Sometimes, something stops you, pulls you aside, and you do not know why. On October 3, four years ago, Jerry Adler was buried at age 90, grateful to the end. Jerry was a B-52 navigator. His friend, Dan Bulli, was a B-52 pilot. Dan predeceased Jerry at age 94. These two patriots remind us of what matters, risks taken for America, and how blessed life is. They are forever linked…to Maine.
On January 24, 1963, Jerry and Dan were part of a nine-man B-52 crew flying over northern Maine. Their mission was important, the first of its kind. The Cuban Missile Crisis had just occurred, October 1962. All the world had – including members of my family – imagined a possible nuclear war.
Fear rocked America before John F. Kennedy’s resolve fortified us. A former Navy combat veteran, Kennedy stopped the Soviets, who put Surface-to-Air missiles in Cuba. People breathed again.
What Eisenhower learned in 1960, when an American U-2 was shot down, Kennedy relearned in 1962: The Soviets were expanding, planned to knock U.S. nuclear bombers down at high altitude.
This is where Jerry and Dan come in. Their mission on January 24, 1963, was to fly low – low as 100 feet – over Maine’s highly forested, mountainous north, testing whether a B-52 could penetrate Soviet airspace at very low altitude, avoiding Soviet radars – not at 50,000 feet, where visible.
All nine aboard were prepared: Jerry and Dan, co-pilot Robert Morrison, Joe Simpson Jr., William Gabriel, Robert Hill Jr., Herbert Hansen, Charles Leuchter, and Michael O’Keefe. They took off at 12:11 in the afternoon.
Unknown to the crew, flying a large airframe, fast, at low altitude in mountains creates “lee waves,” a kind of unusual, highly varying, violent set of air waves. The crew hit them in Maine, near Greenville.
At 100 feet, travelling at 320 miles an hour, these invisible waves tore off the stabilizer – the vertical part of the tail – vital for a B-52. The plane immediately rolled 40 degrees left, nosed down.
Dan was at the controls, Jerry navigating. Now, just ten seconds existed between the B-52 being airborne, with a football field-sized wingspan, and it being spread across the side of Elephant Mountain. Dan told all to abandon the plane.
He, Jerry, and Robert ejected. Ejecting at 100 feet altitude, 320 miles an hour, 40 degree angle to the earth, is like praying for mercy as your rocket explodes, an act of faith, with no margin. Robert hit a tree, died immediately. Dan’s chute deployed, leaving him hanging from a tree; Jerry’s chute never deployed.
At 40 degrees, Jerry’s seat somehow re-angled itself to vertical. He hit five feet of snow hard, bending the seat’s steel, cracking his ribs, fracturing his skull. The other seven died instantly, the plane spread over miles.
Prayers and mercy still needed…The temperature was minus 29 degrees. Dan and Jerry summoned the energy to wrap themselves in what they had. The plane was destroyed, and both men were near death.
Mainers then did the seemingly impossible. More than 80 from the Maine State Police, Inland Fisheries and Game, Civil Air Patrol, and Dow Air Force Base in Bangor pushed into Maine’s wilderness. Scott Paper Company plowed 10 miles of 15-foot snowdrifts. At 11 a.m., the two survivors – Jerry and Dan – got airlifted to Bangor.
Both made it, Jerry with a leg amputation, Dan – a veteran of WWII, Korea, and Vietnam – later flew other B-52 missions. Jerry is the only person ever to survive ejection without a chute.
These two stayed in touch all their lives, helping others for decades. Dan, a heroic military aviator, Jerry going to law school, finally meeting his rescuer 50 years after the crash, and is forever grateful.
In Maine, the site of the B-52 crash is preserved on land owned by Plum Creek Timber, hundreds of pieces of metal spread across the mountain still – engines, wings, tires, fuselage, and other debris – a surreal reminder that those who sign up, serve, and fly for America – in peacetime and war – take incredible risks, their lives sometimes over in a second.
Every year, the Moosehead Riders Snowmobile Club holds a service at the site on the anniversary of the crash, remembering the lives lost and two – Jerry and Dan – who miraculously survived.
So much could be said about this epic tragedy and miracle, the service of all involved, God’s mercy, the importance of honoring those who take risks for America, and the spirit of Mainers.
I will only offer this. I did not know any of these facts until today, did not know the crash date, and did not know Jerry was buried today, four years ago. I was just driving in northern Maine. Sometimes, something stops you, pulls you aside, and you do not know why. Hearing it, you learn.
Robert Charles is a former Assistant Secretary of State under Colin Powell, former Reagan and Bush 41 White House staffer, Maine attorney, ten-year naval intelligence officer (USNR), and 25-year businessman. He wrote “Narcotics and Terrorism” (2003), “Eagles and Evergreens” (North Country Press, 2018), and “Cherish America: Stories of Courage, Character, and Kindness” (Tower Publishing, 2024). He is the National Spokesman for AMAC. Today, he is running to be Maine’s next Governor (please visit BobbyforMaine.com to learn more)!
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