Boston, Massachusetts – January 17, 1956
On the evening of January 17, 1956, a Northeast Airlines twin-engine Convair aircraft with 24 people aboard took off from Boston’s Logan Airport bound for LaGuardia Airport in New York City. Several minutes after becoming airborne the aircraft’s electrical system suffered a failure which plunged the cabin and cockpit into darkness, and left the radio inoperable. With no way to report their situation the crew was left to improvise.
Fortunately there was a flashlight in the cockpit, and while the co-pilot used it to illuminate the control panel, the pilot continued flying the airplane. The captain decided not to return to Boston due to heavy air traffic there, and fog and snowstorms prevented him from making an emergency landing elsewhere, so he opted to continue to New York.
The air crew knew the general direction to reach La Guardia, but they had no idea of their exact position along the way.
Meanwhile, when the flight failed to arrive on time, and couldn’t be contacted by radio, it was declared missing and a search was instituted.
The flight arrived at LaGuardia two hours and twenty-two minutes late, and landed safely without benefit of radio contact with the tower.
Source: The Evening Star, (Washington, D. C.), “Blind Airliner Lands With 24”, January 18, 1956, page A-36