worldwartwocrashes

From the Orange County Register www.ocregister.com/articles/bill-603441-ertz-one.html. A survivor, Bill Ertz, says: The Army Air Corps instead trained him to be a navigator. Second Lt. Ertz became a member of the “Bachelors Baby” crew, so named because all 10 members were single. On their B-24 Liberator was painted a voluptuous blonde, clad only in a baby diaper fastened with an oversized safety pin, a bottle of champagne in one hand and a bubbling glass in the other. On Jan. 7, 1944, while making the last leg of its trip from the United States to its permanent base in England, Bachelors Baby crashed into a mountain just outside of Wales, killing four crew members and badly injuring the other six. “You couldn't see to first base, it was that cloudy,” Ertz remembered. “We first hit the top of a house and, then, a low mountain. The fuel burned and the ammo on board exploded. I fractured my spine, and hid behind one of the engines to dodge the flying ammo.”

Location in Moelfre, Penmaenmawr, North Wales, confirmed by the Peak District Air Accident Research at www.peakdistrictaircrashes.co.uk/pages/wales/wales42-9999...

Severed wing panel from the fatal plane crash of Consolidated PB4Y-2, BuNo 59554, in San Diego on 22 November 1944. See: www.thisdayinaviation.com/tag/consolidated-pb4y-2-privateer/ Consolidated Vultee PB4Y-2 Privateer, Bu. No. 59554, took off on its first test flight. A company crew of six men were aboard. Shortly after takeoff at 12:20 p.m., the left outboard wing of the airplane separated. The airplane immediately went out of control and crashed near a residential area in Loma Portal, a short distance west of the airfield. The wing panel struck the roof of a house at 3121 Kingsley Street. All six crew members were killed. The house was occupied but there were no persons injured inside. The wing section was recovered and the cause of the separation was quickly discovered. 98 of the 102 bolts which secured it to the inner wing section had never been installed. Two workers who were responsible for installing these missing bolts, and two inspectors who had signed off the work as having been properly completed, were fired.

This one is a real head-scratcher. The serial number doesn't turn up in any online accident database; Jim Baugher's serial number website for B-24M 44-50938 simply states "condemned combat Jun 30, 1945."