CF-CUP Douglas
DC-6B
(c/n 43843)
A poor
shot of the ill fated CF-CUP, "Empress of Mexico City" Delivered
in February 1953,
this
aircraft crashed at Cold Bay, Alaska, on 29 August 1956. It
was Canadian Pacific's Flight
307 enroute from Vancouver to Hong Kong, with a technical stop in Cold
Bay, Alaska. Upon
reaching the Alaskan
location Cold Bay weather reported to the crew was of indefinite
ceiling,
500 feet sky obscured;
visibility 1,5 miles; light drizzle, fog; temperature 47F; dewpoint
46F; wind
WNW 21 knots. At 20:35 the crew
reported over the Cold Bay range station outbound on a standard
instrument approach to Runway 14. The procedure turn inbound was
completed at 20:42. When the
aircraft broke through
the clouds it may have been too close in and high. Combined with an
excessive
groundspeed due to a
quartering tailwind, this may have caused the pilot-in-command to
decide to
go-around. Power was
applied and flaps raised fully (instead of retracting to 20
degrees). The aircraft
then struck the ground
in a descending left turn and caught fire. Cause was attributed
to the failure of
the pilot in
command to leave enough flap to provide the necessary lift at that
altitude. All 22 persons
on board perished.