List of Accidents and Incidents Involving Military Aircraft Before 1925 - 1919

1919

4 February

First of three Bristol F.2C Badger prototypes, F3495, suffers crash landing when its 320 hp (240 kW) ABC Dragonfly I nine-cylinder radial engine fails during the type's first take-off due to an air lock in the fuel feed. Pilot Cyril Uwins unhurt. Aircraft is subsequently rebuilt and flown.

9 April

Second of only two Bristol M.R.1 metal-covered, two-seat biplanes built, A5178, powered by 180 hp Wolseley Viper engine, flown by Capt. Frank Barnwell, strikes pine tree on approach to RAE Farnborough's North Gate and is written off.

2 May

A U.S. Army seaplane en route on afternoon flight from Balboa, Panama to France Field, near present-day Colón, Panama, with three aviators on board, suffers engine failure shortly after departure. Pilot Lt. J. R. L. Hitt attempts landing on Miraflores Lake but aircraft falls short and hits the front of the Miraflores Locks of the Panama Canal at ~1700 hrs. Airframe crumples "like a house of cards", according to account published by the Panama Star & Herald on 3 May. Hitt, Lt. Thomas Cecil Tonkin, and Maj. Harold Melville Clark (4 October 1890 - 2 May 1919) are all thrown from the plane into the water of the lock. "Lieutenant Tonkin was undoubtedly killed instantly by the twisting timbers of the machine. ...Major Clark sank to the bottom of the lock, and it's not known whether he was killed in the crash or whether he drowned", stated the article. Hitt was severely injured in the crash, but was rescued by bystanders. The Panama Star & Herald reported that a diver was sent to retrieve Clark's body. The Army rules his death as an accident due to internal injuries caused by "aeroplane traumatism", according to a War Department report on Clark's death dated 8 May 1919, and awards his mother $10,000. Clark is buried 29 May 1919, with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery. Clark had made the first-ever inter-island flight in the Hawaiian Islands on 15 March 1918, in a Curtiss N-9 of the 6th Aero Squadron. Fort Stotsenburg, established in the Philippines in 1902, is renamed Clark Air Base with the establishment of the U.S. Air Force in 1947.

26 May

Monstrous Royal Air Force three-wing, six-engine Tarrant Tabor bomber, F1765, attempts first flight at Royal Aircraft Establishment, Farnborough, noses over on lift-off, forward fuselage crushed back to the wing, both crew, Capts. F. G. Dunn and P. T. Rawlings killed. No second prototype is ever built.

8 June

Biplane bomber, Cierva BCD3 (Barcala-Cierva-Diaz), designed by Juan de la Cierva, reminiscent of the German Gotha, powered by a trio of 220 hp Hispano Suiza engines, called El Cangrejo (The Crab), is destroyed on a test flight when it stalls close to the ground. Pilot, Capt. Julio Rios Argiieso (also reported as Angueso), is shaken up but survives. Project is abandoned.

2 July

U.S. Navy blimp C-8 explodes while landing at Camp Holabird, Maryland, injuring ~80 adults and children who were watching it. Windows in homes a mile away are shattered by the blast.

15 July

Royal Navy North Sea class airship N.S.11 burns over the North Sea off Norfolk, England, killing twelve. In the early hours of 15 July on what was officially supposed to be a mine-hunting patrol, she was seen to fly beneath a long "greasy black cloud" off Cley next the Sea on the Norfolk coast and a massive explosion was heard shortly after. A vivid glare lasted for a few minutes as the burning airship descended, and finally plunged into the sea after a second explosion. There were no survivors, and the findings of the official Court of Enquiry were inconclusive, but amongst other possibilities it was thought that a lightning strike may have caused the explosion.

Summer

Sole flying prototype of Curtiss 18-B two-bay biplane version of 18-T triplane trainer, USAAS 40058, 'P-86', crashes early in flight trials at McCook Field, Dayton, Ohio. Type not ordered into production. One non-flying prototype also delivered for static testing.

1 August

World War I Russian ace Aleksandr Kazakov (32 kills, but only 20 officially) is killed in the crash of what was probably a Sopwith Camel. On 1 August 1918 Kazakov became a major in the Royal Air Force and was appointed to be commanding officer in charge of an aviation squadron of the Slavo-British Allied Legion made up of Camels. After the British withdrawal from Russia which left the Russian White Army in a desperate situation, Kazakov died in a plane crash during an air show on this date which was performed to boost the morale of the Russian anti-Bolshevik troops. Most witnesses of the incident thought Kazakov committed suicide.

8 October

During the first (and only) transcontinental reliability and endurance test, an air race between Roosevelt Field, Long Island, New York and the Presidio of San Francisco, California, Brig. Gen. Lionel Charlton, Royal Air Force, the British Air Attaché, hits a fence during a forced landing near Ithaca, New York in his Bristol F.2 Fighter, 2nd Lt. George C. McDonald hits a ditch when engine trouble in his unspecified type (probably a de Havilland) forces him down at Plymouth, Pennsylvania, and 1st Lt. D. B. Gish's DH-4 catches fire over Livingston County in western New York state, and he makes an emergency landing. Neither he, nor his passenger, Capt. Paul de la Vergne of the French air service and French Air Attaché, are injured, but the plane is written-off. A forced landing kills Sgt. W. H. Nevitt when the Liberty L-12 engine of the DH-4B piloted by Col. Gerald C. Brant fails after an oil line breaks. Plane plunges to the ground near Deposit, New York when power is lost on landing, killing Nevitt and injuring Brant. Of entrants flying from the Presidio to New York, one DH-4B crashes attempting to land at Salt Lake City, Utah, killing pilot Maj. Dana H. Crissy, commander of Mather Field, California, and his mechanic, SFC Virgil Thomas. The flying field at the Presidio is subsequently named Crissy Field.

9 October

Continuing the cross-country contest, a DH-4B hits the side of a mountain W of Cheyenne, Wyoming, killing 1st Lt. Edwin V. Vales and badly injuring 2nd Lt. William C. Goldsborough. Lt. A. M. Roberts and his observer survive a close call when, in an effort to make up for lost time, Roberts chooses the direct route, over Lake Erie, between Buffalo and Cleveland. His engine fails, and he has to ditch in the lake. Luckily, a passing freighter sees the crash and picks up the two men.

10 October

On third day of transcontinental contest, an east-bound DH-4B, piloted by Maj. Albert Sneed, almost out of gas, makes fast landing at Buffalo, New York. Passenger Sgt. Worth C. McClure undoes his seatbelt and slides onto the rear fuselage to weight down the tail for a quicker stop. Plane bounces on landing, smashes nose-first into the ground, and McClure is thrown off and killed.

15 October

Two more fatalities are recorded in the transcontinental endurance test when 2nd Lts. French Kirby and Stanley C. Miller die in an emergency landing in their DH-4 near the Wyoming–Utah border when they suffer engine failure near Evanston, Wyoming. During the two-week test, 54 accidents wreck or damage planes. Twenty-nine result from motor trouble, 16 from bad landings, 5 from poor weather, 2 when pilots lose their way, 1 in take-off, and 1 by fire. In 42 cases the accident meant the end of the race for the pilot. Seven fatalities occur during the race, one in a de Havilland DH-4B, the others in DH-4s. Lt. John Owen Donaldson was awarded the Mackay Gold Medal for taking first place in the Army's only transcontinental air race. Donaldson Air Force Base, South Carolina, would be eventually named for the Great War ace (eight credited victories).

Fall

A Caquot Type R observation balloon, manufactured by Goodyear, being deflated at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, explodes, with 24 soldiers handling sand bags on the leeward side of the balloon receiving burns. A dramatic photo exists of men bolting away from the airship as it ignites. Nearly 1,000 were manufactured in 1918–1919. A Type R is displayed at the National Museum of the United States Air Force, thought to be the sole survivor of some manufactured in Great Britain during WW II.