On the 20th of August, 1973, CH-46D 153354 was written off at Yokosuka, Japan whilst with H&MS 36. No details of any casualties.

According to the H&MS-36 Command Chronology for Jul-Dec 1973, "20 August - One CH-46 of H&MS-36, SU#2, Atsugi, Japan, crashed while on final approach at Yokosuka NB. The crew sustained minor injuries -- two passengers were killed."

Just a thought

I wonder if the Naval Safety Center in Norfolk could help:

http://www.safetycenter.navy.mil/

There is a link there for FOI - Freedom of Information.

I live in Norfolk, but have neither a "live" contact there nor do I have a base sticker. However, if we can find someone I would be happy to call and/or visit.

Naval Safety Center Data Base

http://www.safetycenter.navy.mil/aviation/aviationdata/downloads/datareq.dot

NAVAL SAFETY CENTER
AVIATION DATA RETRIEVAL & ANALYSIS DIVISION (CODE 15)
375 A ST.
NORFOLK, VA. 23511-4399
PHONE: (757) 444-3520 DSN{564}
FAX: (757) 444-7049

I suspect these folks have the safety investigation in their files. However, the decision to offer it is above my pay grade.

Phrog crash @ Yokuska Japan ~1973

Might wanna e-mail Joe Shanley . If I remember right, he and Dickie Driggers had a crash about then, in Japan, and a Marine female passenger and either a crewman or another pasenger were casualties.

I may be wrong. VA says my memory is going at the anticipated rate of most veterans' my age...

Hooper:eek:

Yokosuka Crash

I was there in SU 2 and was supposed to fly that flight but was too close to my ritation date that Maj HT Nance took me off the flight. Dick Driggers was the pilot. I have forgotten who the copilot was. The crew chief went by Little Al but cannot remember his last name. There was a Naval Officer who was taking the flight to Yokohama enroute to pick up his wi=fe who was arriving at Nagrita Airport. There was also a WM Major who had visited the unit the day before. She was sitting on the seat next to the crew chief's door. I piloted the flight that carried Major Nance to the site and assisted in the initial investigation. Tha cause of the accident was a thrown blade. The A/C was a CH 46 A with hoover aft. Ch46's were grounded for almost 6 months after the accident.
Neal Nadler
neal.nadler@prodigy.net

crash info

I was the pilot in that CH-46 crash on August 20, 1973. We were MAG-36, sub unit 2 stationed at Naval Air Station Atsugi. Joe Shanley, a fine Irish lad from Boston, was co-pilot. We had flown the same A/C for over an hour that morning at >1k feet altitude. We had 5 passengers (one was a female). We were in the last part of a descent into a concrete landing zone about 10 feet off the deck when a blade broke off. (It landed a little over a hundred yards away.) We had five passengers. Two were killed from one of the blades coming through the side of the A/C. The forward transmission "drilled" down through the forward compartment/cockpit. There was an explosion and fire. The crew chief was a tall blonde headed guy. He suffered a separated shoulder, was unconscious after impacting the deck and was pulled to safety. To my knowledge, we are the only crew to ever survive losing a blade in flight, before or since. I figure the Lord had more for me to do.

Hope that helps.

Dick Driggers
richard.driggers@edwardjones.com
Fort Worth TX
888 444 5420 (office)

A/C info

The A/C was a CH 46 A with hoover aft.

Bureau number 153354 was a CH-46D manufactured in late January 1967. Those aircraft were built with automatic hover aft. No manual switch.
Regardless, it was amazing to survive the partial blade loss. Glad they were so close to the ground.

i was the crew chief

:eek:the woman marine was a major.she was hit by the blades. i lost my right knee cap ,dislocated left shoulder,fratured l-1 spine.and neck ,and ptsd.cpl al wheeler and lt dick driggers pulled me out by my gunners belt as i had crawled towards the back to try and help someone get out.both al wheeler and dick driggers should have gotten the navy marine corps medal for pulling me out !!! thanks you guys and GOD BLESS YOU ! l/cpl k.c. roberts ( LURCH ) if anyone has names and units of the deceased and injured please repond here or kc roberts 1001 sage st #1 ,evanston wy. 82930 ps i remember when joe's boston connection got us out of jail on that army base !!

i was the crew chief

:eek:the woman marine was a major.she was hit by the blades. i lost my right knee cap ,dislocated left shoulder,fratured l-1 spine.and neck ,and ptsd.cpl al wheeler and lt dick driggers pulled me out by my gunners belt as i had crawled towards the back to try and help someone get out.both al wheeler and dick driggers should have gotten the navy marine corps medal for pulling me out !!! thanks you guys and GOD BLESS YOU ! l/cpl k.c. roberts ( LURCH ) if anyone has names and units of the deceased and injured please repond here or kc roberts 1001 sage st #1 ,evanston wy. 82930 ps i remember when joe's boston connection got us out of jail on that army base !!

cheat the switch

Joe Reed;22404 wrote: Bureau number 153354 was a CH-46D manufactured in late January 1967. Those aircraft were built with automatic hover aft. No manual switch.
Regardless, it was amazing to survive the partial blade loss. Glad they were so close to the ground.

the aircraft was a d model but it did have a manual switch with an automatic override safety that prevented the aft head from programing to hover aft.this feature could be and was cheated by a crew member placing their hand over the pitot tube so as to do a really fast botton hook into a hot l z.or to impress the brass like at the singapore air show !:D the switch worked at 80 knots indicated fwd air speed;)

Hover aft

Lurch,
I guess the late '67 date could have allowed this to be one of the few early "D" models with manual hover on board. Don't remember the exact count (maybe John Dullligan would) but it was VERY few....

CH-46's and "hover Aft"

#1. I am so happy to see Dickie Drigger's name that I cannoy see my keyboard...
#2. Joe Shanley has disappeared from Egypt or Arabia where he was flying fire control (H-46).
#3. I was on several LPH's and if a CH-46 was landing, If the ship made an HF transmission for whatever the reason, The landing A/C would loose it's control system @ the most critical time of the landing...SAS I think it was called...
Hooper (the) 1969-1981...

CH-46 Super D Climb

At LTA in early 1970 we found the speed trim would program a climb when the FM radio was keyed. The pilot writing up the yellow sheet was known to pull a leg or two so I didn't believe him at first but I tried it on the ground and he was right. The FM antenna cable goes right by the speed trim box.

Wayne Stafford

sas

it was called sas which stood for stability augmintation system.got an e-mail from richard driggers,he did get the navy marine corps medal for pulling me out of that burning helo,he's doing fine in ft. worth tx..don't know if cpl al wheeler got nm medal, he should have !the 46's had alot of quirks like engine fire caution lights going off during a steep banked turn at just the right angle to the sun:Dp.s. how could i find out if little al got the medal he deserved or if not that he be awarded it now !

not the right thread maybe...but

i just remembered another quirk on 46f models keying the hf could sometimes cause a emergency throttle malfunction:p

CH-46 crash

I just spelled to Dickie Driggers, he lives about 100 miles or so south of me...we used to play GOSHAWK foot ball on their very last team...~1970 or so...

salt of the earth

they don't come any better than Lt driggers , a good man and a great stick(his high speed low level nap of the earth used to scare the crap out of the co-pilots .... and I ! thats how you know its done right !) he gave me my first stick time going into the embassy in tokyo (i used to think pilots were just bus drivers until then. i gained a world of respect for what they do ) plus he saved my ass !!!