Decades-old military plane wreckage found in Alaska glacier, may give families closure

AP via FOX News ^ | 6/28/12

[Kartographer]

The wreckage of a military plane found this month on an Alaska glacier is that of an Air Force plane that crashed in 1952, killing all 52 people aboard, military officials said Wednesday.

Army Capt. Jamie Dobson said evidence found at the crash site correlates with the missing C-124A Globemaster, but the military is not eliminating other possibilities because much investigation still needs to be done.

Processing DNA samples from relatives of those on board the plane could take up to six years, Dobson said.

"We're still at the very beginning of this investigation," she said. "This is very close to the starting line, not the finish line."

The Alaska National Guard discovered the wreckage and possibly bones June 10 on Colony Glacier, about 40 miles east of Anchorage.

[Kartographer]

June 27: This image provided by the U.S. Air Force shows an undated photo of a C-124A Globemaster cargo aircraft similar to the plane that went down on the Colony Glacier. (AP Photo/U.S. Air Force)

[JRandomFreeper]

God bless the men that fly and fight.

Training is as dangerous as fighting.

/johnny

[Kartographer]

A specialized eight-person recovery team searches for aircraft wreckage, remains, or other personal affects while conducting recovery operations at an aircraft crash site on Knik Glacier, Alaska Photo: REUTERS

[pfflier]

Old Shakey. I flew from Travis to Hickam on a 124 in 1972...I stll haven’t stopped vibrating.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Didn’t Northwest Airlines use the Globemaster has a civilian aircraft ?

[Kartographer]

As a kid I remember seeing these flying over Gary Indiana of say around ‘60 and ‘61. The seems so huge to me at the time. I wonder where they were flying out of?

[Ranger Warrior]

Flew cross country in one these contraptions in 1967, and I can attest why people in the Air Force called it the Barfmaster.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

I never had the pleasure of flying in one of these but did make a long day trip across the country in a series of DC-6C airplanes, operated by United Airlines. This was in the late 50s. There were four or five take offs and landings and I got sicker in each one...

[onedoug]

You may be thinking of the Boeing 377 Stratocruiser. Northwest used them alot.

Fifty-two aboard the C-124.... That’s a pretty full load. RIP All.

[Pompah]

I caught a “Hop” from March AFB to Seward Nashville back in 1958 on a C-124
Big Noisy SOB felt like it was waddling on the runway and in the air . the vibrations were so great that I stood up through the whole flight.
She was rigged for cargo so you can imagine the deafening ratttle and
roar. Worst Hop I ever took but it got me back to Fort Campbell on time.

[Don Corleone]

That’s a “C” model.

[pfflier]

Could be Scott AFB or Dover AFB. The one I flew on, and on, and on..was Oklahoma Air Guard.

[Hillarys Gate Cult]

The C-124 wasn’t at Scott until 1966. That’s the only Midwest location I can find where the plane was stationed. As a kid I used to hear air cargo types often mention flying in and out of Palatine, Ill ( different planes in the late 60s ) but web searches give no air force history for that place. Some type of operation was there.

[thackney]

I wonder where they were flying out of?

...JPAC spokeswoman Capt. Jamie Dobson said the plane is believed to be a Douglas C-124A Globemaster, a heavy-lifting transport plane that crashed Nov. 22, 1952 while approaching Anchorage....

"The evidence does positively correlate to that wreckage," Dobson said.

The Globemaster was flying from McChord Air Force Base in Washington. With giant bay doors under its nose, the Globemaster, nicknamed "Old Shaky," was the largest cargo plane in the American arsenal at the time, the only aircraft capable of carrying a tank or bulldozer -- or 200 soldiers.

On this flight, it carried 52 men, mostly Air Force and Army personnel and at least one from the Marine Corps and one from the Navy.

It passed Middleton Island, in the Gulf of Alaska south of Prince William Sound, en route to Elmendorf Air Force Base. At about 4 p.m., the captain of a Northwest Orient Airlines passenger plane picked up a distress call.

A scratchy signal made the call almost impossible to understand, but the Northwest pilot heard, "As long as we have to land, we might as well land here."

Silence followed. Nobody heard from the plane again.

http://www.adn.com/2012/06/27/2522442/plane-found-on-glacier.html

[contrary]

I was a flight engineer on ‘old shaky’ flying cargo in the states, SE Asia, Europe, and S America. The older it got the more dependable it got. Thought of as being ‘very forgiving. That is a “C” model flying over San Francisco Bay. Another photo shows a C-141, C-124, and C-130 in formation over the bay. Old models 124A had PW-4360-20A engines with 7 mags and the 124C had pw4360-63 engines with 4 mags and other modifications. Most problems I remember encountering were loosing generators, overspeed props, and loss of oil pressure. Electric props could get away from you and you'd have to shut down. Worse experience I had was extremely rough weather over north atlantic and it took both of us engineers (carried 2 engineers)to maintain throttles, props, card heat, and cowl flaps. Took off from Recife Brazil loaded in the summer and took 30 minutes to get to 1000’. Flew EC121 next and got out before C141 were available to me.

[SunkenCiv]

Note: this topic is from 06/28/2012. Thanks Kartographer.

• More fragments from 1952 crash in Alaska found in glacier | Mark Thiessen | June 27, 2020

[21twelve]

“As long as we have to land, we might as well land here.”

That’s the first thing I thought of - he was trying to land it on the glacier (rather than it just “crashed” into it.) Probably would have made it if it had been a small bush plane. RIP