Flight 19 - The Lost Squadron T-Shirt

"Flight 19 - The Lost Squadron" From an original oil painting by Bob Jenny for the NAS Fort Lauderdale Museum. The Mystery of FLIGHT 19: Fort Lauderdale, Florida. December 5, 1945. A warm day with billowing clouds soaring overhead in the current of a gusting southwest trade wind. The temperature was 67 degrees. The general weather conditions were considered average for training flights of this nature except within showers. It was supposed to be a routine navigation exercise and mock bombing run of a concrete shipwreck just south of Bimini. Five TBM Avenger torpedo bombers carrying 14 men, were to fly to the Hens and Chickens shoals in the Bahamas to practice and then return to the Fort Lauderdale Naval Air Station. But 90 minutes after takeoff, squadron commander Lt. Charles C. Taylor reported that he was lost. The weather and sea conditions got worse as the evening wore on. Over the next three hours, he mistakenly led Flight 19 far out to sea, where the planes apparently ran out of fuel and crashed. That was on December 5, 1945, several months after the end of World War II. A search was launched for 5 lost planes, with units of the Navy, Army and Coast Guard, to scour the sea for the lost NAS Aircraft. Flight 19 remains one of the great aviation mysteries. To read more about it visit the NAS Fort Lauderdale Museum website: www.nasflmuseum.com