Article of the Week - The Day the Music Died

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The Day the Music Died
The infamous 1959 plane crash killed
three rock & roll idols plus the pilot

On February 3, 1959, a small-plane crash near Clear Lake, Iowa, killed three American rock and roll pioneers: Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and J. P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson, as well as the pilot, Roger Peterson. The day was later called The Day the Music Died by Don McLean, in his song "American Pie". The plane crash has been called the first and greatest tragedy rock and roll has ever suffered.

The plane departed from the ramp and taxied to then-Runway 17 at around 12:55 AM Central Time on Tuesday, February 3. Contrary to popular belief, there was no blizzard at the time but a very light snowfall with winds out of the south at 20 knots, gusting to 30 knots and a cloud ceiling of 3,000 feet above the ground. The ceiling had dropped by 2,000ft in the previous hour. Though there were indications of deteriorating weather along the route, the weather briefings that Peterson received failed to relay the information.

Hubert Dwyer, owner of the plane and the flight service company, watched from a platform outside the tower and "saw the tail light of the aircraft gradually descend until out of sight", just after 1:00 AM. Peterson had earlier told Dwyer he would file a flight plan with Air Traffic Control by radio after takeoff. When Peterson did not call the tower personnel with his flight plan, Dwyer requested that they continue to attempt to establish radio contact, but all attempts were unsuccessful. By 3:30 AM, when Hector Airport in Fargo, North Dakota, had not heard from Peterson, Dwyer contacted authorities and reported the aircraft missing.

Around 9:15 AM, Dwyer took off in his own Cessna 180 to fly Peterson's intended route. Within minutes he spotted the wreckage less than 6 miles (9.7 km) northwest of the airport, in a cornfield then belonging to Albert Juhl. The Bonanza was at a slight downward angle and banked heavily to the right when it struck the ground at around 170 miles per hour (270 km/h). The plane tumbled and skidded another 570 feet (170 m) across the frozen landscape before the crumpled wreckage came to rest against a wire fence at the edge of Juhl's property. The bodies of Holly and Valens lay near the plane, Richardson was thrown over the fence and into the cornfield of Juhl's neighbor Oscar Moffett, and Peterson's body remained entangled inside the plane's wreckage.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "The Day the Music Died"