LANE MICHAEL S

Narrative

After takeoff, pilot had visual difficulty. Aircraft was seen descending in an excessive bank. Aircraft struck shower stall and impacted with the ground, cartwheeled, smashed into building, skidded up hill, and burned. War Story: Jeff Morley was my hoochmate, he lived in the cubical directly across from mine. We were flying quite a few missions in support of the 1/50th Mech at the time. I drew the same mission the next day. The mission involved reporting to the 1/50th position at 1st light and as they were located 30 Min. away to the south we had to take off before 1st light. The weather was generally clear but there was a definate nip in the air before the sun came up. You could see stars from the ground but on takeoff you would fly into a thin cloud layer at about 100 ft that was 100 to 200 feet thick. If you took off with the landing light on you would go into a sudden whiteout as soon as you entered the cloud layer. My ship took off shortly after Jeffs, we went IFR, I got on the insturments and continued the climb, they didn't. We didn't know they had crashed until we got back around noon. When you broke out on top you could see the fog layers quite distinctly. We called flight ops and told them to warn any subsequent flights of the problem. I was given the task of going through all Jeffs personal effects and getting it ready to ship home. from Chickenman 24, March 1997