[ARC5] Video discussing the loss of the Lady Be Good

[Robert Eleazer]

The ADF indicators used in WWII as well as some time thereafter had a needle that covered the dial from one side to the other.  When crossing the station it did a quick 180- deg flip.  Theoretically you could track outbound from the station as well as inbound, although that was fraught with difficulties if there were significant crosswinds involved.

If you missed the needle doing the flip and did not note the different colors at each end of the needle you kept right on tracking, thinking you were inbound but instead getting further away.  In this case the NDB station was at the airfield, so no triangulation was required.

They were flying at night and had a tailwind that apparently the navigator did not know about.  He probably thought they had a headwind given that they seemed to be taking much longer to get to the airfield.  Looking down in the moonlight, they say that the sand dunes look like waves and so they thought they were over the ocean.  Unlike the B-17, the B-24 does not ditch or belly land very well, due to the high wing.  So with the airplane going down eventually (out of fuel, I guess), they decided to bail out and took their life raft with them, to find themselves in a trackless desert rather than the ocean.  

I don't think the remains of most of the crew have ever been found.  There was drinkable water and coffee found on board as well as working radios and loaded, live .50 cal machine guns.       

Wayne