Passengers 22 Fatalities 25 Date 1 December 1959 Operator Allegheny Airlines Passenger count 22 | Crew 4 Survivors 1 Number of deaths 25 Survivor 1 Location Pennsylvania | |
Summary Pilot Error (Controlled flight into terrain) Site Bald Eagle Mountain South Williamsport, Pennsylvania Destination Williamsport Regional Airport | ||
Allegheny Airlines Flight 371 was a scheduled passenger flight on December 1, 1959, between Philadelphia and Cleveland with stops in Pennsylvania at Harrisburg (HAR), Williamsport (IPT), Bradford, and Erie. The flight had 26 on board. All but two passengers were killed on impact; one died on the way to the hospital, and the other was the lone survivor. Of the passengers from throughout the Eastern United States many were on business or vacation. There were two International passengers on board: Arthur Levin was born in Lithuania, and Robert Rene Noel Emile was French.
Contents
Early stages
Flight 371 was scheduled between Philadelphia and Cleveland with stops at Harrisburg (HAR), Williamsport (IPT), Bradford, and Erie. Flight 371 departed Philadelphia at 08:15, proceeded VFR to Harrisburg where it landed at 08:51 without incident. Flight 371 departed Harrisburg at 09:06 with 22 revenue passengers, one additional crew member 9 and 598 pounds of baggage, mail, and cargo.
Crash and reaction
Most of the passenger cabin area was consumed by the ground fire which followed the crash. The crash site was located about 1.3 miles (2.1 km) south of Williamsport, Pennsylvania.
Emergency response
Due to the terrain it was hard for authorities from South Williamsport, Loyalsock Township, and Williamsport fire departments to reach the site; thus, it took would-be rescuers half an hour to reach the crashed aircraft. Following the crash the Bureau of Aviation Safety of the Civil Aeronautics Board sent an investigative team, which was at the crash site by December 2.
Reaction
The accident was the deadliest in Allegheny Airlines' history at the time and was the most deadly in Pennsylvania state history until Mohawk Airlines Flight 40. The crash made headlines around the nation and in France because one of the passengers was French.
Lone survivor
Twenty-five of the 26 people aboard were killed, but Louis Matarazzo of Springfield, Pennsylvania, a manager of a Philadelphia sportswear company who was on a business trip, was the only survivor. Matarazzo was severely burned in the wreck. Two other passengers. initially survived but died before they could be transported.
Rescue workers needed one and a half hours to lower Matarazzo down from the mountain. Matarazzo died in 1988.
Crew
The crew of Flight 371 were Captain Thomas R. Goldsmith, Co-Pilot George M. Bowers, Co-Pilot Donald W. Tygert, who was occupying the jump seat at the time of the crash, and the steward, William Thompson Conger.
Legacy
In May 2014, a Williamsport-area resident, Shane Collins, and his cousin, Mark Avery, re-located the Flight 371 crash site on Bald Eagle Mountain using GPS.
Robin Van Auken, an archaeology instructor at Lycoming College and a board member of the Northcentral Chapter 8 of the Society for Pennsylvania Archaeology, led efforts resulting in the state Historical and Museum Commission designating the crash site (about the size of a football field) as an official archaeological site. Recovery of artifacts would be difficult as much of the site is on a 67-degree slope.
Plans, as of 2014, are to place a small memorial at the crash site and interpretive panels at key locations, such as the Susquehanna River Walk in Williamsport, describing the plane crash.