My father was there that day. He was a V.P. at North American aviation and one of the heads of the XB70 program. It was one of the only times I’ve seen my father cry when he got home and told my mother. I still have some of the gifts they give my father after completion of the final build. What a great video and thank you. I have to admit I’m 65 years old and got a little teary watching this.. I guess I should mention I was present at the roll out of the aircraft in Palmdale CA!!! I think I came up to my dad’s knee but I still remember it like it was yesterday!!
my brother was the medic on the x15 program. I was driven to edwards several times as a 9 year old,in a red xke jaguar. front end lifts at 130 mph. I don't remember the visits.😮
Nice work, those crash sites are hallowed ground. White has stated Cross appeared to be incapacitated or unconscious early in the spin, perhaps by the 1st snap roll, and there was nothing he could do to help. The clamshell escape capsules [Same ones they used in the B-58] were operated individually, and White knew early on that he'd be lucky to save himself. His arm got trapped in the clamshell, and the ejection sequence would not begin until it was fully closed, so he nearly had to break his arm to get it free. As is well known, he was seriously injured upon landing. One of the bags that deployed to cushion the landing failed/was not deployed and he landed at an estimated 44 g's, nearly unsurvivable. Impact was so hard that imprints of his ass and feet were left on the aluminum seats and floor. As this flight was completely unauthorized [not uncommon in those more carefree days], repercussions followed. The base and wing commander were sacked and others reprimanded.
I'm German and I have been interested in the history of aviation since I was a child. I have known about this case since the 70s, when there was no internet back then, and I am very grateful to see such details over 40 years later. The way you present it, is also something very special. Thank you for your careful work and research Sir !
I'd like to thank you for pinpointing the location of the crash site. I was at the Edwards AFB airshow which took place on May 20,1966, just a few weeks before the tragic crash. AV/2 #20207 was the XB-70 that crashed, it was the one flying at the show. While AV/1 #20001 was on static display. I've always thought the XB-70 was such a beautiful aircraft, and always was disappointed it never went into production.
This is not intended as a brag in any way, but this was one of my first in-depth Google Maps/Earth searches, and had to do a ton of detective work to actually locate it. At the time, there were only a few stones among intersecting ATV and motorbike tracks, and a cross. I couldn’t believe I could see it on Google Earth, but there it was, only just barely being able to make out the stone. I could be wrong about this, but I think Joe Walker’s crash site has been provided a memorial by a kid for his Eagle Scout project. Hopefully I can head out that way one day and see where my heroes met their fates. Regardless, thanks Forrest for taking the time to head out to the high desert and show us curious types where these pieces of history happened.
The XB-70’s were the last project my grandfather worked on before he retired. He and his team developed the stainless honeycomb process that was used in the construction of the XB-70. Thank you for your work, and let’s get together sometime. -Forest Hansen
Thank you, Forrest. I really enjoy your "This is what happend and here is where it happened" videos. You are an excellent story teller that recounts a relatively obscure event and makes it interesting. Not long ago I was in the Los Angeles neighborhood where you told the story of Howard Hughes' plane crash and had a brief look around for myself. Of course today there is less than nothing left to see, but knowing the who-what-when-where was an experience. I've been to Pearl Harbor and Hiroshima and have seen the damage and relics of those battles. For years I've tried to figure out a way to get to Midway Island but have resigned myself to the fact that it is not going to happen. maybe you can find a way to pull it off?
Forrest, I bloody love your channel. It's been a hell of a learning experience throughout each of your videos. Your presentation, your approach to difficult subjects and overall general demeanor is such a wonderful thing to see. I really appreciate your work and the commitment to your channel. Thank you for your time and effort, it is greatly appreciated. Cheers from sunny ol' England 👍
I know this spot very well. Most my life we made monthly trips out there to camp/dirtbike. We parked not very far from this spot. It can be very confusing if you’re not familiar with the area since everything looks the same, and there’s trails everywhere. Awesome video. I enjoyed this one.
Great video as always. Joe Walker was considered an excellent pilot and was 1 of only 12 pilots (Neil Armstrong also being one) that flew the X-15. Chuck Yeager was considered to be a very good pilot, but many fellow pilots and astronauts felt that he was not only very cocky and arrogant, but had a chip on his shoulder because he was not accepted to the astronaut corps.
I don’t know if it’s accurate, but in the movie “The Right Stuff,” Yeager turned down the offer to be an astronaut because he said they were just Spam in a can.
Interesting question. A brief history. I was an Air Force pilot for 8 years (T-38 Instructor and B-52 Aircraft Commander) then got on with Delta in 1991 and flew with them till 2020 when I retired. I've been collecting Space memorabilia since 1995 and have gotten to know many of the Apollo era Astronauts on a personal level. Whenever the subject of Chuck Yeager came up, those that knew him well, pretty much said the same thing, that he was a good pilot and was just in the right place at the right time (first to break the sound barrier). I actually have a good friend from my pilot training class that took General Yeager up in a F-15. He said pretty much what every one else that "knew" him said: cocky, arrogant, etc. Because Yeager did not have a college degree (especially not an Engineering background) he did not qualify for the Astronaut corps.
Very cool! In the early 90s I was a Crew Chief on the then new B-2 Bomber and made a few trips to Edwards AFB and the N-G plant in Palmdale. I never had the time, but really wanted to go explore some of these historically significant sites, like the X-1 pit where they loaded it into the B-29. The one thing I did get to do though was get an inside tour of the NASA Mothership B-52B, "Balls 8". I had worked on B-52H's prior to the B-2, so that was significant to me.
Another outstanding video Forrest! Very well researched, very well explained, and of course very well filmed. Thank you so much for showing us on-site history that we would never likely have ever been able to see otherwise. See you on the next one my friend.
The excitement I get a when a Forrest Haggerty upload notification pops up!.. 😀 - hope you get the deserved 100k plaque soon, nearly there. Fantastic work Forrest 👏
What an amazing video! As a 15 year old Air Cadet from Canada, I remember watching film of the XB-70 on a trip to Wright Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton Ohio. That was 50 years ago today. Your video has shed so much light on this accident. I hope to go visit those sites as well.
Great research, production, narration; and a possible explanation for why this terrible tragedy happened. Condolences to families and friends of the pilots. A very good friend, Ted Easton, worked for North American as a model builder. Ted was a mechanic in the USAAC; spent the War at Cabanatuan, worked for NA on X-15, XB-70. The right stuff was not just in the cockpits. RIP
GREAT job on this video Forrest- as with all of your work. I had lunch with Al White twice back in the late 90’s. He had nothing but kind words for Joe Walker. Your technical accuracy in your narration are spot on.
Great video. I remember reading about this accident in a book when i was a kid. The B-70 looked like a Star Wars cruiser and must have been insane to the imagination back in the 1960s.
Very well presented - and with respect. I learned a couple things I didn't know about the crash prior. You just got another subscriber, thank you sir. - Ed on the Ridge
The XB - 70 is easier to get to. You can drive to it with a high profile vehicle. The F - 104 much more challenging to get to. I had to hike in about 1 mile one way with no trail.
Amazing how little the landscape changes out there. I saw both of the X-70's at an open house . One flew and one was static.i recall the silver colored tires with a lot of threads showing . I was 12. Then spen 30+ years working at south base. Love the history of that place.
Outstanding job , thanks for sharing forest .. a tragic case I often research is the station nightclub fire .. there is a vid online of the actual fire that is very disturbing yet oddly fascinating as well ( how quick the building went up and how so many could not escape)
Love it Forrest. I had the honor of seeing an XB 70 at the Air Force Museum at wright Patterson afb. Quite a marvel of engineering. Also just fyi they made an arrest in connection with the Tupac murder case here in Vegas. Love these videos keep up the good work
I found the crash site of the F104 cockpit in the 1990's by accident. I had my son with me on a camping trip and stopped in that little sand wash below the cross. After prepping dinner I saw the cross glowing in the light from the setting sun. We climbed the hill to check it out and what a surprised. There were more bits and pieces of the plane and even plastic parts from the canopy. I have a photo of the cross from that trip. I returned a couple more times over the years to show friends. We also found the other two sites you showed. The wording on the cross was clearly legible back then. On the left it said "NASA Test Pilot Joe Walker a highly regarded test pilot died when his F-104 collided with an XB-70 bomber on June 8, 1966, 9:24 am". On the right it said "this is the Impact Site of his F-104. He had qualified Astronaut wings having gone up 50 miles in an X-15A. January 17, 1963. The square item in the center was the NASA symbol (blue globe with NASA across it). There had been a photograph glued on between NASA and Test on the left side but it was already not legible. I worked in aerospace and a coworker's father was a photographer on that flight. Another coworker had a relative who had been training the ejection seat procedures to the XB-70 pilots. Some paid attention and some didn't. The one who died was not paying attention. Thank you for the video reminding me of this location.
Wow! Thank you for sharing this story! I love reading comments like this. I think it would have been fascinating to come across the site by chance back then. And thank you for letting me know what was written on the cross!
FYI - I used my old photo as a reference and repainted the cross. I scraped the peeling paint off and repainted it white. Later I added the writing back as it was. Anyone who finds it now can read the story.
My old desert racing club, the Lost Coyotes MC has hosted several dual sport rides to aircraft wreck sites out there. One of them started at Teagle Wash and we went to the Valkyrie, the F-104, X-15 and B-1 Bomber. One of our old time members (RIP Mr. Wilson) was the powerplant crew chief on Mike Adams ill fated flight in the X-15 and had stories about them searching for all of the wreckage for months afterwards.
@@forresthaggertychannel4301 The B-1 is maybe 20 miles at the most to the west of the Valkyrie. The X-15 is maybe 3 or 4 miles in on Trona Rd from 395, and then a mile or 2 off the pavement, easily accessable in a pick up.
Howdy Forrest, I’ve got an interesting crash site that maybe you could check out for all of us Country Western fans (& fans of your channel too). I’ve lived in San Diego for over 50 years & back on March 16, 1991 there was a terrible plane crash that killed 10 people. Seven of the people were in Reba McEntire’s band, also her tour manager & the 2 pilots. She had played a private concert party for IBM & it was too late to take off from Lindbergh field. So she rented 2 Hawker Sidley DH-125 twin jets & took off from Brown Field down in Otay Mesa, by the Southern border. She was a little sick, so she stayed behind with her husband in San Diego, but her band & support staff took off around 1:45 am in the 2 planes. One plane took off with no problems & continued on with their flight until notified about an hour later to divert their flight plan. The second plane flew right into Otay mountain at about 3,500 ft. elevation. They say another hundred feet higher or slightly to the left or right, they would have made it over the peak. The peak is only about 10 miles Northeast of Brown field, you can easily find it on Google maps. There’s some dirt roads up there & maybe even a memorial. I’ve watched all your videos & I think this would be an easy hike for you. You’ve gone to countless other crash sites & even made a few videos around San Diego. I thought you might enjoy a hike up Otay mountain & then share your video with us about your experience. Thanks again Forrest for all your videos, RIP to the 10 souls who perished back on 3/16/91.
This is an incredible and also sad event that I was not aware of. Always bringing interesting events and locations that we can learn from Mr. Haggerty. Stay well as always 💕
I was there at the crash site in 1996. None of the memorials were there, just very small pieces of honeycombed titanium, other tiny pieces of debris and a 4'x4'x2' hole where someone had dug up pieces to sell on E-Bay. The smell of the XB-70s fuel was still present near the 4x4 hole. This was before the internet was in as widespread use as it is today. I used a topo map and lat/long provided by Dr. Puffer from EDW museum and it took a bit of work to find it. GPS was not very popular either. The roads weren't as well defined either.
Very nice and professional. I remember that crash. I was 14 years old and the son of a fighter pilot. God bless you Forrest. You did a good thing here.
wild, ive been aware of this story for awhile and never knew there was a “crash site” that you couls still visit. Im currently saving up for a solid truck so I can join people like you exploring the desert and experiencing these cool slices of history. thank you for this video!
there are so many crash sites in Cali. All a bit of a hike/drive, but still there....Happens unfortunately when you are in the area of the largest aircraft testing site. Heard about this one a long time ago from a show Peter Merlin (fantastic aviation archeologist) was on, but never really saw vlogs/vids on the sites. Another awesome vid
I remember in the early 2000s seeing the documentary of the XB-70 on the Discovery Wings Channel, which should have never been cancelled. I still miss that channel, badly. Anyway, I was totally shocked when I saw the chase plane video of it. I thought he got caught in the disruption of the airflow over the wing, which I thought the video mentioned. I might be wrong. But the sun angle would be a major issue if he was looking for the other aircraft rather than where he was in relation to the XB-70.
I thought it had been speculated that the XB-70 wingtips were creating a vortex that sucked the F-104 toward it when it got too close. Anyways, nice video -- thanks.
Excellent video. Thanx for the information in the description section and thanx for sharing this history with the audience who might not be able to visit these sites themselves.
