“He set up the National UFO Reporting Center and the Aerial Phenomena Research Group, and he also formed a telephone hotline which is the hotline I run today,” Davenport said. Nearly 60 years later, it doesn’t really help clear things up much to see that the crash investigation report prepared back then by the US Air Force still has about two pages of text redacted-even though Lee Corbin has tried for years to get the full report and has been denied multiple times.Īll those details aside, it’s fascinating to hear Peter Davenport describe the big-picture, scientific and non-sensationalized national approach that Bob Gribble took to studying UFOs, from right here in Seattle. He described the odd sounds and lights that many witnesses had reported that evening, and what he described as the “silencing” of local officials in Orting – by the military – about what had really happened on the night of April 1, 1959. Bulletin” – short for “Aerial Phenomena Research Organization.” Gribble’s piece detailed his investigations into the Bonney Lake crash. Gribble published an article in May 1959 in a publication called “A.P.R.O. “What triggered my memory was the fact that the plane appeared to have been pressed down vertically to earth rather than hitting, striking the earth at a slant angle.” “I think Bob Gribble did mention this case to me once before,” Davenport said. What actually caused the crash? Officially, the Air Force cited “operator error” and “supervisory error” in the downing of the C-118, pointing to the confusion over who was keeping track of the plane’s altitude. He’d ultimately like to see some kind of monument to the crew of the C-118, maybe when the Tehaleh development reaches this, so far, relatively untouched piece of land.Ĭorbin has also been in touch with the developers and asked them to keep him apprised when work is set to begin in the area near where the C-118 crashed, so that he can help keep a lookout for artifacts that might turn up during any tree removal or excavation. Foote, both flight engineers.Ĭorbin has researched military aviation accidents around the Northwest, and he lives not too far from the site of the C-118 crash. Lasater, co-pilot and Technical Sergeant Guy J. “At the time this happened, and this is where the UFO controversy comes in, is supposedly the made a radio call saying ‘We’ve hit something or something has hit us,’” Corbin said, leading the way along an old logging or fire road leftover from when the land belonged to Weyerhaeuser.Īll four men aboard the plane died in the fiery crash, including 1st Lieutenant Robert Roy Dimick, the pilot 1st Lieutenant Thomas E. Corbin had parked his truck off the side of the road, near a dead end that will one day connect the east and west halves of the development, and then walked up a gentle slope and onto a woodsy plateau. The woods where Corbin walked are in Pierce County near Bonney Lake, south of Highway 410, and not far from the growing “master planned community” called Tehaleh. Last Friday, Corbin led a reporter on a hike to a wooded area not far from Highway 410, during an unusual bout of springtime snow. Lee Corbin is a retired military and airline pilot who for many years has been researching the story of what happened to the C-118. Some still aren’t sure what exactly happened. The C-118 went down.Īnd within a few days, some people were blaming a UFO. It was about five minutes later when something went terribly wrong.
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