On February 27, 1980, the long-lost glasses of rocker Buddy
Holly, who died in a deadly plane crash in 1959, were found—
filed away in a manila envelope in a court clerk’s office marked
"Charles Harden Holly".

That envelope was opened by Sheriff Jerry Allen. The glasses
were eventually returned to Holly’s widow.

A Beechcraft Bonanza carrying Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens 
and “The Big Bopper” Richardson, crashed outside Clear
Lake, Iowa, in the early morning hours of February 3, 1959.
 

The Apollo 1 crew, from left, Edward H. White II, Virgil I.
"Gus" Grissom, and Roger B. Chaffee.

A launch pad fire during Apollo program tests at Cape Canaveral,
Florida, killed all three astronauts of Apollo 1 on this day in 1967. 
     
An investigation indicated that a faulty electrical wire inside the
Apollo 1 command module was the probable cause of the fire.

The astronauts, the first Americans to die in a spacecraft, had been participating in a simulation of the Apollo 1 launch scheduled for
the following month.

The entrance to the tribute to the three astronauts who died
in the fire.

The three-part hatch that was in place on the Apollo 1
spacecraft is shown in the tribute.This is the first time
any part of the Apollo 1 spacecraft has been displayed
publicly. 

ED DANAHUE

The final flight of the Space Shuttle Columbia took
place from January 16, 2003 to February 1, 2003.

The mission ended in disaster when the shuttle
broke apart during reentry, killing all seven crew
members.

The space shuttle Columbia lifting off on its final flight.

On January 16, 1942, the actress Carole Lombard, famous for her
roles in such screwball comedies as My Man Godfrey and To Be
or Not to Be, and for her marriage to the actor Clark Gable, was
killed when the TWA DC-3 plane she is traveling in crashed en - 
route from Las Vegas to Los Angeles. She was only 33.

Doug Scroggins of Las Vegas spent years documenting the crash
site on Mount Potosi which is 35 miles southwest of Las Vegas.

Scroggins said "Flight 3 crashed near the 8,300-foot level of Mount Potosi with flaps retracted, and the plane in level flight. Something happened inside that cockpit and happened so fast that the pilot
could not react.”

Clark Gable and Carole Lombard.

1939

A TWA DC-3, similar to the accident aircraft.

N8082U, the United Airlines DC-8-61 involved, pictured in
1972 sporting a previous identifying design. Photo taken
at Seattle / Tacoma – Int. (SEA). 

       
        
       
Originating at John F. Kennedy Airport in New York, United
Airlines Flight 173 stopped in Denver, and continued to
Portland on Thursday, December 28, 1978.

The pilot reported a problem with the plane’s nose landing
gear to the Portland tower, and, according to the National
Transportation Safety Board report, failed to monitor properly
the aircraft’s fuel state and to properly respond to the low
fuel state. The Board blamed pilot error for the crash

After circling Portland International Airport the DC-8 ran out
of fuel and crashed into two vacant houses and a grove of
trees at East Burnside Street, five miles southeast of the
airport and about 200 feet east of 157th Avenue  at around
6:15 P.M.

The jetliner, reportedly was carrying 172 adult passengers,
five infants and eight crew members.

     
    
    
Capt. Malburn "Buddy" McBroom (52), a World War II Navy
veteran and longtime United pilot, recovers in a Gresham,
Oregon hospital.  (KATU)        

United Flight 173 survivor Lynn Egli, right, stands with
KATU’s Steve Dunn at the memorial for the passengers
aboard United Flight 173 that killed 10 people. (KATU)