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KF5JRV > TODAY 09.12.18 11:18l 46 Lines 2378 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
BID : 26368_KF5JRV
Read: GUEST
Subj: Today in History - Dec 05
Path: IZ3LSV<ED1ZAC<GB7CIP<AB0AF<KF5JRV
Sent: 181205/1230Z 26368@KF5JRV.#NWAR.AR.USA.NA BPQ6.0.17
At 2:10 p.m., five U.S. Navy Avenger torpedo-bombers comprising Flight
19 take off from the Ft. Lauderdale Naval Air Station in Florida on a
routine three-hour training mission. Flight 19 was scheduled to take
them due east for 120 miles, north for 73 miles, and then back over a
final 120-mile leg that would return them to the naval base. They never
returned.
Two hours after the flight began, the leader of the squadron, who had
been flying in the area for more than six months, reported that his
compass and back-up compass had failed and that his position was
unknown. The other planes experienced similar instrument malfunctions.
Radio facilities on land were contacted to find the location of the lost
squadron, but none were successful. After two more hours of confused
messages from the fliers, a distorted radio transmission from the
squadron leader was heard at 6:20 p.m., apparently calling for his men
to prepare to ditch their aircraft simultaneously because of lack of
fuel.
By this time, several land radar stations finally determined that Flight
19 was somewhere north of the Bahamas and east of the Florida coast, and
at 7:27 p.m. a search and rescue Mariner aircraft took off with a 13-man
crew. Three minutes later, the Mariner aircraft radioed to its home base
that its mission was underway. The Mariner was never heard from again.
Later, there was a report from a tanker cruising off the coast of
Florida of a visible explosion seen at 7:50 p.m.
The disappearance of the 14 men of Flight 19 and the 13 men of the
Mariner led to one of the largest air and seas searches to that date,
and hundreds of ships and aircraft combed thousands of square miles of
the Atlantic Ocean, the Gulf of Mexico, and remote locations within the
interior of Florida. No trace of the bodies or aircraft was ever found.
Although naval officials maintained that the remains of the six aircraft
and 27 men were not found because stormy weather destroyed the evidence,
the story of the “Lost Squadronö helped cement the legend of the Bermuda
Triangle, an area of the Atlantic Ocean where ships and aircraft are
said to disappear without a trace. The Bermuda Triangle is said to
stretch from the southern U.S. coast across to Bermuda and down to the
Atlantic coast of Cuba and Santo Domingo.
73 de Scott KF5JRV
Pmail: KF5JRV@KF5JRV.#NWAR.AR.USA.NA
email: KF5JRV@ICLOUD.COM
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