Just outside the small town of Walker, in California, USA, a tourist catches a glimpse
of a C-130 belonging to the US Forest Service, fighting wildfires.
The man takes out his camera to record the plane as it flies by - incredibly, he captures
this - footage of the plane's wings inexplicably detaching from the plane, mid-flight.
It's summertime 2002 - wildfires are raging across Northern California.
As part of the effort to combat the fires, the United States Forest Service flies planes
modified for firefighting over affected areas to drop fire retardant.
One of these planes, was call sign Tanker 130 - a Lockheed C-130A Hercules, crewed by
pilot Steve Wass, co-pilot Craig Labare and flight engineer Michael Davis.
On the 17 June, Tanker 130 was making its sixth drop of the day, carrying 3,000 gallons
of fire retardant to the edge of Walker, California.
At 2:45pm, it made an initial spotting pass of the area, before looping back to drop half
of the load of fire retardant.
At the end of the drop, a passerby films the plane.
He is only filming for a second, when the plane comes apart right before his eyes.
The two wings fold up and tear off Tanker 130, sending the fuselage rolling into an
inverted position, where it crashed and killed all three on board.
What seems like a straightforward story takes a turn when we ask - what happened to this
plane?
How could the wings just fall off like that?
The National Transportation Safety Board launched an investigation, and discovered that the
three crewmen were the victims of circumstance, in a much larger, stranger story.
Tanker 130 was originally a US Air Force craft.
In fact, it was one of the original 1957 production models of the Lockheed C-130A Hercules.
By the time of its crash in 2002, it was 45-years-old, and one of the very few original production
models still considered airworthy.
It saw service in Europe, Southeast Asia and the Americas.
As the US Air Force keeps detailed records on the flight and maintainance history of
all its aircraft, this was a good place to start in determining if the plane had any
previous issues, or just to shed some light on any work that had been done to it over
the years that may provide a hint as to what went wrong.
What investigators found in this archive, was a very unusual and puzzling detail.
There was a significant gap in the plane's records.
For four years, starting in the late 1960's, there was nothing logged.
But the plane hadn't been forgotten about for four years, no, it was released by the
US Air Force to a commercial company, as part of a program that supposedly partnered with
industry.
The company that received the plane, was the cargo airline Southern Air Transport.
The company was based in Miami, Florida, and is best known for being a front company for
the CIA, which came to light during the Iran-Contra scandal of the 80's, when a Southern Air Transport
aricraft delivering weapons to rebels was shot down over Nicaragua.
What exactly Tanker 130 was used for during its time in Southern Air Transport is unknown.
For that four year period, there are no documents detailing its use or maintainance.
We don't know if there were any issues or incidents with the plane during this timeframe.
The plane did return to the Air Force, and the maintainance and record-keeping resumed.
However, this was at a time when units were understaffed and underfunded, so the C-130A
did not receive much attention, especially when newer models like the C-130E were arriving
on the scene.
In the late 70's, Lockheed recommended the replacement of the C-130's center wing box,
that is the primary load-carrying structure of the wings.
The Air Force followed this advice, and replaced the center wing box on the newer models, but
not the aging C-130A's.
By 1988 most of the A-models were in the boneyard.
Tanker 130 was instead sold as surplus.
It was modified for fire fighting and operated under contract to the US Forest Service, which
is where it received its call sign, Tanker 130.
It performed in this role for years without issue, until the fatal crash in 2002.
The National Transportation Safety Board found that the center wing box had failed, leading
to the wings detatching from the fuselage.
It was deemed a result of structural fatigue from decades of use.
The crew were found to be entirely blameless, paying with their lives for the carelessness
of others.
They were merely unfortunate participants in the final chapter of Tanker 130's long
history, probably oblivious to the fact there was an obfuscated part of it, in which no
one knows how the plane was used, or perhaps misused.
Had the CIA put the plane through inordinate stress?
Overloaded it?
Pushed it past its limits?
It's impossible to say.
All we can see for ourselves is the footage.
The horrific crash occurring so spontaneously that the crew probably didn't have the time
to fully grasp what was happening.
The sudden jolt, the loss of control, the violent upside-down roll - the shock of what
was happening perhaps didn't have sufficient time to subside before the crash, and the
realisation never had the chance to sink in.
A random passer-by, from his vantage point, had a much better understanding of what was
happening to these men than they did, but was powerless to help or intervene in any
way.
The most he could do, was capture their terrifying last moments.