Sgt. Gordon Sealy
82nd Airborne Division 504 A.I.R.

The sad recount of this air disaster is still fresh in my mind, it happened in Ft Bragg in '54 or '55, time dulls my recollection of the date but not the occurrence.

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We had a large drop of about 21, C119's to be followed by a drop from C124's. The C119's were in a line of vees, each vee was made up of 3 planes and each vee was higher than the other, the first vee being the lowest.

Editors Note: A Stick is a line of Troopers ready to jump.

As the sticks began exiting the aircraft, one of the C119's became unstable and dropped below his assigned altitude. Before the pilot recovered his position, a few of his exiting troopers got in the flight path of the lower C119. One of the troopers hit the windshield of the plane and caused it to go into a slow uncontrollable descent through the troopers already in the air under canopies (parachutes). As you might imagine the carnage this created is indescribable. Imagine the sight of this and add to it ,the horror of watching this plane on a collision course with the ground with troopers exiting from it, praying to get out of the plane before the impact !

The coolest acting human being I ever saw in my life was an unfortunate trooper who was snagged by the falling plane, caught on one of the stabilizers on the tail boom he was dangling by his canopy. Only a moment before impact he hit his quick release and struggled out of his harness and dropped free about 3 seconds before the plane hit the ground. Sadly this act of supreme self control was not rewarded by survival.

I had an ice cold chilling view of the entire scenario as I was in the air, drifting slowly down under canopy as the whole disaster unfolded. When I landed I was near a Deuce and Half that I commandeered from some "Legs" (regular army soldier, non-trooper). I picked up some troopers and headed for the crash site, unfortunately we found no survivors.

When we returned to the Company Area we were told we were to go up again for a "Confidence Jump".

Sgt. Gordon Sealy
82nd Airborne Division 504 A.I.R.
Hq.&Hq Co. Ft Bragg N.C.
Story recounted 5-19-02

PS. We red smoked the "C124''s not to drop.

Post Script from Gordon.

I am very grateful to be able to tell their story, to me, nothing is worse than people giving their lives and nobody knowing how or when it happened.

I know the people that count in this country are very caring and humbled by the loss of young men who gave up their futures while still too young to really know what they were losing.

Sometimes when I am having a very good time with family and friends, I feel a sobering pang of remorse, I get a flashback of all the scenes I've witnessed like a fast forward on a VCR. Maybe I'm too emotional and patriotic but I like the way I am and I am at peace with myself. But I still have "Fire in the Belly".

Gordon Sealy
P.S. We did make the confidence jump, That same night.

I have one more thing to say that I believe Sums up the way we veterans feel about the privilege of Serving our Country, in peacetime or wartime. "War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. A man who has nothing which he cares about more than his personal safety is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself"!

Quote from American Legion magazine 1983.
I love every word. Your Comrade in Arms: Gordon Sealy