uscg pby-5a catalina - bluie west one greenland

On November 9 a B-17 PN9E flew into a visual “white-out” during a search and rescue operation over the Greenland icecap. During the whiteout, the left wings struck the ice. The plane went down and broke into two pieces. The crew survived, although some were badly injured. In the following months numerous attempts were made to rescue the men by ground parties, but they all failed. A Norwegian native, Lt. Col. Bernt Balchen, who was in charge of the search and rescue operations of the USCG, finally proposed the Navy to have a PBY belly-land on the ice cap and evacuate the airmen. It was a bold idea, and one not without considerable risk, for nobody really knew whether the PBY’s hull could withstand this type of battering. From February-April 1943, Bernt Balchen and Pilot Lieutenant Bernard W. Dunlop belly-landed a PBY-5A three times on the Greenland ice cap to rescue the downed crew of the B-17. Both were later awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for this heroic act under very difficult circumstances.