1952 Mount Gannett C-124 crash

1952 Mount Gannett C-124 crash

Members of the US military recovery team examine remains from the crash on June 25, 2012
Accident summary
Date	November 22, 1952
Summary	Controlled flight into mountainous terrain during approach in bad weather
Site	Colony Glacier, Mount Gannett, Alaska, United States
Passengers	41
Crew	11
Fatalities	52
Survivors	0
Aircraft type	Douglas C-124A-DL Globemaster II
Operator	United States Air Force
Registration	51-0107
Flight origin	McChord Air Force Base, Washington (state)
Destination	Elmendorf Air Force Base, Alaska

The 1952 Mount Gannett C-124 crash was an accident in which a United States Air Force Douglas C-124 Globemaster II military transport aircraft crashed into Mount Gannett in the Chugach Mountains, Alaska, on November 22, 1952. All of the 52 people on board were killed.

Accident

The C-124 departed McChord Air Base in Washington state en route to Elmendorf Air Force Base near Anchorage, Alaska, with a crew of 11 and 41 Army and Air Force passengers. The flight was recorded as passing Middleton Island in the Gulf of Alaska. Around 4pm, a distress call was received by the pilot of a Northwest Orient Airlines passenger aircraft. The reception was very poor, but the Northwest captain made out the sentence: "As long as we have to land, we might as well land here."^[1] Weather near Elmendorf at the time was very bad with heavy clouds. The C-124 was flying without visual references, using just altitude, a radio beacon and a stopwatch. There was no further communication from the C-124 and it failed to arrive at Elmendorf as scheduled.^[1]

The severe weather continued for three days, so searching was only able to begin on November 25. Thirty-two military aircraft searched the surrounding mountains and four Coast Guard vessels searched Prince William Sound. The wreckage of the plane was found on November 28, 1952, on the south side of Mount Gannett by Terris Moore from the Fairbanks Civil Air Patrol and Lieutenant Thomas Sullivan from the 10th Air Rescue Squadron.^[2] The pair spotted the tail section of the C-124 sticking out of the snow at about 8,100 feet close to the summit of Mount Gannett.^[1] Sullivan and Moore recorded the location as being on the Surprise Glacier, which flows south and empties into Harriman Fjord. However, the 2012 rediscovery of the remains of the aircraft at the foot of Colony Glacier, where it enters Lake George, suggests that the actual crash location was a little further north on the Mount Gannett ice field, sufficient for the debris to be carried 12 miles (19 km) down the north-flowing Colony Glacier over the subsequent 60 years.

Moore, who was a mountaineer and pilot as well as president of the University of Alaska, told journalists the C-124 "obviously was flying at full speed" and appeared to have slid down the cliffs of Mount Gannett and exploded. Wreckage was spread across several acres of the glacier. Moore surmised that the pilot had narrowly missed other Chugach Range peaks during his approach. "From this I conclude he was on instrument, flying blind, and probably crashed without any warning whatsoever to him directly into the southerly face of Mt. Gannett."^[3]

Moore reported finding blood on a blanket and noted the "sickly-sweet smell of death" at the site.^[2] It seemed clear that there were no survivors. Sullivan noted that recovery of remains would be very difficult as the glacier was already covered by fresh snow eight feet deep. Near the remains of the aircraft, drifted snow was piled up to hundreds of feet. Apparently, the crash had also triggered avalanches that had further buried the remains.^[3] Because of the difficult conditions, the recovery effort was terminated after a week and the victims' families were told they would have no remains to bury.^[4] The debris was then covered by snow and ice, and was lost for the next 60 years.

At the time, this was only the second fatal accident for the C-124, and was by far the worst. However, the following year saw even more deadly crashes at Moses Lake, Washington, and Tachikawa, Japan, Overall, this was the fourth-worst accident involving a Douglas C-124.

Discovery of remains

On June 9, 2012, an Alaska Army National Guard Black Hawk helicopter crew on a training mission noticed a large yellow canister on the surface of the Colony Glacier above Inner Lake George.^[2][3][5] The site was nearly 14 miles from the 1952 crash location.^[2] The National Guard sent a team on foot to examine the site and they retrieved items that were identified as being from the crashed C-124.^[4]

On June 28, 2012, the U.S. military announced the discovery of the wreckage.^[2][6][7]

The recovery operation was then taken over by the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command, whose primary role is to search for US military personnel missing overseas.^[4] On June 18, 2014, after two seasons of operations on the glacier, the Department of Defense announced that the remains of 17 of the victims had been identified and would be returned to their families for burial.^[7]

See also

• 1952 Moses Lake C-124 crash, another C-124 crash less than a month later that killed 87 people and was at that time the deadliest-ever aviation accident.
• Tachikawa air disaster, a June 1953 air accident also involving a C-124.

Further reading

• Scott, Steve (2013). The Longest Flight Home. Author House. ISBN 148177266X. 

Notes