Greenland Bomber Crash, page 1

Do you mean this incident:

16) January 21, 1968: B-52 Crash near Thule

Communication between NORAD HQ and the BMEWS station at Thule had 3 elements:

1. Direct radio communication.

2. A "bomb alarm" as described above.

3. Radio Communication relayed by a b-52 bomber on airborne alert.

On January 21, 1968, a fire broke out in the b-52 bomber on airborne alert near Thule. The pilot prepared for an emergency landing at the base. However the situation deteriorated rapidly, and the crew had to bale out. There had been no time to communicate with SAC HQ, and the pilotless plane flew over the Thule base before crashing on the ice 7 miles miles offshore. Its fuel and high explosive component of its nuclear weapons exploded, but there was no nuclear detonation.

At that time, the "one point safe" condition of the nuclear weapons could not be guaranteed, and it is believed that a nuclear explosion could have resulted form accidental detonation of the high explosive trigger. Had there been a nuclear detonation even at 7 miles distant, and certainty much nearer the base, all three communication methods would have given an indication consistent with a succsessful nuclear attack on both the base and the B-52 bomber. The bomb alarm would have shown red, and the other two communication paths would have gone dead. It would hardly have been anticipated that the combination could have been caused by accident, particularly as the map of the routes for B-52 airborne flights approved by the President showed no flight near to Thule. The route had been apparently changed without informing the White House.

www.nuclearfiles.org...

I just found a site with details on the crash: ufocasebook.com...

LOL, this is a total fabrication!

Air Traffic Control at Thule Air Force Base first started making intermittent contact with the aircraft when it was approximately 100 nautical miles out of Thule, over the Atlantic.

Er, look at a map, if they were a 100 nautical miles east of thule, they would clearly be over the ice cap, NOT the Atlantic Ocean. Map of Greenland here

The last message came at 01:07 GMT, at which time the aircraft was a solid radar image, and approximately 10 nautical miles from Thule AFB's main runway, over the lip of the glacier.

10 nautical miles form the runway, huh? That would place them well within the territory of the base, between the runway and the ice cap.

I've worked at this very base for a couple of years, including the time at which this supposedly happened. Not many secrets to be kept there, small place, less than a 1000 people there. What else?

Thule AFB is accustomed to having unscheduled visitors… many of whom are in distress.

That is stretching the truth, in the time I've been there there hasn't been a single (non-scheduled flight) that had to make an emergency landing. I've heard of only one such incident, which was a commercial airliner a few years back, so stating that Thule AFB is "accustomed" to unscheduled visitors is a lie.

At first light, a search party was dispatched to the last known location of the incoming contact.

LOL, this is hilarious! As Thule is above the arctic circle, this means that the sun does not rise AT ALL between approximately November and May! Arctic night...And this was suppose to have happened on Dec.23rd? Right.

After a search of approximately two hours, they reported back to Thule AFB

Again not possible, if they were to mount a rescue effort on the ice cap, there is NO way anyone could do it in 2 hours!!

According to reports, the aircraft has, since it's recovery, been transported to a maintenance hanger at Thule Air Force Base.

Simply not true. As i mentioned earlier, there is NO way this could have been done without the whole base knowing about it. And there is not that many hangars up there anyway.

The original source was two fairly highly placed military people, serving at Thule Air Force Base, Greenland.

Hmm, how can you argue with that? That just means that he doesn't have to supply credible sources, such as people working there, for instance. Most of the people up there are actually contractors and civilians, this is hardly a secret.

So in my opinion this i totally BS...

BTW here is the official USAF homepage for Thule, many more to be found around, from ex-military to ex-employees on their own experiences in the arctic.

An expedition a few years ago attempted to restore an old WWII bomber, that had made an emergency landing in Northern Greenland, but failed when the plane caught on fire after they completed the refurbishment. Maybe this could be the source of this idea?

You may be thinking of this plane...

news.nationalgeographic.com...

Amid bad weather and turbulence in the dark of night, the plane overshot its target and got lost. Running out of fuel, the pilot landed the 85,000-pound (38,000-kilogram) plane in a belly-flop on a shallow frozen lake in northern Greenland, 950 miles (1,500 kilometers) above the Arctic Circle. Two days later, the 11-man crew was rescued in a daring recovery effort that was heralded nationwide.

There was a show on that. Darrel Greenameyer was involved. In the end the plane burned and fell through the ice. Recently a p38 was brought from over 200 feet deep in a Glacier and restored. Read about it HERE

Another Keebird link, with pictures

About the Thule B-52 crash, it was messy indeed, Lampyridae. Many of the workers from back then, mostly contractors, has gotten cancer since, most likely from cleaning that up.

My dad was employed by the same contractor, but left a couple of months before the crash.
All the participants of the cleanup has since received a settlement of 50.000 Danish crowns (approx. $ 8.000).

They have their own association; The Association of Irradiated Thuleworkers

Another site about the incident

[Edited on 8-3-2004 by operatoreleven]

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