My career was with Pan Am, an airline pioneering international air travel, 1943-1980, from cleaning sparkplugs to exec --

Guam, large island, a US possession in the far Pacific, was the operating base of a small Pan Am airline that serviced the Trust Territories, islands formerly Japanese. Now 1960s Pan Am's 2 aged DC-4, 4 engine aircraft & 3 SA-19 twin engine amphibians serviced the several islands, some of which had runways & some requiring water landing.

I was sent to Guam to investigate an accident to one of the DC-4s being taxied by one of our maintenance people -- that was how I heard it as I left. The scene was disastrous when I got there, looking almost like an in-flight crash, my first impression. The nose was stopped by plowing into the quonset hut maintenance office. On its way there the four engines running had chewed up a mess of work stands & on its way, right inboard propeller tore the radiator off a big generator unit & threw it into the forward baggage compartment. Quite a lot of damage to the airplane from flying debris.

Several misdeeds figured into the cause. Before daylight one of the Foremen was to taxi to the terminal for morning departure. He, alone, pulled the wheel chocks, brakes set, started the four engines & bent forward to feel behind the hydraulic pressure gauge to ascertain a reported fix of a drip leak. In service its brakes were replaced. One of the major causes was that the brakes were inoperative.

Side bar: The system hydraulic pressure was 3000 psi which had a debooster to reduce brake pressure to 600 psi. Brake-change required valves be shut off while the brake was removed but in this case had not been turned on afterward. This allowed the brakes to be 'parked' in the cockpit but free to roll at the wheel.
Engines started the airplane rolling, some build up of momentum & with distraction of the leak check, the taxi-er got a rude awakening.

The man involved had been in the Guam job only a few days but had years experience with the same aircraft type which is how he got the assignment. A contributing factor was he had been in other assignments for several years.

Without excusing him for his misdeeds & omissions, I laid the overall responsibility on the local maintenance manager, considering apparent routine disregard of procedures. I spent some time crafting a coded telex & sending the above info back to HQ. I then went on around the world inspecting three of our stations before getting back in couple weeks.

Side bar: There is a code book available in book stores with thousands of 5 letter groups, each with a phrase meaning. Anyone with the book can de-code the message but it prevents casual reading.

On my return my boss said my report was being held up, its being unpopular in some executive quarters due to my assigned 'culprit' being an old timer with long time friend associations. Would I reconsider, etc., revise or whatever; to which I said that was my finding from investigating the facts but if he wanted to re-work the report, he was the boss & I had no objection. Couple days later a similar conversation.

Several days later I was alone, late lunch in the cafeteria, boss comes in & sits across from me, saying we have to talk about this Guam report. I was fed up with the subject & told him I had said all I had to say about it. He stormed out & I figured I'd cooked my own goose.

Saved by another Guam near-disaster, next morning boss goes to Guam. One of the SA-16s on a test flight developed control problems & the pilot barely got it back on the water & had to taxi miles to get back. In service an elevator trim tab had been changed & its bolt just stuck in the hole when the worker went off shift. Left unfinished it worked OK till it it came out in flight. I never heard any more about my Guam report but boss did a thorough house cleaning there.

Couple years later boss was dealing with a major event in Karachi, having meetings in his office with the their VP boss , Chief Flight Engineer, the perp & others. At a lull point he called me in alone & asked me to be judge & jury while he told me the facts. I listened & gave him my recco based on facts presented & then I asked "why Me?." He said 'because I knew you would give me your opinion rather than say what I wanted to hear'---->

Sounds like interesting times. Glad to hear that doing the right thing turned out well for you.
Thanks for sharing.

Good for you, you are the type of person I would want taking care of my things (not even to talk about aircraft I would be flying on!).

I would hope that I would do the same, in those circumstances.

Thank you for sharing a very interesting part of your career!

As you well know honesty is the best policy. I spent 15 months on Guam in 1986-87 and my dad sailed off of Agana for a few days in July 1944.

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Mike
S&WCA #3065

Mike, beautiful photos, I almost, but didn't, copied the sunset photo to my computer. :-)

OP: Great story. I have a saying that helps me along through life: "If you always tell the truth, you don't have to remember what you said."

Have a blessed day.

The truth is usually funnier than anything I could make up anyway.

Guam is a large island? It must have shrunk between the time you were there, and the time I spent there in the 70's.

I thought Hank Johnson said it was going to tip over?

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Music/Sports/Beer fan

I spent all of 1967 on Guam as a Radioman 3rd class. I worked
at Barrigada at a transmitter farm tuning 10KW & 40KW
transmitters. Mind you, I was born and raised in Hawaii, so
being on an island was a big whoop. It was hot and humid.

In November of 1967 president Johnson started to build up
the troops in Vietnam, and they put out a call for Vietnam
volunteers. Everyone I was stationed with volunteered just
to get off the island. True story. I got orders to the USS
Arlington AGMR-2, a communications relay ship. I flew out
of Guam on Christmas day to the Philippines on Braniff
airlines. The flight attendants were wearing short shorts. Wow!
I ended up in Subic Bay for 4 weeks. That's where the Navy
adventure started.

I' ve been on Guam, briefly, while flying to and from Palau back in the late 80's.

(When I told my dad that I was taking a vacation on Palau, previously known as Peleliu where he had fought as a Marine in WWII, shocked, he asked, "Why in the hell would you want to do that?!")

You started in 43? When were you born?

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Thirty characters. Exactly...

When you left Anderson AFB via the back gate their was a place long the road you could see the Pacific out of one side of the car and the Philippine Sea out of the other side.

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Mike
S&WCA #3065

Ardmore, OK in 1924 & after about 40 years out in the world, I live at the address where I was born ----->

Good for you rhmc24. After 42 years in the Air Force I made it back to within 200 miles of where I was born.

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Mike
S&WCA #3065

Was trying to come up with a Guam story that sort of fits the thread.
Was with a Buddy driving N of Agana following a flatbed loaded with bombs.
We get pulled over by a Guam Policeman because of license plate expiration.
My Buddy has a long sad complicated reason, so the Cop just gave him a speeding ticket instead.
So we go to court.
I'm the defense witness.
The judge asks me who are thee?
I tell him, he throws me out of the courtroom.
I'm standing outside and he then throws the Cop out too.
We make small talk, mostly about his issued rusty probably Mil Surplus 1911.
The Cop is called back in, then my Buddy and the policeman both come out.
The Cop shakes hands and wishes us well.
Turns out the Judge drops the ticket and chews out the Cop.
Oh my!
I was TDY to that rock, but the guy who got the ticket had just arrived permanent party , WC-130 Weather Bird Pilot.

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NRA LIFE MEMBER

Guam,,,,what was the name of that negro politician who was worried that Guam would tip over or float away?
A wonderful tv broadcast about it!

I never knew what a flat frog was until I was stationed on Guam.

Never had a snake enter my home thru the toilet until I went to Guam.

Wonderful food in the local villages and very friendly folks.

The best Eggs Benedict I've ever had were at Achang Bay Marina.

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Mike
S&WCA #3065

Post #8...

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Music/Sports/Beer fan

Your PanAm story is way better than mine. I bought the same 500 shares for $4 and sold them for $9, a dozen round trips starting in the early '70's. Went big in the '80's until Lockerbie. I still have the certificates for 2000 shares, although I bought 1000 of those for 25 cents a share. I remember a stockholders' meeting in Miami in 1980, treated us like royalty in a 5 star hotel. A great company that met an ignominious demise.

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Wisdom chases me; I'm faster