Friday, December 14, 2007

World War II Crash Site


I've mentioned before that, due apparently to the location of a radio beacon there, Two Egg was the site of numerous airplane crashes during World War II. Aircraft flying in or out of the Marianna Army Air Base (later Graham Air Force Base) would use the beacon tower at Two Egg to help with navigation.
The photograph at right shows the location where one of these crashes took place. James W. Hart, Jr., who later retired from the U.S. Air Force Reserve as a brigadier general, remembers that a training flight crashed on this site during the final years of World War II.
Although Hart was a young boy then, he remembers being with his father in Greenwood when the crash took place. Seeing firetrucks and other rescue vehicles pass by, they joined with other local residents in following them to the crash scene. The military plane had crashed into this field and both of its occupants had been killed. Hart remembers that the rescue crews used a large crane to pick up the wreckage and place it on the back of a flatbed truck for removal from the scene. The site is just west of Two Egg.
There were numerous other crashes in the vicinity, most of which claimed lives. It is a little known fact that at least 941 military aircraft crashed in Florida alone during World War II. At least 1,941 lives were lost in these incidents, most of which took place as pilots were training for combat missions.

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