Historic Boeing plane recovered

By Elizabeth Murtaugh

Associated Press

SEATTLE – A 1940s-era Boeing passenger plane was carefully hoisted Friday from the waters of Elliott Bay off West Seattle, one day after engine failure forced a veteran test pilot to ditch the aircraft.

The Boeing 307 Stratoliner was loaded onto a barge late Friday afternoon. Plans called for it to be taken to a terminal along the Duwamish River, where it would be thoroughly washed before being transported to a hangar at Boeing Field.

Debra Eckrote of the National Transportation Safety Board said three Boeing test pilots and an observer had taken the vintage aircraft for a training and maintenance flight Thursday afternoon when they lost power.

The pilot set the plane down in Elliott Bay – in full view of downtown Seattle – because he determined it was the safest place to land, Eckrote said. All four people on board escaped unharmed.

“Ditching is not an easy thing to do, and they did an excellent job,” Eckrote said.

The plane was secured overnight so it would not sink or drift.

The crew had planned to make several practice landings at Paine Field in Everett, but the captain decided to return to Boeing Field early when the right inboard engine failed after the first successful landing, Eckrote said.

That engine regained power on the way back to Boeing Field, then failed again as the plane circled over Bainbridge and Vashon islands while the crew tried to fix a problem with the landing gear, Eckrote said.

Soon after, all four engines failed, and the pilot ditched the plane not far from Salty’s restaurant on the West Seattle waterfront.

“He knew he was going down, and he picked a spot that was perfect. … He pancaked it in beautifully,” said Ed Munson, a retired barber who said he saw the plane go down.

The refurbished Stratoliner had been unveiled here last summer after six years of painstaking restoration by a group of Boeing retirees. One of only 10 made, it is the last known to be in existence and was headed for Washington, D.C., where it was to be the centerpiece of the new Smithsonian Institution’s air museum being built at Dulles International Airport. The plane once served as the presidential aircraft of the late Haitian dictator “Papa Doc” Duvalier, Smithsonian spokeswoman Claire Brown said.

The plane is owned by the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum.

Paul Tooley, one of more than 200 spectators who watched the plane recovery on Friday, said he had been on the plane twice and knew the work that went into its restoration.

“Everything was so professionally done, an incredible labor of love,” Tooley said. “I shed a tear when I saw it go down” on the television news.

Otto Gaiser, 70, a Boeing retiree, also came to watch. “This is history,” Gaiser said. “It’s a sad situation,”

The plane was piloted by veteran Boeing test pilot Richard “Buzz” Nelson, 60, of Seattle. Also on board were Boeing test pilot Mike Carriker and Boeing flight test manager Mark Kempton. Kempton headed the plane restoration effort.

NTSB officials interviewed the men and planned to continue their investigation of the crash at Boeing Field, where the plane will be stored.

When it was originally built, the 307 Stratoliner was the first commercial plane with a pressurized cabin – which allowed it to fly at 20,000 feet, far higher than the 5,000- to 10,000-foot altitudes of its unpressurized competitors.

The Stratoliner could carry 33 passengers and a crew of five.

This plane was first delivered to Pan American Airways in 1940 and named the Clipper Flying Cloud.