
2022-03-11
.
External links
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Jan 24
Philippine Air Lines DC-3 disappearance
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