Humphreys B-24 Bomber Crash Site, AZ

In the early morning hours of September 15th, 1944, a U.S. Army Air Force B-24 Bomber on a night training mission crashed into the San Francisco Peaks, killing all eight crewmen. This memorial is dedicated to those young American Airmen.


The Bomber still sits on the slopes of Humphreys Peak. From the Humphreys Trail Parking lot, if you look up the mountain, you will see a rock flow, and just above that, there is a small rocky clearing in the trees at about 11,000 feet. This is where they crashed, right in this clearing. From the Parking lot, you can look up there and see the sun glimmering off of the pieces of the plane.Many have sought out this wreckage and have failed to find it. Looking for it is almost like finding a pin in a haystack, but it's not impossible to find. Here is a description to find it, but you must keep your eyes open, as, with directions, it's still hard to find. To find it, take the Humphreys trail about seven switchbacks up. Once you get to the rock field, cross over it and take it till it ends. From here, it's not really clear how to find it. You want to keep heading up the mountain while heading north. If you go too far north, not north enough, or angle too steep, you will miss it. Keep your eyes open for the propellers of the plane. Once you find pieces of it, head straight up, and you will enter a clearing in the trees, and there it is. This site is breathtaking, seeing how the plane tumbled up the mountain. It created gashes in the mountain, changing the landscape of the mountainside.

2003-06-30 MtnGeek