page_title: List of accidents and incidents involving military aircraft (1950–1954)
section_title: 1953
hierarchical_section_title: List of accidents and incidents involving military aircraft (1950–1954) / 1953
caption_attribution_description: Recovery of the Ensign E.H. Barry, pilot of a U.S. Navy Grumman AF-2 Guardian from Anti-Submarine Squadron 22 (VS-22) by a Piasecki HUP helicopter after the plane was forced to ditch immediately after launching in 1953. The parent escort carrier USS Block Island (CVE-106) is standing by in the background.
context_page_description: This is a list of notable accidents and incidents involving military aircraft grouped by the year in which the accident or incident occurred. Not all of the aircraft were in operation at the time. Combat losses are not included except for a very few cases denoted by singular circumstances.
context_section_description: 5 January
  A Royal Air Force Boeing Washington B.1, WF553, of 15 Squadron, RAF Coningsby, crashes whilst attempting a Ground Controlled Approach at Coningsby in bad weather, impacting near Horncastle. Both pilots, the flight engineer, radio operator and nav/radar are killed, whilst the nav/plotter survives with serious injuries.
  8 January
  A Royal Air Force Boeing Washington B.1, WF502, of 90 Squadron, RAF Marham, crashes at Llanarmon, North Wales whilst on a simulated night radar bombing exercise. Dives into ground at high speed, all ten crew killed.
  12 January
  "An Eglin (AFB) North American F-86 Sabre crash landed on Range 51 injuring the pilot." Aircraft was North American F-86F-30-NA, 52-4306, of the 3200th Flight Test Squadron, 3200th Proof Test Group, piloted by Robert G. Loomis; suffered engine failure.
  13 January
  Strategic Air Command Boeing B-50D-125-BO Superfortress, 49–386, c/n 16162, of the 93d Bombardment Wing, Castle AFB, California, one of a flight of four on a routine navigational flight, spins down out of clouds at 1340 hrs. PT and crashes 13 miles (21 km) W of Gridley, California, killing all 12 on board. Witnesses said that the bomber appeared to lose power. "When we first saw the plane it was coming out of the clouds in a steep spin at about 2,000 feet," said John Cowan, manager of Grey Lodge Waterfowl refuge. "The pilot gave it full power several times, but he couldn’t pull it out."  Just before they hit the ground, the plane appeared to level out some, but it was too late. "They hit the ground with a tremendous thudding sound."  Cowan, a flier himself, and a pilot of Navy planes during the war, could offer no explanation for the crash. "We could hear the pilot hit his engines before he dropped out of the clouds," Cowan said. A special investigations team was dispatched early today (14 January) from Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Dayton, Ohio. Salvage, and additional recovery of bodies, waited on the arrival of a 92-foot (28 m) crane sent from McClellan Air Force Base, Sacramento. Gridley residents said the doomed plane "barely cleared treetops" while passing over the town seconds before the crash, but regained altitude momentarily. Eyewitnesses to the actual crash said the bomber came out of the clouds at 2,000 feet (610 m) in a spin. Many heard the pilot gunning his engines during the fall, and the plane appeared to level out slightly just before the impact half buried it in the mud of an open grain field on the Terrill Sartain property, two miles (3 km) W of the Butte-Colusa county line. Shortly before the crash the flight of four bombers were seen in formation over Oroville. Killed were T/Sgt. Curtis F. Duffy, 27, husband of Ruth A. Duffy, Atwater, California; T/Sgt. Bobby G. Theuret, 29, son of Mr. and Mrs. Harry D. Theuret, Box 413, Costa Mesa, California, and husband of Barbara L. Theuret, Atwater; M/Sgt. William H. Clarke, 32, husband, of Audrey W. Clark, Merced, California; M/Sgt. Wallace N. Schwart, 28, Maywood, Illinois. Those missing and presumed dead include Lt. Col. Gerald W. Fallon, 34, husband of Elaine K. Fallon, Merced; Maj. William P. McMillan, 37, husband of Greta A. McMillan, Atwater; Capt. William S. Raker, 27, husband of Lorraine G. Raker, Atwater; M/Sgt. Joe L. Bradshaw, 37, husband of Jessamine Bradshaw, Atwater; A.J. William B. Crutchfield, 27, husband of Della Ann Crutchfield, Atwater; A1C Charles W. Hesse, 21, Sauk Center, Minnesota; Capt. Edward Y. Williams, 33, Spokane, Washington; and 1st Lt. George D. Griffitts, 23, Hico, Texas.
  15 January
  Two RAF aircraft, Vickers Valetta, VX562, and an Avro Lancaster, TX270, collide over the Mediterranean Sea with 26 killed.
  31 January
  A USAF North American F-86F Sabre crashes in bad weather while on final approach to Truax Field, Wisconsin, killing the pilot Major Hampton E. Boggs a former Korean War pilot and second ranking ace with the 459th Fighter Squadron flying the Lockheed P-38 Lightning during the China-Burma-India campaign (1943–1945).
  31 January
  A Lockheed P2V-5 Neptune, BuNo 127751, c/n 426-5085, of VP-22 goes missing out
caption: Recovery of a Grumman AF pilot from USS Block Island (CVE-106).
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