Greetings, Jim!
  On 19 Oct 97, Jim Sanders entered the following ASCII codes for the express 
viewing pleasure of Bill Wunsch:
 JS> BILL,
 JS>
 JS>      In a message dated 10-16-97 you wrote ...
 JS>
 >> An article in the local newspaper back in January made mention of
 >> American bomber crews exploding nuclear weapons over Canandian territory
>                         ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
 >> on two different occassions.  Ever hear of those?
 JS>
 JS>
 JS>      I will butt in here because I flew many of the early missions
 JS>  carrying Nuclear weapons over Canada.
The article is rather long, but I will happily SnailMail you a copy if you 
want
to send me your address NetMail.
The year was 1950 and the weapons were atomic bombs with the plutonium core 
removed.  I understand it was standard procedure, with the intent being to 
safeguard nuclear-bomb design secrets, to jetison and explode the device if 
the aircraft developed problems.  The blast would disperse about 45 kilograms 
of uranium into the atmosphere.
The first was on Feb. 13, when a B-36 lost three engines en route from 
Fairbanks to Fort Worth.  The aircraft crashed into a mountainside - 17 crew 
bailed out and 12 survived.
The second was on Nov. 10, a B-50 on a military exercise in Gosse Bay on its 
way to Tucson had engine problems and exploded the bomb over the St. Lawrence 
river.  The plane landed safely at a Maine air base.  Since this was over 
populated territory, the cover story was that a load of 500 pound practice 
bombs was dumped.
                                             -==-
--- GoldED/386 2.42.G0615+
---------------