Airplane Creek Memorial B-24 Liberator KK241 - June 1st, 1945 — Chilliwack, BC
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Dunbar Loop
N 49° 04.793 W 121° 52.776
10U E 581817 N 5436940
On the morning of Friday, June 1st, 1945 the crew of Liberator KK241 take off from Abbotsford, BC on a navigational training exercise as a part of the RCAF World War II effort. The plane crashed on Mount Walsh just 100 feet shy of the summit
Waymark Code: WMQ9WQ
Location: British Columbia, Canada
Date Posted: 01/18/2016
Views: 4
V-E day happened less then month before June 1st, 1945, however the war in the Pacific Theatre continued to rage. As a part of the war effort the Royal Canadian Air Force had a training base at Abbotsford, British Columbia. It was from here on the morning June 1st that Liberator KK241 departed at 0906 for a navigational training exercise.
Flying Officer Hill was the Captain and Pilot Officer Gilbert E. E. Long was the second pilot. Sergeant Graham Murray was the navigator; Sergeants William T. Swatton and David R. Langlands were the WAG (Wireless Air Gunners). Air Bomber Sergeant James L. G. Hammond and the aircraft’s air gunners Sergeants William P. Drummond, Stanley Aldridge, John R. Dale, Isaac Gibbons and Albert E Broadbent made up the eleven-man crew.
Liberator KK241 failed to make it the first turn on the flight in about a half-hour from the takeoff. When the plane did not return to RCAF Abbotsford concern for the crew was high, however due to poor weather over the next two weeks the search was delayed. The wreckage was spotted on Mount Welsh at 100 feet below the 7730 foot summit.
This point was to be found to too inaccessible to retrieve the eleven crewmen's bodies and they have been buried near the wreckage.
In 2015, seventy years after the fateful flight, several groups joined together to honour those who had died by erecting this memorial in Thompson Regional Park. Mount Walsh is about 22 km northeast of the memorial at 49.159880, -121.600589.
Disaster Date: 06/01/1945
Date of dedication: 09/26/2015
Memorial Sponsors: Veteran Affairs Canada, BC/Yukon Command of the Royal Canadian Legion, Royal Canadian Legion Branch #280, Western Concrete, Kednic Concrete, IMS Steel Group, Friends of Old Canada, Ron Shore CD, Wishbone Furnishings
Disaster Type: Technological
Relevant Website: [Web Link]
Parking Coordinates: Not Listed
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