Lost Nuke: The Last Flight of Bomber 075, Revised Edition

by Dirk Septer

“A story seemingly drawn out of a Hollywood action script…Gripping stuff.”—Canada’s History

Just before midnight on February 13, 1950, three engines of a US Air Force B-36 intercontinental bomber caught fire over Canada’s northwest coast. The crew jumped, and the plane ditched somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. Almost four years later, the wreck of the bomber was found accidentally in a remote location in the coastal mountains of British Columbia, three hours’ flying time in the opposite direction of where it was supposed to have crashed.
After years of silence, the United States finally admitted to losing its very first nuclear bomb; the incident was its first Broken Arrow, the code name for accidents involving nuclear weapons. But was the bomb dropped and exploded over the Inside Passage, or was it blown up at the aircraft’s resting place in the mountains? This Cold War–era tale follows the last flight of bomber 075 and attempts to unravel the real story behind more than fifty years of secrecy, misdirection, and misinformation.

224 pages, Paperback

Published May 27, 2016

Reviews

[Kaisa Este · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 🌟 Very interesting story but this was a read that I had to push myself to finish because it’s non-fiction and there were a few chapters that I didn’t understand. The writing and layout of the book were great, but because this isn’t my normal genre, I didn’t find myself reaching for it. Glad I finished it though and maybe I’ll find myself reading and enjoying non-fiction more…

[Liz N · Rating 5 out of 5]

I stumbled across this book at The Book Warehouse and immediately bought it. This is the only thorough write up about the US government’s first Broken Arrow I had found anywhere. I was especially keen to learn more because in 1950 the B36 aircraft the bomb was on crashed just north of Smithers, BC, where I was born and raised. I wasn’t aware of this event while growing up there until my mom once casually commented that a neighbour had guided US soldiers into the bush to find ‘that plane that crashed with a nuclear bomb on board.’ I recall my response was “NUCLEAR BOMB?! What nuclear bomb??”

So this book explains in detail the investigation by geologists and other interested parties into what really happened. During their search expeditions, the US military completely commandeered Smithers airport and the town. I wish I could have asked my grandparents what they recalled, as they were living in Smithers at that time.

A lot of information is still not known because the Pentagon will not release it to the public. There is also a YouTube video about this incident:

https://youtu.be/x5NZ0K0uff0

[Vic Lauterbach · Rating 4 out of 5]

This thoughtful and thorough account of the first nuclear accident covers all the material well. I appreciated that Mr. Scepter presented the various conspiracy theories but left it up to the reader to decide how plausible each was. This is yet another instance of truth being stranger than fiction. The most intriguing thing about this accident is that we will never know exactly what happened during the hours between when the crew bailed out of B-36 #92075 and it crashed into the eastern slope of Mt. Kologet. This book provides all the information required for an informed opinion. A valuable companion volume is John Clearwater's slightly shorter account Broken Arrow #1: The First Lost Atomic Bomb. It provides more information directly from primary sources but Mr. Clearwater is overtly supportive of the official account of what happened so his book will have less appeal to conspiracy theory buffs. Like most historical puzzles, applying Occam's razor leads us back to the less exciting but more likely scenario described in the USAF and Canadian reports on the crash and the extensive search operation it spawned.

[William · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very interesting book that raises a lot of legitimate questions.