SMITH-LLOYD

COLD  WAR  TRAGIC  MULTIPLE  DEATHS

The period called the Cold War was not a time of active hostilities but unfortunately it was not a time devoid of deaths of U.S. military forces.  On January 18, 1953, Lockheed P2V-5 Neptune (BuNo 127744) attached to Patrol Squadron VP-22 departed Okinawa to conduct surveillance in the South China Sea and specifically to photograph a communist antiaircraft artillery emplacement on China’s southeastern coast.  Completing the assignment and as the plane turned back toward Okinawa, Chinese antiaircraft fire from shore struck the P2V behind the cockpit.  The strike set the port wing on fire and the vertical and horizontal stabilizers sustained significant damage.  The port engine soon quit, and emergency procedures failed to distinguish the fires, which were also sucked into the after station.  When the second engine began smoking and the port wing was showing signs of structural failure, the pilot landed the P2V in the Formosa Straits near Swatow, China, in a perilous sea state with 15-foot swells, 30-knot winds, and a water temperature estimated at 62F.  The P2V slammed into the ocean fifteen minutes after being hit by the Chinese ground fire.  All thirteen crewmembers successfully got out of the sinking plane.  Unfortunately, only one burned and partially inflatable seven-man life raft was launched.  Two crewmembers who had been injured by the shelling and fire were placed in the raft and most of the remaining men clung to the raft, trying to keep afloat.  Another VP-22 P2V, patrolling a different sector, was alerted to the situation and sped to the reported ditching position.  Eventually sighting survivors, another raft was dropped but it could not be retrieved due to the high winds and rough seas.

Aviation Machinist Mate Second Class Lloyd Smith Jr. was assigned as the Second Mechanic aboard the P2V-5 Neptune.  Review of readily available public records reveals little information concerning him.  He is reported to have entered the Navy from Russellville, Arkansas.  After Smith successfully evacuated the crashed P2V, survivors advised he was last seen in the company of PH1 William Freeman McClure Jr. and that the two men drifted away from the crash scene due to the high winds and ocean currents.  Many hours later when rescuers arrived on scene, they were unable to locate Smith and McClure.  On September 20, 1955, the Navy publicly reported the two men were being declared dead as their remains were never recovered.  Historical records contain an unconfirmed report that the two men succeeded in reaching land where they were captured by the Chinese and when they later tried to escape, they were recaptured and purposely executed.  The validity of this report has never been established. 

Of the thirteen crewmembers aboard the P2V, only AD2 Smith and PH1 McClure died at the scene of the crash.  Unfortunately, a later rescue aircraft successfully rescued eleven P2V crewmen, but when it attempted takeoff it also crashed due to the unfavorable ocean conditions and four of the P2V survivors were killed.  Of the 21 crewmembers aboard the two aircrafts that crashed that day, 11 died and only 10 survived. 

Submitted by CDR Roy A. Mosteller, USNR (Ret)