Muscogee County GaArchives Photo Place.....Tornado Hits Lawson 1954  (Ft.Benning) 
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Christine Thacker http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00033.html#0008100 April 28, 2007, 7:56 pm

Source:             Special Sesquicentennial Supplement IV Ledger-Enquirer
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http://www.usgwarchives.net/ga/muscogee/photos/tornadoh12682gph.jpg
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                 Tornado Hit Lawson in 1954
  
  Shown is wreckage from CI19Gs following the tornado devastation of 1954. 
  This picture is from the personal file of Congressman Jack Brinkley who was 
then an air force pilot stationed at Lawson Field at Fort Benning. The Cl19G 
was commonly referred to as the Flying Boxcar and replaced the C46s which had 
been stationed at Lawson Field. They were used primarily for parachute drops 
and for cargo.
  The 776th Troop Carrier Squadron to which Congressman Brinkley was then 
attached was assigned on a temporary duty basis later that year to the North 
Atlantic Treaty Organizations at Frankfurt, Germany. The squadron ferried its 
own airplanes to Rhein-Main via the northern route from Dover Air Force Base to 
Newfoundland to BW-l at Greenland; to Keflavik, Iceland, Scotland then direct 
to Germany.
  Between Iceland and Greenland, the airplane piloted by Captain Knold and Lt. 
Brinkley sustained an explosion in the right engine. The cowling was blown away 
with severe shrapnel damage along the side and in the vertical and horizontal 
stabilizers. Limping along over the North Atlantic Ocean all cargo was 
jettisoned.
  With one engine feathered and the other at top speed for 2 1/2 hours, the 
plane was piloted safely back to Greenland down a fjord and to a safe landing. 
The conditions were IFR, the weather below freezing, but the joy at overcoming 
the adversity was a matter of esprit for the entire squadron many of whom had 
heard the Mayday. 
  The plane's number was AF 5912 with the lead plane carrying Lt. Col. Maynard 
Ashworth, to-be and former publisher of The Columbus Ledger-Enquirer.

Special Sesquicentennial Supplement II
Ledger- Enquirer, Sunday, May 7, 1978. S-16.
    

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