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Pike Co. Woman Searches for Answers after Father Killed in Plane CrashFrom the CBS 8 Troy Newsroom-- A Pike County woman is not giving up her search for answers after her father along with more than forty other servicemen and women were killed in a plane crash in 1950. To this day, the plane and crew were never found. In January of 1950, the C-54 Skymaster disappeared on its way from Alaska to Montana. The Air Force believes it crashed somewhere over the Yukon Territory, but they never found the plane or the 44 members aboard including Judy Jackson's father. Clarence Gibson was a World War II veteran, a Distinguished Flying Cross recipient, a father of three girls, and a missing person. In 1950, Gibson was aboard a plane transporting servicemen from Alaska to Montana. "He wasn't even supposed to be on the plane. He took another man's place," says Gibson's daughter Judy Jackson. Jackson says the plane sent a message from Snag, Canada. It was the last time anyone heard from the crew. "Of course, they started a search immediately," she says. Jackson says in the 72 hours that followed, the Air Force searched 55,000 acres by foot and air, and she says because of the bad weather, two search planes crashed. "It was very stormy, windy and the terrain there is just desolate," Jackson says. Since then, Jackson says no other search has been done. "That's the thing that's really bothered all of us. Not really knowing what happened to him. Whether they crashed in that plane or what happened to it, they just listed it as missing," she says. Jackson and her husband Bill are trying to re-open the case, but have been rejected by the Air Force. "I am embarrassed right now by my service with the lack of interest that they're showing here in bringing veterans back home," Bill Jackson says. Jackson says the Air Force owes it to her father, and she's not giving up hope. "I would like for his body to be brought home. My mother is 93 years old. She's an Alzheimer's patient, and she's entered the last stages, and she'll never know what really happened to him," Jackson says. The Jacksons are asking for your help in getting the Air Force to initiate another search. Right now, they say the best way to help is by sending letters to your senator and President Obama. Also aboard the plane were a pregnant woman and her 23-month-old child. To find out more about the crash and the victims lost, head to the Operation Mike Facebook Page: http://www.facebook.com/OperationMike |
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