1965 Philippine Sea A-4 incident explained

Date:December 5, 1965
Type:Pre-flight human error
Occurrence Type:Incident
Site:Philippine Sea
Coordinates:27.5533°N 150.3°W
Plane1 Fatalities:1
Plane1 Type:Douglas A-4E Skyhawk
Plane1 Operator: Attack Squadron VA-56
Carrier Air Wing Five
Plane1 Tailnum:BuNo 151022

The 1965 Philippine Sea A-4 crash was a Broken Arrow incident in which a United States Navy Douglas A-4E Skyhawk attack aircraft carrying a nuclear weapon fell into the sea off Japan from the aircraft carrier .[1] The aircraft, pilot and weapon were never recovered.[2]

The accident

On 5 December 1965, 31 days after Ticonderogas departure from U.S. Naval Base Subic Bay in the Philippines, the attack jet was pushed backwards over the side, off the number 2 elevator during a training exercise while being rolled from the number 2 hangar bay to the elevator.[3] The pilot, Lieutenant (junior grade) Douglas M. Webster; the aircraft, Douglas A-4E BuNo 151022 of VA-56; and the B43 nuclear bomb were never recovered[4] from the 16000feet depth. The accident was said to occur 68miles from Kikai Island, Kagoshima Prefecture, Japan.[5]

Ticonderoga had aboard Carrier Air Wing Five during this cruise, with two squadrons of Skyhawks. The lost aircraft was part of Attack Squadron 56 (VA-56); VA-144 was the other.[6]

Number of weapons

Though most sources state that a single weapon was involved, a document from Los Alamos National Lab indicates that two weapons were involved.[7]

Revelation

It was not until 1989 that the United States Department of Defense revealed the proximity of the lost one-megaton H-bomb to Japanese territory.[8] The revelation inspired a diplomatic inquiry from Japan requesting details.[9]

See also

Notes and References

  1. Web site: 2022-09-15. The Bizarre Mystery of the Only Armed Nuke America Ever Lost. www.vice.com. 2022-09-15. https://web.archive.org/web/20220915080616/https://www.vice.com/en/article/y3p3xw/the-bizarre-mystery-of-the-only-armed-nuke-america-ever-lost. live.
  2. News: U.S. discloses accidents involving nuclear weapons . Richard Halloran . . May 26, 1981 . February 15, 2023 . August 30, 2019 . https://web.archive.org/web/20190830194355/https://www.nytimes.com/1981/05/26/us/us-discloses-accidents-involving-nuclear-weapons.html . live .
  3. Web site: LTJG Douglas M. Webster . A4skyhawk.org . 1965-12-05 . 2022-07-22 . https://web.archive.org/web/20101206021038/http://a4skyhawk.org/3e/va56/webster-va56.htm . 2010-12-06.
  4. Web site: Broken Arrows: Nuclear Weapons Accidents . atomicarchive.com . Almanac . July 22, 2022 . April 23, 2022 . https://web.archive.org/web/20220423202633/https://www.atomicarchive.com/almanac/broken-arrows/index.html . live .
  5. Book: Maruyama Kuniaki 丸山邦明 . Gunji kichi mondai to Amami . ja:軍事基地問題と奄美 . Amami sengo-shi . ja:奄美戦後史 . Kagoshima-ken chihō jichi kenkyūsho 鹿児島県地方自治研究所 . 2005 . ja . 254.
  6. Web site: CV-14 . 2012-06-14 . 2021-02-23 . https://web.archive.org/web/20210223000823/http://www.gonavy.jp/CV-CV14f.html . live .
  7. 24. Los Alamos National Lab. (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States). Peterson. Paul David. Clarke. Steven Anderson. An Introduction to Los Alamos National Laboratory. 2022-10-25. 2022-10-11. 1891826. 2022-10-25. https://web.archive.org/web/20221025134620/https://www.osti.gov/biblio/1891826. live.
  8. News: May 9, 1989 . U.S. Confirms '65 Loss of H-Bomb Near Japanese Islands . Politics . . . July 22, 2022 . March 28, 2021 . https://web.archive.org/web/20210328074756/https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1989/05/09/us-confirms-65-loss-of-h-bomb-near-japanese-islands/947ccbfa-f91b-48a0-99eb-ab9f18dfb399/ . live .
  9. News: Washington, D.C. . The Washington Post . Japan Asks Details On Lost H-Bomb . 10 May 1989 . A-35.

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