This Day in Aviation History
February 13th, 1950
A Convair B-36B Peacemaker crashes in British Columbia, Canada. This crash marks the first of 32 “Broken Arrow” incidents officially recognised by the US Department of Defense.
On 14 February 1950, a Convair B-36B, Air Force Serial Number 44-92075 assigned to the 7th Bomb Wing at Carswell Air Force Base, crashed in northern British Columbia after jettisoning a Mark 4 nuclear bomb. This was the first such nuclear weapon loss in history. The B-36 had been en route from Eielson Air Force Base near Fairbanks, Alaska to Carswell AFB in Fort Worth, Texas, more than 3000 miles south-east, on a mission that included a simulated nuclear attack on San Francisco…..
Source:
Wikipedia, 1950 British Columbia B-36 crash: http://gstv.us/20ZJ3Ek
Wikipedia, Broken Arrow: http://gstv.us/20ZJ5fu
YouTube, B-36 Lost Nuke in British Columbia, Broken Arrow: http://gstv.us/20ZJ8Ik
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Photo from: http://gstv.us/20ZJrmv
#avgeek #Convair #B36 #Peacemaker #BrokenArrow #military #ColdWar #USA #Canada #aviation #history #fb
Gazing Skyward TV Crossing the streams here but speaking of crazy experiments. It would take the Russians to fly one with nuclear power but we did fly the B-36 with a live reactor. The lesson learned was that you needed a lot of weight in radiation shielding for the safety of the crew. Which was not an issue for the Russians of course. I think they only flew theirs once and I need to dig up the letter from the survivor of the crew describing what happened to the rest of the crew. It’s a real good example why they didn’t move forward.
en.wikipedia.org – Convair NB-36H – Wikipedia