{"id":739625,"date":"2026-06-16T03:13:15","date_gmt":"2026-06-16T03:13:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/739625\/"},"modified":"2026-06-16T03:13:15","modified_gmt":"2026-06-16T03:13:15","slug":"eight-people-aboard-u-s-air-force-b-52-bomber-killed-in-crash-near-california-base-military-officials-say","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/739625\/","title":{"rendered":"Eight people aboard U.S. Air Force B-52 bomber killed in crash near California base, military officials say"},"content":{"rendered":"

Officials say a B-52 bomber crashed shortly after takeoff at a U.S. Air Force base in Southern California’s Mojave Desert. Aerial footage over the scene showed emergency crews responding at Edwards Air Force Base after the aircraft went down.<\/p>\n

The Associated Press<\/p>\n

A B-52 bomber crashed shortly after takeoff at a U.S. Air Force base in Southern California\u2019s Mojave Desert and burst into flames Monday, killing all eight people aboard, military officials said.<\/p>\n

Aerial footage showed virtually nothing left of the aircraft that went down around 11:20 a.m. PT during a routine test mission at Edwards Air Force Base, which is north of Los Angeles. Black smoke rose from a large swath of charred desert near the runway on the base, with emergency vehicles nearby.<\/p>\n

Those on board included government contractors and uniformed military.<\/p>\n

After reviewing footage of the crash, it was determined that no one could have survived, Colonel James Hayes, the deputy commander for the 412 test wing at Edwards, said at a news conference.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe lost eight great Americans,\u201d Col. Hayes said, adding that officials were working to notify their families.<\/p>\n

It was not immediately clear what caused the crash, and it could take up to six months to complete an investigation, Col. Hayes said, but shared that the B-52 was supporting the \u201cradar modernization program.\u201d<\/p>\n

Details emerge about U.S. military\u2019s rescue of aviator shot down in Iran<\/a><\/p>\n

The Boeing B-52 Stratofortress is a long-range bomber that entered service in 1955. Designed to carry both conventional and nuclear weapons, it has been used in conflicts involving the U.S. military from Vietnam to Iran.<\/p>\n

In 2025, Boeing sent a B-52 to Edwards with a new, modernized radar system. A test team planned to conduct ground and flight test activities on the aircraft throughout 2026 to feed a production decision, the air force said in a 2025 news release. The modern Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA) radar system replaced the aircraft\u2019s antiquated radar for efficacy. It was unclear if that was the same aircraft involved in Monday\u2019s crash.<\/p>\n

Edwards Air Force Base is home to a large portion of the U.S. Air Force\u2019s aircraft test and development efforts and is about 161 kilometres north of Los Angeles. The 412th Test Wing, which runs the base, also conducts developmental testing of all Air Force aircraft, weapons systems, software and components before purchase by the service as well as throughout their lifespan.<\/p>\n

The vast desert base is also where Air Force test pilot Chuck Yeager reached a speed of Mach 1.05 and broke the sound barrier in 1947.<\/p>\n

The airfield was closed most of Monday and all inbound aircraft were being diverted, but it reopened to people coming onto the base by late afternoon. Non-commercial visitor passes for the base were suspended as emergency crews doused the flames.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s too soon to say what might have happened.<\/p>\n

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

A Boeing B-52 Stratofortress is shown in flight over Texas in May.Stacy Revere\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

The way the B-52 crashed so quickly after takeoff without getting very high or going far makes aviation safety expert Jeff Guzzetti suspect some kind of flight control malfunction. But it\u2019s too soon to say what might have caused the control problem.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s possible the controls were rigged wrong after maintenance, he said, or a catastrophic engine problem or a failure of a piece of equipment that was being tested.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it was definitely a controllability issue. Now, whether that was tied to an engine failure, a flight control failure, or some new testing device failure, I\u2019m not sure,\u201d said Mr. Guzzetti, who used to investigate crashes for both the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board.<\/p>\n

Although the Air Force has been flying B-52 bombers for more than 70 years, testing out new equipment on a plane can create new challenges.<\/p>\n

\u201cA flight test is always riskier than normal operations, so that\u2019s why you have specially trained test pilots, and you should have other safety protocols,\u201d Mr. Guzzetti said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Officials say a B-52 bomber crashed shortly after takeoff at a U.S. Air Force base in Southern California’s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":739626,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[901,888,902,879,877,903,48,876,895,896,891,878,875,46,549,295,894,887,914,880,881,893,43,889,890,884,904,885,909,910,44,912,907,911,905,908,882,898,899,714,897,906,865,61,41,39,42,40,900,892,886,883,913],"class_list":["post-739625","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-alberta","tag-arts-news","tag-bc","tag-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news-video","tag-british-columbia","tag-canada","tag-canada-news","tag-canada-sports","tag-canada-sports-news","tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","tag-canadian-breaking-news","tag-canadian-news","tag-economy","tag-education","tag-environment","tag-federal-government","tag-foreign-news","tag-globe-and-mail","tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","tag-government","tag-headlines","tag-life-news","tag-lifestyle","tag-local-news","tag-manitoba","tag-national-news","tag-new-brunswick","tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","tag-news","tag-northwest-territories","tag-nova-scotia","tag-nunavut","tag-ontario","tag-pei","tag-photos","tag-political-news","tag-political-opinion","tag-politics","tag-politics-news","tag-quebec","tag-sports-news","tag-technology","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-travel","tag-trudeau","tag-us-news","tag-world-news","tag-yukon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/739625","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=739625"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/739625\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/739626"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=739625"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=739625"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=739625"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}