-

 September 24, 1972

Executive Airport Sacramento, California.

A beautiful day. It was for an air show. Fifty years ago, a needless tragedy happened, killing twenty-four people. Twelve children celebrating a birthday at Ferrel's Ice Cream parlor. It is located right across the road from the airport. My parents took me to this same Farrels for my sixth birthday.

My name is James. I am fifty-six years old, and I was at that show. Just a couple months until my seventh birthday. My brother was just a few months old, and my sister was five. I am a witness to what was the worst airplane crash in history.

Fifty years and parts of that day are vividly clear in my memory. Like the morning of the air show. My dad had told me about the air show a week before. I am an aviation nut. I just completed my first airplane model. With my imagination, I was already a jet pilot. I wanted to join the Air Force because of that model.

So to say I was eager to get there would be an understatement. Finally, we get there and have to wait on everyone, God! Now we are going toward those big noisy jets. It transfixed me. The silver bird.

The Canadian Sabre, a Korean war relic. It was all shiny and pretty. I couldn't take my eyes off of it. My dad took me over to have a look. It was the coolest thing I have ever seen. 

We walked around and checked out some exhibits, had some lunch, and watched air stunts. Those were awesome. 

Mom was telling dad we need to go home because the baby was throwing a fit. That was the first time I got angry at my brother...

Mom! The jet hasn't taken off yet! Enough of that Jimmy, it is time to leave. Let's go! I glared at Mark and started to the car with dad. The jet was starting its engines. I pleaded since the engines were starting. My charms, begging, and pleading didn't work.

I am trying to stop and glimpse the plane taking off. Just as I turn back to see where I am walking, BAM! Right into a telephone pole, I went. That was when I saw a flash and then a huge billowing cloud of black smoke.

It happened so fast I didn't believe my eyes. Dad! look as I pointed. He looked and said c'mon we need to go fast. We had to go by the scene because it was the only way to the road home. I remember all the carnage and the gurney with a child my age on it.

All I said was we needed to get home and watch the news.

https://www.usdeadlyevents.com/1972-sep-24-air-show-plane-crash-fire-ice-cream-parlor-sacramento-ca-22-23/

To this day I wonder about events such as this and everything that happened in that one instant. I mean, the second that plane hit the Ice cream parlor there were five thousand other things happening five feet away and nothing could have prevented that tragedy.

Thank you for reading, James W. Sims IV



  


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

-
  Angels Camp 1864 It was nothing but a mud pit as it had rained for days on end. People came and went by the wagon loads. It was during this period a younger Samuel Clemens aka Mark Twain, rode into the Camp. He was just another miner to everyone there. It was due to the weather he stayed in. As it was there wasn’t much to do except to go and hang at the saloon and share tall tales. It was on a night such as this one, meaning wet. Sitting in the saloon Mark twain found the inspiration for The jumping frog story. This story in today's terms went viral. And made a lot of fans want to head west. Where it was found out that it was a piece of fiction. In 1893 The first County fair in the state of California opened in Copperopolis California. Copperopolis having the fifth-largest copper mine in the World? Most defitenatly In the U.S. Calaveras County was a booming place and as history tells it a rather dangerous one too. Meanwhile, life in the county was a time full discovery...
Read more
-
               It is the craziest time in history The history we are living in is crazy. We have had nothing like it. The Spanish flu is the only thing I found that comes somewhat close. I am pretty sure it wasn't an election year. I don't think we had riots and protests and a president that dropped the ball on the fact of the spread of the disease. More worried about blame than a vaccine or cure.  They somewhat wrote the scenario about in Tom Clancy's The Sum of all Fears. The biggest difference was disease and the political landscape. Anyhow, I have not found the history of our country in the same situation at the same time. Yes, at different times. The Spanish flu in 1920, and the Civil Rights movement in the 1960s.  Here we are more than a year after Covid-19 showed up on our shores and we still do not have a handle on it. Our government was so hellbent on Donald Trump and Impeaching him, they wouldn't do anything but push that agend...
Read more
-
 Realizing your old It’s a hard time in life to realize you are old. The first sign is your body. Things hurt in places that you think what the, hey. The second sign is denial. You know what is happening but refuse to believe it. And finally, there is the number of years your birthday celebrates. My last was 55. Just a couple more, and I am officially a senior citizen.   Now even the realization of it doesn’t make your brain accept it. You continue to think you can do what you did in your thirties. Or that you can still attract them pretty young things. And in today’s way of meeting makes you an immediate target for scammers. Your other part of denial. Thinking that the pretty woman on the profile you are chatting with is the person you are actually talking to. The only way to know is through video chat. And in my experience, there will be an excuse why that is not possible. And they throw the word trust in a lot.   They are pretty good at manipulation, but not perfect. I...
Read more