21 June 1971 – F-4E

F-4E with serial CR 68-0433 got back from a weekend trip when it crashed on Monday 21 June 1971 near the city of Maurik.

On Friday 18 June 1971, Pilot Captain Ted G. Sweeting and WSO Captain David B. Rice left Soesterberg AB at 14.50 Zulu and headed for Ramstein AB, Germany. Prior to landing at Ramstein, the crew had a ‘Boundary Layer Control Misfunction’ and declared an emergency, but they landed safely at 16.00 Z at Ramstein AB. The maintenance team at Ramstein couldn’t duplicate the problem, so just normal maintenance was being performed while the crew had an overnight stay at Ramstein.
On Saturday 19 June 1971, the aircraft left Ramstein AB at 12.00 Z and headed for RAF Mildenhall, U.K. It arrived at 13.36 Z at Mildenhall, where normal servicing of the aircraft was performed including folding the drag chute and refuelling the aircraft. At 15.00 Z, the aircraft left RAF Mildenhall for a flight to Denmark. It arrived at Aalborg AB at 16.43 Z. The aircraft was only refueled since the drag chute was not used during the landing. The crew left the aircraft and returned no earlier than on Monday morning.
At 9.30 Z the aircraft, with callsign “Shakey 21”, left Aalborg for a 50 minute flight back to Soesterberg. Around 10.15 Z, the aircraft was approaching Soesterberg and Captain Sweeting stated that he wanted to burn some fuel before landing the aircraft. At 10.40Z, the F-4 made a low-approach at Soesterberg AB. Its route afterwards can only be estimated because Captain Sweeting was not working with GCA. Shortly thereafter the Phantom was seen over the city of Tiel, flying North towards the city of Eck en Wiel. A few minutes later the aircraft crashed close to the town of Maurik. Both crewmembers were instantly killed. The Phantom crashed only 100 meters from a farm house, but on the ground nobody was hurt.