North Stonington, CT. – December 5, 1945

North Stonington, Connecticut – December 5, 1945

 

F8F Bearcat
U. S. Navy Photo

     Shortly after 9:30 a.m. on the morning of December 5, 1945, an F8F-1 Bearcat, (Bu. No. 94867), left the Quonset Point Naval Air Station in Rhode Island for a familiarization training flight.

     About fifteen to twenty minutes later, while at 2,000 feet over the area of North Stonington, the engine suddenly lost all power.   The pilot tried to restart the engine but was unsuccessful, and his only option was to make an emergency landing.  Seeing an open field, he aimed for it and made a wheels-up landing in an area of North Stonington known as Pendleton Hill.  Unfortunately the field was littered with rocks and boulders of various sizes, and upon landing, the aircraft struck some of them causing serious damage to the fuselage and for the aircraft to catch fire. The pilot was able to extricate himself as the plane began to burn, and made his way to a nearby house where he asked to use the telephone. 

     Sources:

     U. S. Navy accident report dated December 5, 1945

     Westerly Sun, “Pilot Escapes Pendleton Hill Plane Crash”, December 6, 1945,  courtesy Westerly Public Library

 

North Stonington, CT. – May 20, 1983

North Stonington, Connecticut – May 20, 1983

     On May 20, 1983, a Cessna 172 with three persons aboard left Nantucket, Massachusetts, bound for Groton, Connecticut.  While passing over the town of North Stonington the aircraft lost power and crashed into a large maple tree next to a house located at the corner of Main’s Crossing Road and Route 2.  The severely damaged aircraft was left hanging forty feet in the air lodged in a fork in the trunk in the upper portion of the tree.  There was no fire after the accident, and all three persons remained trapped in the aircraft until freed by local firemen utilizing a bucket truck.   There were transported to a medical facility for treatment of non-life-threatening injuries.

     Sources:

     Providence Evening Bulletin, “Groton-Bound Craft Lodges In tree Fork; 3 Extricated”, May 21, 1983, page 1, with photo.   

     The Sun, (Westerly, R.I.), “Pilot: ‘I Wasn’t Thinking Whether I Was Going To Die'”, May 22, 1983, page 1, with 2 photos

     The Sun, (Westerly, R.I.), “Air Crash Study Nearly Complete”, August 22, 1983, page 3.  

     The Sun, (Westerly, R.I.), “Two Years After crash, The cause remans Unclear”, May 26, 1985, page 3.

 

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