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Declassified 341st SMW unit histories

USAF via The Black Vault · 88 pages · text by GLM-OCR

This Black Vault release contains the Air Force's 2001 response from the 341st Space Wing FOIA office at Malmstrom AFB, Montana, to a request about the 16 March 1967 Echo Flight missile shutdown, with excerpts from 341st Strategic Missile Wing histories covering 1967 to early 1968. The histories say all ten Echo Flight launch facilities lost strategic alert almost simultaneously. Investigators could not find a logical cause and found rumors of UFOs near Echo Flight to be unfounded.

Read from the scan by GLM-OCR; expect the odd misread word.

Capt. Bradshaw in the command post at the time of Echo Flight incident, verified that there was no activity on the 85 Primary Alerting System (PAS) at Echo Flight. (U)

During the investigation it was discovered that Boeing modification teams were at sites B-1, K-1 and G-1 on 16 March 67; but this could not have affected anything in relationship to E Flight because they arrived at the sites after the incident occurred. (U)

As mentioned before, a power problem affected E-1 at 1453 on 16 March 67 according to LCC log. The Brine Chiller (CH-1) shutdown due to power fluctuation. This was not considered unusual for power failures or fluctuations often cause CH shut downs. Between 1510 and 1600 hours, E-1 experienced another power fluctuation. The capsule crew heard the Motor Generator brushes chatter. At this time the site manager indicated that one phase had low voltage, but LCF power was not appreciably affected since capsule florescent lights were still on. The diesel generator started but could not be put on the line due to broken lead. Commercial power was restored at 1921 hours on 16 March 67. (U)

In reviewing the maintenance history of the Wing, it was discovered a similar incident occurred at Alpha Flight in

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