This Anniversary Snuck Up on Me

Today (December 12, 2015) is the 30th Anniversary of the Arrow Air Crash, the worst civil aviation disaster in United States Military history, and the worst disaster in Canadian aviation.

Short form of what happened: The facts are that on December 12, 1985, a Arrow Air DC-8 took off from Gander International airport, with a crew of six and 248 soldiers of the 101st Airborne. The soldiers were flying home for Christmas after serving as peacekeepers in Beirut. The plane left the runway and immediately crashed, belly flopping into the woods overlooking Gander lake. All were killed. (It actually could have been worse - the crew had the choice of taking off over the lake or taking off over the town of Gander. As somebody who grew up there, I can be glad the pilot choose the lake route, as if the incident had happened over the town, the DC-8 would have taken out the local fire station on crashing, and Gander would have a name like Lockerbie, Scotland.)

As to the causes of the crash, well, it is a mess. I could do an effortpost on this subject, but it is safe to say the causes are controversial, and several questions remain in a superposition that are unlikely to collapse into an answer anytime soon. Unlike in America, the remains of the DC-8 were disposed of after investigation, so there is nothing left to base further inquiry on. The DC-8 was very run down, with its cockpit monitors capturing nothing, and its flight recorder a 1950s model so badly out of adjustment, the only data recorded was when the DC-8 left the runway. FBI explosive experts sent to Gander to help with the investigation (like in the later Lockerbie bombing, where the FBI helped extensively) were mysteriously recalled and sent home as soon as they arrived, and the crash was almost immediately attributed to ice on the wings.

Later investigation by CASB, the body charged with air crash investigation, only managed to confirm that ice on the wings could not have been the cause. CASB and its chief investigator (in his first and last air crash investigation, his previous experience in air crash investigation being limited to a two week FAA course taken in Los Angeles) doggedly maintained the ice on the wings thesis in the face of further evidence. Here's our first superposition - CASB did this because [they were really incompetent / somebody told them to make the findings as uncontroversial as possible.] Ronald Reagen actually had several reasons to ask his BFF Canadian PM Brian Mulroney to intervene. For one, Arrow Air was used by the CIA to smuggle weapons to Iran, a larger piece of the yet-undiscovered Iran-Contra affair. For another, Reagen's popularity reached its lowest point with the bombing of the Beirut barracks by terrorists. Given these involvements, it is possible Reagen called on Mulroney fearing these things, but in fact Arrow Air crashed for some other reason.

The DC-8 stopped in both Cairo and Cologne before flying across the Atlantic. In Cairo, some of the soldier's gear was unloaded to make room for large wooden crates, approximately coffin sized. This cargo was accompanied by 2 well dressed men assumed to be secret-squirrel types by the soldiers. Later investigation also revealed that security on the apron was lax, with 'lots and lots of guys' hanging out with the baggage crew. These were apparently Hawk missiles being returned by the Iranians. An anonymous phone call to Reuters in Beirut the morning of the crash claimed the wreck was the result of the Islamic Jihad, working with an Egyptian terrorist group, and that the bomb was set to go off as the airplane was landing in the United States, but the flight had been delayed in Cairo. This call was repeated to the American Consul-general in Algeria, and to an Italian news agency. (The 1980s saw what us moderns would call a shitload of terrorist bombs claiming airliners; something that we've sort of forgotten.) Post-mordem analysis of the deceased flight crew revealed hydrogen cyanide in the blood of 6 of 8, with the flight engineer having already received a lethal dose. The medical examiner ruled out anyone being able to survive the crash, which meant the crew was breathing toxic fumes before the crash - consistent with a fire. It turns out most of the remains that could be tested showed signs of elevated carbon monoxide levels, elevated hydrogen cyanide levels, or both. Any sort of mention of these toxicology results was absent from CASB's final report. (CASB later tried to dismiss the toxicology findings by saying that every person that had these elevated levels had also survived the crash for about 30 seconds. Two problems here - the number of people with these elevated levels is about 150, and apparently despite surviving these 150 people made no attempts to escape the flaming wreck. Firemen on the scene testified that saw no signs of people surviving the crash.)

Then there is the matter of the #4 engine, which apparently had its thrust reverse extended, or was possibly at idle at the time of the crash. These could have been the causes of the crash by itself, but were never investigated by CASB, so it remains just another cat, state unknown, in a box as far as explanations go.

And that's the gist of it really - CASB did such a bad job for whatever reason that finding the real cause of the crash would have been easier had the DC-8 gone done mid-Atlantic. The whole affair was investigated by a Canadian supreme court justice. CASB claimed that it was Ice on the wings that caused the crash, and some of CASB's board of directors said an explosion, most likely a terrorist bomb. The supreme court justice, Willard Estey, found that the evidence supported nether conclusion - a minor vindication of the minority report, and a big stamp of "yes, the investigation was screwed" over the whole portfolio. The bereaved of the Arrow Air flight managed to get the matter an actual congressional hearing, who then managed to get someone from transport Canada, who claimed 1) there was no evidence whatsoever that ice was the cause of the crash, 2) but that didn't stop him from signing off on the report saying ice was the cause of the crash, because "nobody asked him", and 3) it wasn't ice, it was "freezing mist." The congressmen called him crazy and derelict in his duty. Of course, saying that, the second day of the hearing was also the last one, when the committee rather abruptly gave a prepared statement saying that 1) them Canadians clearly fucked up, and 2) we refer the whole thing to the Attorney General and the executive (IE the President) to keep a eye on the whole thing.

So, the memorial is a nice place. It is situated on the North shore of Gander lake - The lake runs roughly east-west, 20 km long but only 2 km wide, a deep loch of a lake. The surrounding hillsides are black spruce, birch, and fir. Juniper has grown up in the paths carved by the airport firetrucks that raced to the crash. The statue itself is just after where the runway lights end, down a road marked with the somewhat incongruous "Screaming Eagle Head" of the 101st airborne. All of this is beneath the level of the nearby trans-Canada highway, which isolates the memorial from the highway noise. People walk their dogs there.

The November of our Souls

If you live in the Northern Hemisphere, November is nobody's favorite month. It is cold. The yellow face that brings life avoids you. When the sun does show up, it often shines in vain, concealed behind slate grey clouds. Christmas is near enough that you get the stresses of shopping for Christmas, without the benefits of it actually being close to Christmas. If you are a student, you have the reverse ski-jump of exams to look forward to.

Frankly it's enough for you to contemplate suicide by flintlock.

Still, I'm buoyed up a bit by the results of Canada's federal election. The Liberals crushed the Conservatives to form a new majority government. While I feel this is a big positive development generally, it also means that Canada buying the F-35 is now likely not going to happen. While almost nothing has happened on that front as yet, a proper fighter competition is likely, so good news there. There is also two further bits of good news for Canada's next fighter: everybody seems to now agree that ending production of the F-22 Raptor was a mistake, and a new option for Canada might be getting a second shot at life. The F-15 Silent Eagle (SE) is a low-observability version of the F-15 Eagle that Boeing was shopping around the past few years. It remained a prototype - it lost several contests to the F-35 - but is getting a second shot at life thanks to Israel. (Israel is getting lots of new American weapons as compensation for the whole Iran nuclear deal, and apparently want to buy both the F-35 and the F-15SE.) The F-15SE would be a fantastic choice for Canada, combining a proven fuselage with some LO technology and superior performance. It'd be my choice of airplane of the current offerings, but of course Boeing needs a certain production number to be economically viable, and of course Canada has a fairly tight time-frame before the CF-18s are completely used up.

So  - where were we? Shit, it's November.

This woman gets it.

November! Where you can't even decide if "Aspirin is a treatment for depression" is the Sixties view of mental health at work or just a really really dishonest ad campaign!

 November! When you are reminded "I'm not married, so there is literally no way for me to understand this picture!"

(Just for context, here is the whole ad, not that it helps:)

November! Where the only happy people are on drugs!

Chevelle SS 396 - as fun as drugs and slightly less risky.

The latest thing to show up in Life are ads for a new kind of restaurant.

I think Stuckley`s ran ads in the late 1950s, but this is fast food as the world would know it.

McDonald`s has not shown up, but Life did run an actual article on the `Hamburger University` McDonald`s ran.

Kentucky Fried Chicken makes an appearance as well.

As do some franchise rivals in the fried chicken game.

I`m pretty sure sandbox games like GTA and Saint`s Row put more work into fake in-world ads then these people did in the real world.

Speaking of marketing, this `white car sale` was the brainwave of one Lee Iococcia:

The sexism and using sex to sell things has reached some point whereat least some of the ads might be doing it as a joke:

This is a annual ad, with all 52 head shots of the Miss America contestants. Comparing faces and hairstyles to today is an interesting exercise.

A puzzle here is what woman is buying her man a Chevelle.

Women, this is how you use a telephone.

Sexy ad about pens.

Sexy ads about big newspapers

Sexy FIAT ads (OK that`s not too surprising)

but this one is! Et Tu, Quaker Oats?!

But it is not all bad. Car ads are still in a wild era, where the ads themselves are as striking as the shapes Detroit was creating.

This is in fact the first front-wheel drive Detroit car - which naturally weighted two and a half tons, and was powered by a gigantic honkin`V8.

It`s a nice dress and a nice color combo.

In a combination of themes, Mercury was for a time being sold as a man's car. I`d like to think this campaign started when two Ford executives asked each other "so why the hell does Mercury exist, anyway?"

The Late `60 Lincoln Continental grew in size, and was now something between a luxury car and a Dreadnought. This red car is actually a coupe having two utterly gigantic doors but probably the same interior space as the sedan. It was a goofy time. My favorite design detail are the blades of chrome along the lower front bumper. Ironically, this gorgeous car would lead the way to the immensely profitable and bestselling but homely Lincoln Mk. VII of the 1970s.

By the way, you can get an actual Lincoln Continental Limo if the Sedan is too downmarket for you.

The 'quality' spiel is more true than you might expect. While Lincoln-Mercury lost its bespoke V8, the Continental was still on its own platform. Lincoln until 2005 had a factory at Wixom, Michigan, that only made Lincoln products, and unlike much of the rest of the domestic auto industry, Ford regularly spent money to update its technology. The Japanese imports especially would achieve superior quality by always spending money on manufacturing - and its not that Ford was not familiar with the technology. It's just they were only implementing it on Lincoln.

Lincoln: outdoing Cadillac's class anxiety since 1963.

This is worth a look: GM was approaching the zenith of its power, with every fourth car sold being a Chevrolet. This car was the Toyota Camry of its era: the Chevrolet Caprice, with options ranging from convertible and wagon versions, to a whole Chef`s salad of V8 options. (This should not be seen as some sort of performance endorsement - when dealing with sixties cars, unless the V8 was of monstrous displacement, performance would be considered slow compared to modern vehicles.) This car does a good job underlining how much the automotive industry has changed since the 1960s.

You know what George Bernard Shaw fans van drivers are.

The Domestic automakers, despite all their wealth and power, couldn't really figure out the people who were driving imports. With the Chevelle SS, there appears to be some sort of effort to target it to people driving MG Midgets, which was wrong-headed but at least a honest effort.

The giveaway is the driving glove.

The Chevelle was Chevy's midsize platform, and could be had in anything from an economy car to the aforementioned 396.

 Then you had importing foreign cars to sell to these oddball foreign market people. The cars were disdained by dealerships (no options meant low profit) and usually difficult to service by most garages. The cars were fairly terrible too, so the whole experience would deliver the message "if you drive a small car, Detroit hates you" quite well. This is not a message that Chrysler would shake until the K-car of the 1980s - Ford managed to change the tune with the Ford Focus of the late 1990s. GM only really shook that judgement post-2008 bankruptcy, when small car manufacture was outsourced to Korean makers.

The Japanese and VW were not the only people making inroads in North America. Volvo was quite successful selling unfashionable boxes - the 240DL was introduced in the Nixon administration but lasted until 1992.

Even Saab is moving in. This Saab had a two-stroke engine, which made for some...interesting driving characteristics.

I'm guessing the Don Drapists out there liked the style, because Pontiac stuck with lavish illustration when it was falling out of favor.

Truly, while bad moons would eventually arise (mostly when 8 mpg land boats became uneconomical) the Domestic auto industry was languid in its long summer days. They could predict the coming of fall, but did not wish to. Why are my feel so cold?

You tiled the living room floor? Why would you do this? I don't care that it looks sophisticated! I know it is only 2 PM but I was going for a nap and my feet are frozen, just frozen! If I curl up on the couch I go to sleep! We're going to need to cover it all in rugs...

Whoops, sorry. Forgot. November. Just think happy! Don't cry before 2 PM on weekdays! This is what we decided! Look how happy this woman is!

And this is because she got new flooring. Vinyl flooring! Hm, wonder if it'd be cold on the feet like this tile...

 And it could be worse. Look at this guy, fat-shaming a statue. Imagine if I were that guy. Or that statue. Hell, she looks just fine to me. Why is this jerk fat-shaming her? I have to move on.

Another thing old Life magazine frequently has is recipes. While these are mostly food, drinks recipes crop up now and then, which is useful at Christmas. A month from now.

 First whiskey, now Bourbon. I imagine it was pretty ordinary stuff, but I can't help but wonder if it was any good. I leave you with this enigmatic image of a French statue eternally eye-bangin' the French ladies.

Actually, I have another picture of a similar. If memory serves, this is in the sculpture garden in Versailles:

Ok, France, this makes me laugh. I think I can get through November. I mean, I got a shelf full of unmade model kits and god knows what else to look forward to, right?

Exactly.