1985 Arrow Air crash, Gander, NL - 101st Airborne

[vangemeren]

Ceremonies mark 20th anniversary of Arrow crash
Last Updated Mon, 12 Dec 2005 07:39:54 EST
CBC News

Solemn ceremonies are being held in Gander, N.L., on Monday to mark the 20th anniversary of the Arrow Air crash, the worst air disaster on Canadian soil.

The crash of the charter plane killed eight civilian crew members and 248 U.S. soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division. The soldiers were on their way home for Christmas from a peacekeeping mission in the Sinai desert.

The plane was on its way to the Campbell Army Airfield in Kentucky. Ceremonies will be held there as well on Monday.

The crash will also be commemorated at a ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery in Washington.

The plane had stopped for refueling and crashed less than a minute after takeoff.

The site of the crash is now home to a memorial called Silent Witness, which features a statue of a peacekeeper holding the hands of children.

The former Canadian Aviation Safety Board's official determination was that ice on the wings probably caused the disaster.

http://www.cbc.ca/story/canada/national/2005/12/12/Air-Arrow-051212.html

*edited by Staff to correct Anniversary number*

 

[57Chevy]

Ceremony marks 25th anniversary of Arrow Air crash
article link

GANDER, N.L. — St. Martin’s Cathedral in Gander was filled to capacity Sunday, as members of the U.S. and Canadian military, government officials and members of the community gathered for a memorial service to mark the 25th anniversary of the Arrow Air crash that killed all 256 on board 25 years ago.

The Dec. 12, 1985 tragedy near Gander Lake took the lives of 248 soldiers of the 101st Airborne Division based in Fort Campbell, Kentucky, and eight crew members.

Command Sgt. Maj. Wayne St. Louis of the 101st Airborne Division, who spoke at Sunday’s memorial service, says he will always remember the emotional and personal effects the crash had on him.

“There are few events in North American history that have captivated not only a country but an entire continent, and changed so many lives forever,” said St. Louis. “People I talked to in preparation to come here today, in Toronto, Halifax, Fort Campbell and Gander, remember what they were doing that day, and the emotions they felt because of that event.

“I, myself, was personally affected that day, as my friend specialist Raimo K. Puntanen Jr., who graduated only a year before me from my high school, was on Flight 1285. Needless to say, I remember this day, and all that was lost that day.”

The 248 members of the 101st Airborne Division were returning home for Christmas from a six-month peacekeeping deployment in Sinai, Egypt, when the U.S. Defense Department chartered Arrow Air DC-8 jetliner struck down-sloping terrain and bellied for approximately 300 metres less than a minute after taking off from Gander International Airport

The ceremony incorporated remarks and scripture readings by members of the U.S. and Canadian military, hymns and prayers by local residents and clergy, remarks from Gander mayor Claude Elliott, and a poem, Final Flight, written by Herb Greening and read by a member of 9 Wing Gander.

“They lived selflessly to protect others and to safeguard peace ... they have left a lasting mark on the world,” said Brig.-Gen. Robert Beletic, deputy commander of the Canadian North American Aerospace Defense Region. “Their spirit lives on and they will not be forgotten.”

Following the church service, a wreath-laying ceremony was held at the Silent Witness Memorial, which has been erected on the actual crash site near Gander Lake — just east of Gander.


While no family members of the deceased soldiers and crew members were present during the ceremony, several locals laid wreaths on their behalf.

Canadian and U.S. government and military officials, as well as local community organizations also placed wreaths at the foot of the memorial depicting the names of the 256 deceased.

“It’s been our honour and our privilege to keep the memory of soldiers and the people who died alive,” said Gander Mayor Claude Elliott. “We will remember them.”

Photo:
The memorial for Arrow Air Flight MF1285R, a Douglas DC-8-63 carrying American Military personnel which crashed after taking off from Gander International Airport in Newfoundland, killing 248 passengers and 8 crew members enroute to Fort Campbell, Kentucky USA, December 11, 1985.
Photograph by: Peter J. Thompson, National Post


                      (Reproduced under the Fair Dealings provisions of the Copyright Act)

 

[57Chevy]

SPECIAL REPORT

Arrow Air — 25 years later

article link
The conclusion that Arrow Air Flight 1285 crashed because of ice on the wings caused a major rift within the Canadian Aviation Safety Board (CASB).

News stories from the time indicate just how divided the board was.

“Two factions of the Canadian Aviation Safety Board feuded openly at a news conference called to release the board’s findings, each accusing the other of distorting or ignoring key evidence in the Gander crash,” The New York Times reported on Dec. 8, 1988.

Five of the board’s members supported ice as the probable cause.

The other four believed an in-flight fire, which may have resulted from detonations, brought the plane down. The group did a report of its own, titled “Dissenting Opinion.”

Les Filotas was in the minority, and 25 years after the Gander crash, he’s still not buying the icing theory.

“I know what happened, but why it happened is pure guessing,” said Filotas, who released “Improbable Cause,” a book in which he documented what led to the conflicting reports.

The infighting within the CASB prompted Ottawa to ask a former Supreme Court judge to see if a new investigation into the Gander crash should be launched.

Justice Willard Estey deemed there was no need for another probe, saying it wouldn’t be fair to the families of the fallen soldiers.

He also said the ice theory couldn’t be proven.

Even though the crash is one of the largest single-day losses of life in American military history, the U.S. did not launch a full public investigation into Flight 1285.

There was a two-day hearing in December 1990 by the House Judiciary and Subcommittee on Crime and Criminal Justice.

According to a 1992 Time magazine report, that “ended without a call for action, despite surprising revelations of FBI apathy.”

The magazine reported that the subcommittee found an FBI forensics team had flown to Newfoundland after the crash and waited for whatever conclusions “Canadian authorities saw fit to share with them.”

The agents reportedly returned home after 36 hours and accepted the conclusion that terrorism wasn’t involved.

“The FBI claimed the Canadians did not allow its agents to visit the crash site or participate in the investigation,” Time reported.

The magazine story noted that a U.S. Army official who arrived at Gander hours after the crash was quoted by Arrow Air’s maintenance chief as wanting “to bulldoze the site immediately.”

The official, Maj. Gen. John Crosby, denied making the comment.

Time also reported a White House spokesperson as saying there was “no evidence of sabotage or an explosion in flight.”

Days after the magazine story appeared in April 1992, there was an unsuccessful attempt to establish a commission to investigate the crash.

Filotas, in a follow-up email to his interview with The Telegram, said American military and civil authorities stood by in silence as the Canadian investigation disintegrated into chaos.

He also suggests there is slender hope for new information on the crash. American records on Arrow Air are reportedly sealed.

Ottawa reorganized the CASB after Estey’s finding. The Transportation Safety Board of Canada has handled crash investigations since 1990.

Photo:
File photo from The Canadian Press archive — Ottawa Citizen-Lynn Ball
An RCMP officer examines the wreckage of an Arrow Air DC-8 jetliner Dec. 13, 1985 — the day after it crashed outside Gander, killing 256 people on board.


                      (Reproduced under the Fair Dealings provisions of the Copyright Act)

 

[57Chevy]

Book Review
"Improbable Cause ... promises on its cover to expose the `deceit and dissent in the investigation.' ... Filotas does that with a devastating accumulation of evidence " -- ROY ROWAN, TIME MAGAZINE (APR. 27, 1992)

At least 248 American troops didn't make it home for Christmas when the Arrow Air charter flight bringing them home from peacekeeping duties in the Sinai blew up after refueling at Gander, Newfoundland on December 12, 1985 – the worst peacetime military disaster in U.S. history. The Canadian investigators ignored the Islamic Jihad’s claim of terrorist action and suppressed evidence of an in-flight explosion. A slim majority of the investigative board blamed the crash on the crew's inattention to a thin layer of ice on the DC-8's wings. The board disintegrated in controversy after a review by a former supreme court justice roundly rejected the ice theory. Les Filotas, one of the minority who disputed the ice theory, gives a fully-documented insider’s account of the infamous investigation – and of the collapse of a long historical struggle to rid the investigation of aviation accidents of bureaucratic and political entanglements.

                      (Reproduced under the Fair Dealings provisions of the Copyright Act)

*highlights mine

edited to change anniversary date

 

[Strike]

Right.  Because a former supreme court justice has that much experience in the physics involved in getting a plane to fly that he inherently understands that a thin layer of ice would have absolutely no effect on the flying of said aircraft right after take-off when it's in its most vulnerable phase of flight.  (Yes, this response is dripping in sarcasm.)

Politicians have absolutely no place in determining the cause of a crash.  Get involved once the cause is determined to find ways from preventing it in the future.

 

[Good2Golf]

I'm confident that the Justice likely had some subject matter experts with him to aid his decision, but I think it's highly likely that other factors beyond technical ones, played into his decision to recommend no further investigation be pursued. 

Incidentally, that was my cousin's battalion (3dBn/502d Inf Regt, of the [then] 101st (AB) Div) and the majority of his Company perished on that flight.  He had come home a few weeks early because his wife had given birth prematurely to their first son, and the BN CDR told him it was an early Christmas present to see his new son.  You can imagine what a shock it would be to have an entire Company's worth of comrades wiped out like that.  Of note, the 3/502 was retired from formation service within the 2nd (Strike) Bde of the 101st (AA) Div after the incident.  The only "3d" Bn now within the 101st, is within 3d (Rakkasans) Bde, 187 Inf Regt.

My cousin has returned numerous times to the memorial, and continues to maintain ties with many of the locals who witnessed the aircraft's final moments, hence why I think there were a numbers of issues affecting the Justice's final recommendation.

That said, yes, ice on flying surfaces can be bad, no debating that...

Regards
G2G

 

[57Chevy]

The VERY Suspicious 1985 Plane Crash of Arrow Air Flight 1285 in Gander, Newfoundland

Youtube Video

 

[The Bread Guy]

30 years ago as of this weekend  ....

Amy Gallo’s husband wasn’t supposed to be home from his six-month deployment for another week, but he had managed to get a seat on an earlier flight.

“So when he called me that morning, I was blessed,” she said.

That happy phone call would be the last time Gallo would speak to her husband.

The plane carrying Sgt. Richard Nichols and 247 other soldiers, most of them from the 101st Airborne Division’s 3rd Battalion, 502nd Infantry Regiment, crashed shortly after taking off from a refueling stop in Gander, Newfoundland, Canada. All 248 soldiers and the plane’s eight crew members were killed.

It was Dec. 12, 1985, and the soldiers were on their way home from a peacekeeping deployment in the Sinai.

The crash was the deadliest tragedy to hit the famed Screaming Eagles division in years.

“How do you tell 248 family members their husbands are dead?” Gallo said. “I’ve never heard so many women yelling and screaming in my life.”

This year marks 30 years since that dreadful day, and later this week, soldiers, veterans and surviving family members will gather on Fort Campbell, Kentucky, to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the crash.

The Army has marked the anniversary of the crash every year since it happened, but this year is significant, said Col. Brett Sylvia, commander of 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne.

“This was the single largest loss of life in a single event in a single day that this division has ever experienced,” Sylvia said ....

 

[Good2Golf]

RIP Screamin' Eagles. 

A family member was in 3/502 at the time, in fact coming home just prior to the main body of his Company.  He lost his entire Platoon.  He did the NOK for each loved one with the sad news - still to this day, he says that was the hardest thing he's ever done in his career as a professional soldier...

AIR ASSAULT!

 

[tomahawk6]

I remember that day vividly.President Reagan's remarks at Ft Campbell.

https://video.search.yahoo.com/video/play;_ylt=A2KLqIPZemlWVy0APAj7w8QF;_ylu=X3oDMTByZWc0dGJtBHNlYwNzcgRzbGsDdmlkBHZ0aWQDBGdwb3MDMQ--?p=Gander+Disaster+the+President+Speaks&vid=bdf60630e942a67e7f0f2950cf8fd093&turl=http%3A%2F%2Ftse3.mm.bing.net%2Fth%3Fid%3DWN.9a917n%252frH2KcWqGLRR%252fjwA%26pid%3D15.1%26h%3D168%26w%3D300%26c%3D7%26rs%3D1&rurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3D_-0V7r8XYE8&tit=President+Reagan%26%2339%3Bs+Remarks+at+a+Service+in+Fort+Campbell%2C+Kentucky&c=0&h=168&w=300&l=364&sigr=11b4sr8oj&sigt=126oj7586&sigi=12pfaq9s8&age=1272674154&fr2=p%3As%2Cv%3Av&fr=befhp&tt=b