Boxcar ridge debris field

[dima]

On Saturday Sean, Cecelia, Alex and I went to the Pleasant View Ridge Wilderness to check out the 1966 wreckage of a C119 cargo plane (http://www.av.qnet.com/~carcomm/wreck25.htm). We started out by climbing up and over the bumps that comprise Mount Williamson:



Eventually you could see the slope with the debris field in it:



Then Sean looked at a map:



And we descended a steep gully and traversed a steep slope, aiming for the bottom of the debris:





We then passed a cool rock:



And ended up at the bottom of the gully with the debris. We then slowly climbed up, constantly stopping to photograph the mangled bits of plane:











Then we headed back, bagging Goodykoontz in the process

[Taco]

Very cool!

[Sean]

Couple more group shots with Dima and Alex at the plane wreckage.

[Gene]

Thank you for posting this.

May the crew RIP.

They used those C-19s to drop water and fire retardant on forest fires. They used a large rubber bladder to hold the water and left the rear cargo doors open. The bladder had some sort of zip lock opening that could be operated by a crew member strapped in the cargo door opening.

Back in the 70's there was a large fire at the top of Burro canyon near the beginning of the East Fork. Myself and another dam operator were at the mouth of Burro when one of these C-19 came flying out of the smoke in Burro Canyon well down into the canyon. The plane climbed very steeply and turned up the East Fork to avoid running into the far side of the East Fork. The engines were really straining. We were dumbfounded waving as we looked up to see the rear hatch open with a guy strapped to the side was waving back at us. To us it was a miracle they didn't slam into the far canyon face.

[Girl Hiker]

thanks Dima this was a really cool hike and lots of fun

[Uncle Rico]

Very cool guys. I've been along that ridge but didn't even realize that debris field was there.