Silent Heroes of the Cold War Declassified: The Mysterious Military Plane Crash on a Nevada Mountain Peak - and the Families Who Endured an Abyss of Silence for Generations

by Kyril Plaskon

From Las Vegas, Mount Charleston looks like little more than a giant gravel mound in the distance, towering 11,916 feet above the neon lights of the entertainment capital of the world. Only a fraction of the nearly 40 million people who visit this 24-hour city ever bother to look west and skyward toward the mountain.The truth is that this very mountain is a silent memorial to fourteen men who died there in a plane crash on November 17, 1955; men who were part of the secret development of the U-2 spy plane, integral to America's success in the Cold War. The United States government was so determined to keep their mission a secret that it lied to the families of the victims, sealed the crash records and even rigged the site with explosives in an effort to obliterate any remnants of their existence.If it weren't for the curiosity of one visitor, the national secret that haunted the mountainside might never have been revealed. In these pages, finally, the story is told.

203 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 2008

About the author

Kyril D. Plaskon is an award winning broadcast and print journalist, and has worked both abroad and in various US states. As a reporter at KPBS San Diego, he won Society of Professional Journalists top awards for exposing child sex tourism in Tijuana, Mexico. He has won awards also for covering crossborder electricity and pollution issues during the energy crisis.

Today, he is pursuing his masters degree in journalism at UNLV and building a home at the base of Mount Charleston.

Plaskon is a member of the Lee Canyon Ski Patrol and enjoys participating in triathlons. He resides in Las Vegas with his wife and daughter."

Reviews

[Julie Ririe · Rating 4 out of 5]

Since my story is in this book, I thought I might write a review. I like the book of course, the story is fascinating and for all those involved in the story it needed to be told. I had a few issues with the way my part was written because some of the facts were misplaced but over all it was written well and written in a way that allows the reader to get the information quickly and thoroughly for such a huge amount of facts. Thanks Ky, for taking on a great story. Hope to see more books from you.

[Meredith Hruda · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book because a family member was on the flight. We did not know the truth about his death until this book was published. This is a fascinating story of American heroes and it is shocking that the truth was covered up for so long!

[Joseph Hamilton · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don’t enjoy gambling so when I visited Las Vegas I found other things to do: the Hoover Dam, a film location for “The Professionals” and then Mount Charleston. When I arrived at the trailhead I read a sign that mentioned the aircraft wreckage which is highly unusual and strongly motivated me to get at least that far. Unfortunately I started late, didn’t bring a flashlight and took the spur to Griffith Peak before returning to the main trail. I imagine by now it’s been pretty well scavenged and as the book mentions, it was demolished with explosives. All of the book’s crash photos appear to be contemporaneous with the crash or its investigation. I suppose a photo of the crash site today would be underwhelming. Some day I would like to go back and find out for myself.

The book is published by a small press and would have been improved by a proofreading for word choice. Phrases like “literally a can of worms,” “pain in the ass” and “a receptionists” tell me this was a rush job. The pilot is described as well qualified but had graduated from flight school a year before the crash.

I started reading the chapter that most interested me, about the man who brought the crash back to public attention about fifty years later. He started with a simple phone request to Maxwell Air Force Base which produced the accident report that had been declassified in September 1998. This book is listed on Goodreads under two titles, one with the word “declassified” and the other without perhaps because it appears on the cover bordered, at a slant and in red ink.

It’s unclear how long the declassified report had lain dormant before the man made his phone call. The report listed by name the fourteen fatalities; there were no survivors. This is where it gets ghoulish and unsettling: the man phoned the next of kin out of the blue to tell them about the report. Some didn’t want to revisit the tragedy but a biographical sketch of each victim appears in the book anyway.

The book doesn’t detail the news coverage at the time but I imagine it mentioned the obvious, that the plane crashed into a mountain during a winter storm with limited visibility. It had been flying under radio silence since reaching the radio direction beacon in Goodsprings, Nevada but the pilot had broken the silence once his situation worsened. It would appear that no air traffic controller responded, something the man and the author don’t go into at this far remove. The accident report is 157 pages.

Overall the tone strikes me as overwrought about government secrecy and parsimony. One complaint is that the Air Force did not pay for the recovery team’s steak dinners. Admittedly I didn’t read this cover to cover so perhaps I’ve overlooked some exculpatory points. Still I know a lot more about the crash than I did the day I tried to hike Mount Charleston and I appreciate that.

[Jane Gardner · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a well written and researched account of the problems with the "veil of secrecy" the United States Government and Military used to develop weapons for use in warfare and the Cold War. The lack of established protocols was the big issue with this particular case of the engineers, pilots and scientists who worked on the development of the U2 spy plane. The private pain of the families who lost their fathers, husbands, sons and brothers during this period is revealed in this account which includes individual biographies of the personnel who died in the military plane crash on Mount Charleston in Southern Nevada. Unfortunately, many of the family members had passed on before their families learned of their individual heroism. I found this a compelling story of a little-known incident in our country's history that is so important to know because so often it is the behind-the-scenes people who fail to get the recognition they deserve. I highly recommend this book and applaud the writing and research of Kyril D. Plaskon.

[Hailey Leavitt · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not very well written but definitely worth the read. It really helped me to learn about local history in Las Vegas regarding the Cold War.

[Jo Beth · Rating 4 out of 5]

A local tragedy about which few know any details. I hope to see the memorial soon.

[Steve Ririe · Rating 5 out of 5]

I hope those who read this book will come to an understanding of the sacrifice many in the intelligence community have made to secure our freedom and way of life. I think Kyril has done a very good job telling the story and it is worth reading.