B-1B May Have Crashed Because of Ice on Wings

Ice buildup on a plane that was not equipped with wing de-icers may have caused the crash of a B-1B bomber at an Air Force base in South Dakota last week, according to a published report today.

The Chicago Tribune quoted an unidentified Pentagon official as saying that the $280-million aircraft was neither designed for nor equipped with wing de-icers.

The four crew members ejected safely when the bomber crashed Nov. 17 while approaching for a landing during bad weather at Ellsworth Air Force Base, S.D. It was the second bomber to crash in less than two weeks and the third crash of a B-1B in the last 14 months.

The Pentagon source, who requested anonymity, said an ice alert was in effect at the time of the crash, and another bomber that landed about five minutes earlier had a buildup of about half an inch of ice on the leading edge of its wings, the Tribune reported.

The newspaper quoted an unidentified aeronautical engineer as saying that such a buildup of ice could cause a plane to crash, not from excess weight, but from a change in the shape of the airfoil and a resulting loss in lift.

Mike Mathews, a spokesman for Rockwell International, the prime contractor for the B-1B, confirmed that the bomber, unlike civilian aircraft of comparable size, is not equipped with wing de-icers.

“Our wind tunnel tests showed it did not need them for normal cold weather operations,” said Mathews, who contended that the ice buildup was not significant.

A former military pilot told the Tribune that many of the nation’s other military jets are not equipped with wing de-icers. He cited the T-38 and the A-4.

“They’re built to just boom through the low-altitude weather and get to the clear air at higher altitudes,” he said.

One function of the B-1B, however, is to fly hundreds of miles at extremely low altitudes.