Former airman lived through two bomber crashes
By Nick Hytrek Journal staff writer | Posted: Wednesday, August 08, 2007
He had nothing against Sioux City.
But after surviving two bomber crashes in four months, Chester Teich proclaimed he had no desire to fly out of Sioux City Air Base again.
"It just seemed like it was very bad luck," Teich said of the two 1944 crashes, including one 63 years ago today near Hinton, Iowa. "I said I will not fly with another crew from that base.
"I didn't want to go through any more of these training sessions."
His vow held up. The war in Europe ended before Teich, who had survived the two B-17 bomber accidents while in training, could be sent overseas from Sioux City. He was then transferred to another base, where he was training with a B-29 bomber crew when Japan surrendered.
According to research by Calumet City, Ill., historian Tony Mireles, more than 15,500 Army Air Forces airmen and ground personnel were killed in stateside training accidents before ever shipping out to join the fighting during World War II. (More than 53,000 Army Air Forces airmen were killed by enemy action.) At the Sioux City Air Base, local researcher Stuart Flynn has found, accidents and crashes involving Sioux City-based planes claimed 179 lives.
Teich was one of the extremely lucky ones. Mireles' research shows that 46 Army Air Forces airmen nationwide had the misfortune to be involved in two training crashes. Only seven survived their second crash.
'Ball of fire'
Corn and soybeans wave in the wind along U.S. Highway 75 just north of Hinton.
The serene rural scene unfolds along the highway and up the nearby hillsides, much the same as it did on Aug. 8, 1944.
Except the view Teich had that day came from above, from the end of a parachute.
"As I got closer to the ground I noticed it was all cornfields," Teich said.
Moments earlier, Teich had bailed out of his B-17 bomber, which had collided with another bomber while on a training flight out of Sioux City Air Base. Teich and his fellow crewmates jumped from their damaged plane, which the pilot and co-pilot were able to fly back to the base.
Nine of the 10 men aboard the other plane died.
Standing on the shoulder of Highway 75 last month, Virgil Newberg pointed to a spot in the middle of the corn, near a dead tree stump.
"Basically, it was just a ball of fire. It was smoke. It landed in the muck," he said, recalling how the plane came down on land that was once part of his family's farm.
Dwain "Babe" Krause was 17, picking up bundles of oats about two miles to the southeast. He was used to hearing the roar of the bombers flying over Hinton on training missions. This sound was different.
"That was something to see, to see it all happen. I could hear the engines roaring like a son of a gun," Krause said. "When you watch stuff like that, you never forget it."
Teich and his crew were practicing flying in high-level formations. They had already flown 15 training flights since beginning bomber training in Sioux City in June 1944.
While watching the passing countryside from his bombardier seat in the nose cone, Teich was knocked out of his seat when the tail from a nearby bomber struck his plane and sheared off the nose.
"When it hit, it knocked me backwards against the firewall," the Chaska, Minn., native said. "My first thought was to get my 'chute on because we were probably going to have to get out of there."
He helped a crewmate get his parachute on, then struggled to kick open the escape hatch, which had been damaged by the impact.
"We had never jumped before," Teich said.
Search for survivors
From his home below, Newberg, 9 at the time, saw the parachutes. The plane from which they had emerged continued on. The other plane broke in two.
The fuselage crashed into a cornfield near the highway. The tail section landed farther up the hill in a pasture, missing the Newbergs' cattle.
Teich landed in a cow lane between two fields on the Newberg farm. Newberg's father took him to a filling station in Hinton to call the base in Sioux City, then back to the farm to help search for survivors.
Army personnel brought ambulances and trucks. They walked through the cornfield, hand in hand, looking for bodies.
Teich didn't immediately know what happened to the rest of the crew after he had jumped.
"When we got back to the base, we found out we were all OK," he said.
After doctors examined the airmen, "they recommended we start flying immediately, otherwise the fear from the crash might prevent us from flying," Teich said.
A day or two later, Teich said, they were back in the air.
Teich's crew would go to Europe without him. The Army had decided the crew would pick up a new bombardier once it got there. Teich stayed in Sioux City and was assigned to another crew.
Lucky again
It was dark when Teich and his new crew neared Minot, N.D., on Dec. 12, 1944. They were on the third leg of a navigational training mission in which they had flown west from Sioux City to Ainsworth, Neb., then north to Minot, where they were to swing back to the south to Sioux City.
On the way, their B-17 developed engine trouble.
"I was in the nose with the navigator, watching the altimeter, and we kept losing altitude," Teich said. "Pretty soon we were low enough that I knew we wouldn't be able to jump."
An air base at Minot did not yet have lights on its landing strip. The pilot of Teich's bomber kept circling, trying to find it.
"In the meantime, the navigator and I went back to the waist. We figured if we're going to hit, the nose is not the place to be," Teich said.
With no luck finding the air strip, the pilot decided to crash land, hoping heavy snow in the fields would cushion the impact.
"As we hit, one wing hit first and we somersaulted and ended upside down," Teich said.
The fuselage cracked open, and Teich followed the smoke out of the burning plane. On his way, he found the navigator, who was unable to get up. Teich grabbed him with one hand and carried him outside, where they met up with the tail gunner and a waist gunner. The other five crew members were killed.
Together, the four survivors were found by a nearby farmer, who summoned two cars to take the injured airmen into Minot to the hospital.
"I was cut up a bit, but otherwise OK. One guy had burns on his face," Teich said. "Nobody was really hurt that bad."
The four men spent 10 days in Minot before returning to Sioux City.
When told in Sioux City that he'd be assigned to a new crew, Teich issued his statement that he would not fly with another crew out of the local base.
Teich, now 83 and living in Shakopee, Minn., has no profound theory on why he survived not one, but two training accidents.
"Just luck," he said simply.
Nick Hytrek can be reached at 712-293-4226 or nickhytrek@siouxcityjournal.com.
See a list of bomber crashes: http://www.siouxcityjournal.com/articles/2007/08/08/news/local/D4553CED62A0963B862573310000F144.txt
Crash research fills retirement: http://www.siouxcityjournal.com/articles/2007/08/08/news/local/CE854E2CB222B5C4862573310000EF37.txt
According to historian Tony Mireles of Calumet City, Ill., more than 15,500 pilots, crew members and ground personnel died in more than 6,350 known fatal Army Air Forces training accidents in the United States from January 1941 to December 1945.
During training in the United States, more than 7,100 aircraft were seriously damaged or destroyed in fatal accidents, and thousands more were seriously damaged or destroyed in nonfatal accidents. By comparison, more than 8,000 planes were seriously damaged or destroyed in air operations in the European Theater and more than 4,500 planes were seriously damaged or destroyed in the Pacific Theater.
But after surviving two bomber crashes in four months, Chester Teich proclaimed he had no desire to fly out of Sioux City Air Base again.
"It just seemed like it was very bad luck," Teich said of the two 1944 crashes, including one 63 years ago today near Hinton, Iowa. "I said I will not fly with another crew from that base.
"I didn't want to go through any more of these training sessions."
His vow held up. The war in Europe ended before Teich, who had survived the two B-17 bomber accidents while in training, could be sent overseas from Sioux City. He was then transferred to another base, where he was training with a B-29 bomber crew when Japan surrendered.
According to research by Calumet City, Ill., historian Tony Mireles, more than 15,500 Army Air Forces airmen and ground personnel were killed in stateside training accidents before ever shipping out to join the fighting during World War II. (More than 53,000 Army Air Forces airmen were killed by enemy action.) At the Sioux City Air Base, local researcher Stuart Flynn has found, accidents and crashes involving Sioux City-based planes claimed 179 lives.
Teich was one of the extremely lucky ones. Mireles' research shows that 46 Army Air Forces airmen nationwide had the misfortune to be involved in two training crashes. Only seven survived their second crash.
'Ball of fire'
Corn and soybeans wave in the wind along U.S. Highway 75 just north of Hinton.
The serene rural scene unfolds along the highway and up the nearby hillsides, much the same as it did on Aug. 8, 1944.
Except the view Teich had that day came from above, from the end of a parachute.
"As I got closer to the ground I noticed it was all cornfields," Teich said.
Moments earlier, Teich had bailed out of his B-17 bomber, which had collided with another bomber while on a training flight out of Sioux City Air Base. Teich and his fellow crewmates jumped from their damaged plane, which the pilot and co-pilot were able to fly back to the base.
Nine of the 10 men aboard the other plane died.
Standing on the shoulder of Highway 75 last month, Virgil Newberg pointed to a spot in the middle of the corn, near a dead tree stump.
"Basically, it was just a ball of fire. It was smoke. It landed in the muck," he said, recalling how the plane came down on land that was once part of his family's farm.
Dwain "Babe" Krause was 17, picking up bundles of oats about two miles to the southeast. He was used to hearing the roar of the bombers flying over Hinton on training missions. This sound was different.
"That was something to see, to see it all happen. I could hear the engines roaring like a son of a gun," Krause said. "When you watch stuff like that, you never forget it."
Teich and his crew were practicing flying in high-level formations. They had already flown 15 training flights since beginning bomber training in Sioux City in June 1944.
While watching the passing countryside from his bombardier seat in the nose cone, Teich was knocked out of his seat when the tail from a nearby bomber struck his plane and sheared off the nose.
"When it hit, it knocked me backwards against the firewall," the Chaska, Minn., native said. "My first thought was to get my 'chute on because we were probably going to have to get out of there."
He helped a crewmate get his parachute on, then struggled to kick open the escape hatch, which had been damaged by the impact.
"We had never jumped before," Teich said.
Search for survivors
From his home below, Newberg, 9 at the time, saw the parachutes. The plane from which they had emerged continued on. The other plane broke in two.
The fuselage crashed into a cornfield near the highway. The tail section landed farther up the hill in a pasture, missing the Newbergs' cattle.
Teich landed in a cow lane between two fields on the Newberg farm. Newberg's father took him to a filling station in Hinton to call the base in Sioux City, then back to the farm to help search for survivors.
Army personnel brought ambulances and trucks. They walked through the cornfield, hand in hand, looking for bodies.
Teich didn't immediately know what happened to the rest of the crew after he had jumped.
"When we got back to the base, we found out we were all OK," he said.
After doctors examined the airmen, "they recommended we start flying immediately, otherwise the fear from the crash might prevent us from flying," Teich said.
A day or two later, Teich said, they were back in the air.
Teich's crew would go to Europe without him. The Army had decided the crew would pick up a new bombardier once it got there. Teich stayed in Sioux City and was assigned to another crew.
Lucky again
It was dark when Teich and his new crew neared Minot, N.D., on Dec. 12, 1944. They were on the third leg of a navigational training mission in which they had flown west from Sioux City to Ainsworth, Neb., then north to Minot, where they were to swing back to the south to Sioux City.
On the way, their B-17 developed engine trouble.
"I was in the nose with the navigator, watching the altimeter, and we kept losing altitude," Teich said. "Pretty soon we were low enough that I knew we wouldn't be able to jump."
An air base at Minot did not yet have lights on its landing strip. The pilot of Teich's bomber kept circling, trying to find it.
"In the meantime, the navigator and I went back to the waist. We figured if we're going to hit, the nose is not the place to be," Teich said.
With no luck finding the air strip, the pilot decided to crash land, hoping heavy snow in the fields would cushion the impact.
"As we hit, one wing hit first and we somersaulted and ended upside down," Teich said.
The fuselage cracked open, and Teich followed the smoke out of the burning plane. On his way, he found the navigator, who was unable to get up. Teich grabbed him with one hand and carried him outside, where they met up with the tail gunner and a waist gunner. The other five crew members were killed.
Together, the four survivors were found by a nearby farmer, who summoned two cars to take the injured airmen into Minot to the hospital.
"I was cut up a bit, but otherwise OK. One guy had burns on his face," Teich said. "Nobody was really hurt that bad."
The four men spent 10 days in Minot before returning to Sioux City.
When told in Sioux City that he'd be assigned to a new crew, Teich issued his statement that he would not fly with another crew out of the local base.
Teich, now 83 and living in Shakopee, Minn., has no profound theory on why he survived not one, but two training accidents.
"Just luck," he said simply.
Nick Hytrek can be reached at 712-293-4226 or nickhytrek@siouxcityjournal.com.
See a list of bomber crashes: http://www.siouxcityjournal.com/articles/2007/08/08/news/local/D4553CED62A0963B862573310000F144.txt
Crash research fills retirement: http://www.siouxcityjournal.com/articles/2007/08/08/news/local/CE854E2CB222B5C4862573310000EF37.txt
According to historian Tony Mireles of Calumet City, Ill., more than 15,500 pilots, crew members and ground personnel died in more than 6,350 known fatal Army Air Forces training accidents in the United States from January 1941 to December 1945.
During training in the United States, more than 7,100 aircraft were seriously damaged or destroyed in fatal accidents, and thousands more were seriously damaged or destroyed in nonfatal accidents. By comparison, more than 8,000 planes were seriously damaged or destroyed in air operations in the European Theater and more than 4,500 planes were seriously damaged or destroyed in the Pacific Theater.
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harold hull wrote on Feb 28, 2008 5:34 PM: