This is a list of accidents and incidents involving military aircraft grouped by the year in which the accident or incident occurred. Not all of the aircraft were in operation at the time. Combat losses are not included except for a very few cases denoted by singular circumstances.
Aircraft terminology Information on aircraft gives the type, and if available, the serial number of the operator in italics, the constructors number, also known as the manufacturer's serial number (c/n), exterior codes in apostrophes, nicknames (if any) in quotation marks, flight callsign in italics, and operating units.
1950 1950 First of only two prototypes of the Fairchild XNQ-1 Navy trainer contender, BuNo 75725, written off in a crash.
5 January A Boeing B-50A Superfortress, 46-021, c/n 15741 of the 3200th Proof Test Group out of Eglin AFB, crash lands in the Choctawhatchee Bay, northwest Florida, killing two of the 11 crew. Nine escape from the downed aircraft following the forced landing. The airframe settles in eight to ten feet of mud at a depth of . Divers recover the body of flight engineer M/Sgt. Claude Dorman, 27, of Kingston, New Hampshire, from the nose of the bomber on Monday, 8 January. The body of S/Sgt. William Thomas Bell, 21, aerial photographer, who lived in Mayo, Florida, is recovered on Tuesday, 9 January, outside the plane from beneath the tail. The Eglin base public information officer identified the surviving crew as 1st Lt. Park R. Bidwell, instructor pilot; 1st Lt. Vere Short, pilot; 1st Lt. James S. Wigg, co-pilot; Maj. William C. McLaughlin, bombardier; and S/Sgt. Clifford J. Gallipo, M/Sgt. Alton Howard, M/Sgt. William J. Almand, T/Sgt. Samuel G. Broke, and Cpl. William F. Fitzpatrick, crewmen.
13 January A Waco G-15A assault glider, 45-5548, of the 44085th (?) ABS, 14th Air Force, piloted by 2d Lt. Robert D. Henley, of Columbia, Missouri, crash lands on Friday the 13th at Lawson Air Force Base, Georgia, on the Fort Benning reservation, resulting in fatalities to all 13 on board. Two G-15As had been released by a Fairchild C-82 towplane and were sloping in for what appeared to be a normal landing when one tipped sideways and smashed into the ground with a "tremendous roar" that spread wreckage over of the runway. An enlisted man who witnessed the accident, stated that "bodies spilled out in every direction." Two Air Force officers and eleven paratroop students of Company A, Airborne Battalion, died in the accident. The paratroopers were scheduled to "graduate" on 14 January. "First reports said a sudden, strong wind current caused a wing to rip into the ground. But officers later said they did not know the cause." An observer in the control tower said that it happened so quickly that when he took his eyes from the apparently normal glider for a split-second he missed the crash. "Two gliders were coming in for a normal landing approach," said Cpl. James P. Harr of Detroit. "Everything appeared normal, so I turned to look at the C-82 that had released them. Then I turned back to look at the gliders and saw a pile of debris out there. What I thought was debris turned out to be bodies." The other glider landed safely. The Air Force identified twelve of the victims as: 2d Lt. Robert D. Henley, pilot; Sgt. 1/c Eugene S. Jones, 25, instructor, Clay, West Virginia; Sgt. Frank C. Rathberger, 23, Portland, Oregon; Pvt. Alfonso Romero, 18, Berkeley, California; Pvt. Alvin F. Runnell, 19, Creekside, Pennsylvania; Pvt. Gordon A. Smith, 23, Columbus, Georgia; Pvt. Robert Snell Jr., 18, Nashville, Tennessee; Pvt. James H. Stacey, 23, St. Helen's, Lee County, Kentucky; Pvt. Rodney R. Toeppel, 18, Wisconsin Rapids, Wisconsin; Pvt. Norman H. Vlands, 18, Holly Oak, Delaware; Pvt. Townsend E. Tomlinson, 19, Dover, Delaware; and Pvt. Richard L. Wedeikis, 18, of Kenosha, Wisconsin. The name of the second pilot was withheld. Air Force officials at Smyrna Air Force Base, near Nashville, Tennessee, which has jurisdiction over training flights at Fort Benning, began a full investigation into the cause of the accident. These were the first glider fatalities at Fort Benning since 1946.
26 January
A Douglas C-54D Skymaster, 42-72469, of the Second Strategic Support Squadron, 97th Bomb Wing, Strategic Air Command, out of Biggs AFB, Texas, departs Elmendorf Air Force Base, Alaska, for Great Falls Air Force Base, Montana, with a crew of 8 and 36 passengers (34 service personnel and 2 civilians). Two hours into a planned eight-and-a-half-hour flight, at 1709 hrs., it makes its last contact by radio and has been missing since. Despite a massive air and ground search at the time and repeated searches since 1950, as of 19 June 2011 no trace of the aircraft or its occupants has been found, nor has the cause of the aircraft's disappearance been determined.
11 February Twin-engine Beechcraft D-18 cargo air service aircraft flying from Dayton, Ohio, to Albuquerque, New Mexico, crashed four miles (6 km) west of West Mesa Airport with a pilot and two AEC security guards aboard. Plane was making an approach to a landing strip when it encountered a cloud and broke off the approach. While circling around the mesa atop which the airstrip was located, it hit a steep slope in an upright position. Completely demolished by the ensuing impact and fire, killing all three men aboard, the classified cargo of 792 HE detonator units in 22 boxes was destroyed – salvaged from the wreckage. As there was no evidence of sabotage, and since none of the detonators appeared to be missing, the incident was not reported to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.Hansen, Chuck, "The Swords of Armageddon, Version 2: Volume VII-The Development of U.S. Nuclear Weapons", Letter dated 13 April 1950 to William T. Borden, Executive Secretary, JCAE, from Capt. James S. Russell, USN, Acting Director of Military Application, USAEC; "The Atomic Airline", unpublished memoir by Clark Carr, pp. 177–187.
13 February
A U.S. Air Force Convair B-36B Peacemaker, 44-92075, of the 436th Bomb Squadron, 7th Bomb Wing, in transit from Eielson AFB, Alaska to Carswell AFB, Texas, loses three of six engines, suffers icing. To lighten aircraft, crew jettisons Mark 4 nuclear bomb casing over the Pacific Ocean from . High explosives detonate on contact, large shockwave seen, 17 crew later bail out safely over Princess Royal Island, but five (the first to depart the bomber) are not recovered and are assumed to have come down in water and drowned. Aircraft flies with no crew, impacting in the Skeena Mountains at , east of Stewart, British Columbia. Wreckage found in September 1953.
15 February de Havilland DH 108, VW120, flown by RAE's OC, Squadron Leader J. Stewart R. Muller-Rowland, enters steep dive from , breaking up around with fatal result. The main wreckage comes down at Little Brickhill, near Bletchley. The pilot's body was found near Sandy Lane near Woburn Sands also near Bletchley.
22 February On its 102nd flight, the USAF Northrop XF-89 Scorpion, 46–678, crashed on Rosecrans Avenue, the boundary line of the cities of El Segundo and Manhattan Beach, after making a high-speed low pass for Air Force officials at Hawthorne Airport (Northrop Field). Right horizontal stabilizer peeled off, aircraft disintegrated, throwing pilot Charles Tucker clear, parachuted safely, but flight engineer Arthur Turton died in mishap. Aircraft impacted five miles (8 km) from factory, setting alight a Standard Oil below-ground storage tank. Cause was found to be high-frequency, low-amplitude aeroelastic flutter of both the vertical and horizontal stabilizers.
7 March During a practice dive-bombing attack, Hawker Sea Fury FB.11, VX651, coded '132', of 736 Naval Air Squadron, loses part of lower engine cowling which strikes wing. Pilot returns to but misjudges landing, missing all arrestor wires, hits crash barrier, tearing engine loose, airframe overturns, burns. Pilot okay, but Sea Fury written off.
15 March Avro Lincoln B Mk.2, RF511, of No.230 Operational Conversion Unit, crashes on Carnedd Llewelyn near Bethesda, Wales.
15 March First Northrop YB-49, 42-102367, is wrecked this date during a high-speed taxi accident at Edwards Air Force Base, California. Outfitted with additional flight performance measuring instruments after the loss of the second YB-49 on 5 June 1948, the first YB-49 (converted from the second YB-35), being operated by an Air Force crew, piloted by Major Russell E. Schleeh, (1919–2012) engaged in testing the stabilizer response during a high-speed taxi run, experiences a violent nose wheel shimmy. Before the aircraft can be brought under control, the nose gear collapses and the airframe breaks in two, destroying it. Pilot suffers a broken back, and the flight engineer a broken wrist. Reclamation authorized by Northrop, for Air Materiel Command, 28 June 1950.
15 March North American F-51D Mustang, 44-74896, flown by Lt. Edwin F. Gutt, strikes a building after landing at Las Vegas Air Force Base, Nevada, heavily damaging the airframe.
16 March Two F-84s being ferried to Greater Pittsburgh Airport in Pennsylvania were cruising at when they ran out of fuel simultaneously. They were forced down in the rugged hills of Greene County, Pennsylvania, near the town of Spragg. Each pilot crash landed on a different narrow, twisting two-lane highway, narrowly missing automobile traffic and several houses as they came in. Both aircraft were destroyed, but each pilot walked away from his aircraft with minor injuries.
17 March First Mikoyan-Gurevich I-330 SI, prototype for the Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-17, crashes this date. First flown 14 January 1950, piloted by Ivan Ivashchenko, he is killed when the aircraft develops flutter which tears off his horizontal tail, causing a spin and crash. Lack of wing stiffness also resulted in aileron reversal, which was discovered and fixed.
22 March Fuerza Aérea Argentina Avro Lincoln B.Mk. II, B-019, lost in storm over Tierra del Fuego, eleven killed. Wreckage finally found on a glacier on the Chilean side of Tierra del Fuego in 1983.
22 March Two North American F-86A Sabre fighter jets attached to the 93d Fighter-Interceptor Squadron, 81st Fighter-Interceptor Group, at Kirtland AFB, New Mexico, crash in Emmons, West Virginia, just outside Charleston. They had landed in Charleston the previous day due to low fuel on a cross-country flight. After fuel was delivered from Wright-Patterson AFB, Dayton, Ohio, the pilots, Lt. Col. A. F. Reinhardt, 43, and Capt. George Evans, 28, took off this date in morning marginal weather with low clouds and rain. A few minutes later, both aircraft nose-dived into the side yard of local landowner. Both pilots KWF. F-86A 48–306, and F-86A 49-1019, took off in parallel from Kanawha Airport and had an apparent mid-air collision.
26 March RAF Short S.25 Sunderland GR.5, SZ513, sank at RAF Seletar after a bomb explosion while being prepared for a sortie, two killed.
5 April Martin JRM-3 Mars flying boat, BuNo 76822 named "Marshall Mars", destroyed by fire near Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands – force landed in Keehi Lagoon, Oahu, with engine fire. Crew were rescued after which aircraft exploded. Although an order for 20 was placed by the Navy, with the end of the war, this was reduced to the five already in production.
7 April Sole prototype, Nord NC 1080 single-engine naval fighter, F-WFKZ, first flown 29 July 1949, is completely destroyed in a flight accident. Pilot Pierre Gallay dies in the accident. Cause is never determined, and the project is abandoned.
11 April