The freezing level along the route was at about 14,000feet and the winds at that altitude were generally from the northwest at 10-20knots. Add hotel. Feb 2023 - Present2 months. We appreciate you trying our new Live Surface Map feature. National Airlines Flight 967, registration N4891C,[1] was a Douglas DC-7B aircraft that disappeared over the Gulf of Mexico en route from Tampa, Florida, to New Orleans, Louisiana, on November 16, 1959. arrow_forward Literature guides Concept explainers Writing guide Popular textbooks Popular high school textbooks Popular Q&A Business Accounting Economics Finance Leadership Management Marketing Operations Management Engineering Bioengineering Chemical Engineering Civil Engineering Computer Engineering Computer Science Electrical Engineering . Clearly in shock, she turned to the reporter and said: "What can I say? But they don't agree on when it occurred. It appeared that the oil was rising from the northernmost point of this oil slick. ", Alan C. Logans book also cites a vague remark by Mr Turska that Spears was not alone when he showed up in Arizona after the crash. The aircraft had been called into service on short notice when the normal aircraft used for the evening . Alice was not to be dissuaded. As he said in a recent interview: "The more that I learned through the research about Spears, even though this guy had an incredibly profound criminal past [] he never had any history of violence at all. However, the Clearfield, Pennsylvania, Progress speculated in its Nov. 17, 1959, edition that the aircraft may have been brought down by a bomb: "Was there an explosion aboard the National Airlines DC-7B liner that crashed in the Gulf of Mexico Monday with 42 persons aboard? Logan says Taylors ex-wife was media-savvy--and points out that she had a potential financial motive to portray Taylor as an unwitting passenger on that flight. The second radar station at Houma, Louisiana, picked up the flight at 0046, on track and at 14,000feet altitude. Who hatched the plot--Spears? 18cm Wingspan approx. Frank E. Todd of Miami, the pilot, radioed his last message at 12:44a.m. Recently, she said, Al Taylor had been strangely depressed and withdrawn, but his mood only lifted when he talked to Spears. According to the Nov. 17, 1959, edition of the New York Times, I. W. Dymond, vice president of operations for the airline, said the weather "was anticipated, but it was not a factor" in the crash. 03 hrs 40 mins . Intensive sea and air searches resulted in finding nine floating bodies and a small amount of floating debris the following morning. It was a starlit night, and good weather conditions were reported all along the route. A check by the company at this time showed that FAA, New Orleans Approach Control, and ARTC were also out of contact with Flight967. He planned to intimidate the witness in that case somehow with a bomb (not to kill her but to intimidate her). On January 6, 1960 (less than two months after Flight 967) Frank was on board a National Airlines flight which was blown up by dynamite over North Carolina, resulting in 34 deaths. A considerable amount of the floating debris also exhibited signs of burning but only above waterlines. Logan points out that much of the public demonization of Spears resulted from the fact that he performed abortions--something that is viewed very differently in todays political discourse. She was an unflappable woman in her late fifties, with a fondness for ostentatious feathered hats, pearl necklaces, and large brooches. So why the stories from Spears? November 5 After suffering an in-flight engine fire, the second North American X-15 (AF 56-6671), piloted by Scott Crossfield, breaks its Back making an emergency landing on Rosamond Dry Lake, California. I've never heard of this and I love aviation mysteries. [citation needed], Spears was eventually arrested in Phoenix after being turned in by the ex-wife a fellow naturopath in Arizona. Nearby radar stations reported "the flight was very close to being on course and on schedule.'' The last radio contact with the flight was at 12:44 AM, when the flight contacted company radio in New Orleans. Immediately they concentrated their efforts on this area, eventually retrieving: "nine bodies, a portion of a tenth body, five life rafts, five life vests, and a highly diversified quantity of buoyant debris.". At 1:16 AM, company radio attempted to contact Flight 967 to no avail; attempts by FAA en route facilities, New Orleans Approach Control, and air traffic control were unable to raise the flight. His story is absurd, the prosecutor said. The man was a con artist. The other plane crash remains unexplained despite the apparent presence of dynamite and that it happened over land where, presumably, most or all of the wreckage was recovered. At its height, National Airlines had a network of "Coast-to-Coast-to-Coast" flights, linking Florida and the Gulf Coast with cities along the East Coast and large . It is perhaps no coincidence that a PR man from National Airlines wrote a book in 1963 accusing Spears of being responsible for the crash. Flight Departure Times. Cheapest ticket price on Dubai to Toronto Skycraft Air Transport flight air ticket at MakeMyTrip UAE. Tampa Police Detective John C. Daniels was among those who did not buy the hypnosis theory: Taylor was in debt over his head. United Airlines Flight 718, a DC-7, collided over the Grand Canyon with TWA Flight 2, an L-1049 Super Constellation, . Just a few years before, Logan writes, on Valentine's Day 1953, a National Airlines flight on the very same run--from Tampa to New Orleans--also plunged into the Gulf. [] for all those decades and all the different things they got up to. Spear's activities in order to determine whether they might have had a bearing upon the accident. Cooper? It has been claimed that Dr Spears tried to access a vial of cyanide before his sentencing--but some have disputed this. Fri, 26 May 23. . National Airlines Flight 967 of November 15, 1959, was scheduled between Miami, Florida, and New Orleans, Louisiana, with a stop at Tampa, Florida. The Civil Aeronautics Board investigated the cause of the crash. Geo resource failed to load. A Delta Airlines DC-7, similar to the accident aircraft, Learn how and when to remove these template messages, introducing citations to additional sources, Learn how and when to remove this template message, List of accidents and incidents involving commercial aircraft, Robert Spears, 1959 bomb suspect, dies in Dallas, Civil Aeronautics Board Aircraft Accident Report on Flight 967, Clear Lake crash ("The Day the Music Died"), https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=National_Airlines_Flight_967&oldid=1123344434, Accidents and incidents involving the Douglas DC-7, Airliner accidents and incidents in the United States, Aviation accidents and incidents in the Atlantic Ocean, Aviation accidents and incidents in the United States in 1959, National Airlines (19341980) accidents and incidents, Unsolved mass murders in the United States, Short description is different from Wikidata, Articles needing additional references from September 2021, All articles needing additional references, Articles lacking in-text citations from September 2021, Articles with multiple maintenance issues, Articles with unsourced statements from July 2015, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, In-flight explosion (Bombing suspected, but not proven), This page was last edited on 23 November 2022, at 06:57. I wonder how long it took the police to find out about all these shady characters. A problem was discovered (broken window . They even raise the possibility that the two con-men may have been plotting something together. You received a Purple Heart on or after September 11, 2001, and were honorably discharged after any amount of service, or. The weather conditions were good. There she discovered a receipt addressed to their son Junior. A radar-observed descent was close to Lat. For 3-1/2 to 4minutes the flight continued on a normal track of approximately 296 degrees magnetic. Taylor apparently agreed to this, and boarded the flight that night with nothing more than a briefcase containing the dynamite. The the bodies can get torn apart depending on their exact location on the plane, whether they were strapped in or not. Emirates Airlines is the preferable and national . One part of the investigation focused on the passengers. National Airlines Flight 967, registration N4891C, [1] was a Douglas DC-7B aircraft that disappeared over the Gulf of Mexico en route from Tampa, Florida to New Orleans, Louisiana on November 16, 1959. That's where the stories of him driving and Taylor flying, Taylor needing to carry the dynamite, and Taylor accidentally or purposefully igniting it all come from just stories from a guy who was trying not to get accidentally blamed from a plane crash he didn't plan or commit. He had become financially successful in Texas as a . A massive search began. There have been dozens of plane crashes due to explosive decompression. On November 16, 1959, an airplane vanished over the Gulf of Mexico, with 42 people onboard. The only noteworthy observation from the gate agent in Tampa was "a man in a brown or tan suit, carrying a newspaper but no luggage, hurrying toward the Flight 967 gate right at closing time". After several decades of false names, new identities, fresh starts, abandoned wives, abandoned lives--he had spent the last years running "a lucrative underground abortion business". NH967 (All Nippon Airways) - Live flight status, scheduled flights, flight arrival and departure times, flight tracks and playback, flight route and airport The world's most popular flight tracker. and Long. Consultative detailed and customized flight tracking data reports. [1][2][3] In February 1960, Spears was convicted of interstate transportation of a stolen car (Taylor's Plymouth). Braniff International Airways Flight 542, a Lockheed L-188 Electra, registration N9705C, was a scheduled domestic flight from Houston, Texas, bound for New York with scheduled stops in Dallas and Washington, D.C. On September 29, 1959, 23 minutes into the 41-minute flight from Houston to Dallas Love Field, the aircraft disintegrated in mid-air approximately 3.8 miles (6.1 km) southeast of . I told him it wouldn't work!". Turska? As for the insurance policy taken out by Taylor, Spears said: Taylor was sort of a nut on insurance. By rejecting non-essential cookies, Reddit may still use certain cookies to ensure the proper functionality of our platform. Two military radar stations had the flight under surveillance. Texas International walked away from their foiled attempt with a multi-million dollar stock profit and was poised for Lorenzo's next venturesa startup airline in the high-density East coast corridor (New York Air), and subsequent acquisition of Continental Airlines. Probably one of the most intriguing cases Ive read here, what a great write up OP! 432 in 1951, 905 in 1955, 1041 in 1960, 2663 in 1965, 2643 in 1970, 3865 in 1975. November 16 - National Airlines Flight 967, a Douglas DC-7B, crashes into the Gulf of Mexico while on a flight from Tampa, Florida, to New Orleans, Louisiana, in a possible case of sabotage; all 40 on board perish. At 0044 the flight again contacted FAA Pensacola and advised that it would change over to company frequency and would report to the company when leaving 14,000feet and7,000 feet. This position was determined by VOR bearings taken from 14,000feet altitude. May 3, 1969 LINK, Con Man, Best Man, An Air Crash - A Far Out, Far Up Mystery". At Miami, National Airlines prepared one of its Convair aircraft, which left for the area at 0545 under the command of the company's chief pilot. The two had met in the Missouri State Penitentiary, back when Taylor was still known as Albert O. Thompson. All employment decisions are made without regard to age, race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, national origin, citizenship, disability, military leave or veteran status, genetic information, or any other status protected by applicable federal, state or local law. The captain and the dispatcher discussed the flight and concurred in the release. He was "100 percent" certain it was Taylor, and when he called out "Hey Al" he said the man turned, but then hastily slipped away into the crowd. Note the use of the word accident, which is used throughout the report. Low stratus and fog in the area from Mobile to New Orleans and at the New Orleans terminal would have caused the destination to be below limits at the estimated time of arrival. Shortly thereafter a Coast Guard helicopter arrived. In this interview, he told a completely different story about what had happened. but he would have had to have done some rushing to get aboard the plane because it taxied away at 12:25 am. Taylors son Junior dismissed the story. This page was last edited on 5 May 2019, at 15:31. I can understand him taking out an insurance policy. This segment of the flight was completely routine. [2] There was no evidence of any connection between Spears and the accident. She later said she had a premonition that her husband had been on that flight, and she never wavered from it. This is the story Spears gave after his arrest: He said he had been in Tampa and was planning on heading back to Dallas on November 16. Although sabotage was suspected, no definite cause of the crash was determined . It revealed that Al Taylor had bought a $37,500 life insurance policy-- in Tampa airport--at 12:16 am, just nine minutes before Flight 967 departed. November 10 of 1958, National became the first airline to introduce domestic jet service in the United States, with a flight between Miami 's international airport and Idlewild International Airport in New York. In compliance with the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) requirements, some of these records are no longer in the physical possession of the FBI, eliminating the FBI's capability to re-review and/or re-process this material. Investigation disclosed no significant weather condition in the form of fronts, squall lines, thunderstorms, turbulence or icing affecting the route of flight. Searching continued through November23. He added that the passengers apparently had no warning to don lifebelts, as only one life preserver was found among the debris. The flight had been on its way from Tampa, Florida, to New Orleans. No operational or maintenance item was found which can reasonably be linked to this accident. A tragic accident due to some unforeseen mechanical malfunction or even pilot error? . I think it's because "my friend took my ticket last minute under my name, but when I heard the plane exploded, i decided to duck out and start a new life because not only am i a con man, I was in big trouble for illegal abortions too" doesn't make for a convincing story. Flight data API with on-demand flight status and flight tracking data. Spectacular job. Revenue passenger traffic in millions of passenger-miles November 10 of 1958, National became the first airline to introduce domestic jet service in the United States, with a flight between Miami 's international airport and Idlewild International Airport in New York. A Tanzanian airline said on Monday it will start flights to Zimbabwe in December, plying the Harare-Dar es Salaam route three times a week. The U.S.S. Interchange flights like this were fairly common before the CAB awarded more direct routes beginning with the Southeast to West Coast case in 1961. They had been divorced longer than she claimed, and the divorce had been far from amicable. But where had he been? [1] November 16 National Airlines Flight 967, a Douglas DC-7B, crashes in the Gulf of Mexico with the loss of all 42 people on board . [1], Investigators learned that William Taylor, a fellow felon and longtime criminal accomplice of Spears,[1] had boarded Flight 967 using a ticket made out to "Dr. https://en.wikisource.org/w/index.php?title=Aviation_Accident_Report:_National_Airlines_Flight_967&oldid=9238655. The FBI, while stopping short of the Svengali hypothesis, acknowledged that "Spears may have had someone travel for him to collect a large insurance policy for the benefit of his young wife". The 36 passengers and six crew aboard Flight 967 from Tampa to New Orleans died in the accident 35.6 mi (57.3 km) off the coast of Pilottown, Louisiana. * Douglas DC-8-21/31/32/51/54/61 He was charged with three felony accounts and was set to stand trial in Los Angeles on December 3, 1959. Create an account to follow your favorite communities and start taking part in conversations. If there was, did it come before or after the crash? Back then, you could get on a plane, put something in the luggage rack, and then right before take off say "Excuse me, is this the plane to Dallas? In that interview, Turska said he now thought Spears had been lying to hm, and implied Spears's wife was in on the whole scam--accusing her of faking her reaction to seeing him. Adequate fuel, with reserve, was carried. Las Vegas, Nevada, United States333 followers 331 connections. But this investigation led nowhere. - October 5, 1945, a Lockheed Lodestar crashed into a lake in Lakeland, Florida with two fatalities. Two dozen books on hypnosis had been found in Spears's home in Dallas. Police seriously looked into the possibility that Al Taylor may still be alive, even working with Mexican law enforcement to explore the possibility that he had fled south of the border. Turska claimed at the time he did not even know about the airplane crash. Mrs Taylor recalled that Dr Spears had held an unnatural sway over her former husband. See if your flight has been delayed or cancelled and track the live position on a map. It's quick and easy to. By all accounts, he was in financial difficulties, and had many debts. A B D Yes, they help protect natural wonders No, the National Park Service is a waste of federal funding Yes, national parks provided recreational activities and environmental education No, national parks should return the land to indigenous Americans and then hurry away, accidentally forgetting your luggage. Taylor, investigators discovered, was wanted in Washington DC and Philadephlia under a variety of assumed names at the time of his disappearance. Spears had been a close friend of her husband, and she had never considered him to be a good influence. None of these nine persons had been subjected to fire or smoke before death, as demonstrated by low carboxyhemoglobin levels in blood and tissue. The main wreckage has not been located despite several well planned searches. That was before Spears was found in Arizona with Taylors car. Company calls to 967 continued without result for some time. National Airlines Flight 193, registration N4744, Donna, was a Boeing 727-235 en route from Miami, Florida to Pensacola on May 8, 1978. . * Douglas DC-6B . It was founded in 1934 as a Florida-based airline. ASSURANCE and the U.S.S. It'd make him look suspicious, even if it was the honest truth. The media, of course, went straight to Dr Spearss wife. Turska claimed that once he found out about the plane crash fiasco, he immediately told Spears to leave, and then went straight to see his attorney. A rival airline company? The National crew consisted of Captain Frank Eugene Todd, Copilot Dick . All 42occupants, 36passengers and 6crew members, were killed. This dialogue will close in 60 seconds or you can click the exit icon in the top right corner to go back to the flight map immediately. To me it just doesnt add up that Spears is going to tell his best friend of many decades, a man with essentially no history of violence, to take on this package like its Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner..