Oxnard (in California) is not a household name, but it is a spot I visited as a kid growing up in the San Fernando Valley. It was a quiet place where you could escape to the beach surrounded by agriculture and military, and it felt like a world away. So, we did an extended-family trip this August and that’s when I learned that there’s been a somber addition to the area in the last few decades, a memorial for the victims of Alaska flight 261. I thought it was very well done, so I thought I’d share it here.
Alaska 261 was the infamous jackscrew incident. That was the flight from Puerto Vallarta to San Francisco and on to Seattle on January 31, 2000 that ran into control problems when passing by Los Angeles. After an initial dive that the pilots were able to arrest around 24,000 feet, they did everything in their power to get the airplane over to LAX, but there was nothing they could do to save the airplane. A few minutes later, the entire jackscrew assembly failed due to maintenance problems. The MD-83 went into a steep dive and roll and eventually went inverted. They had nearly stopped the dive once they were upside down, but they couldn’t get it safely on the ground.
The pilots, Captain Ted Thompson and First Officer Bill Tansky, fought a remarkable fight. I can’t imagine there was anything else they could have done in this impossible situation. In the end, they lost the battle and the airplane plunged into the Pacific Ocean between Anacapa Island and Port Hueneme on the mainland (right next to Oxnard), killing all 88 onboard.
In the end, this was found to be a massive maintenance program failure, and Alaska had to make serious reforms, but you can get all the details of that in the NTSB accident report. I want to keep my focus on this memorial.
The families ended up commissioning something to be built in Port Hueneme, the closest point on the mainland to where the accident occurred. The idea was to create a giant sundial on the beach, and we visited on an appropriately gray and gloomy day.
At the entrance to the memorial is a plaque explaining why it’s here. If you come in from the beach as we did, you might be very confused about what you’re seeing.
The half wall surrounding the beach side of the memorial has a small plaque recognizing the artist.
Around the base of the sundial, you’ll find a plaque for each of the 88 people who died. Here is the crew:
The plaques must have been individually handled, because they aren’t all alike. Most have the victim’s hometown, but some give an age while others give a birthdate. And even the birthdates aren’t always in the same format. For some reason, that non-conformity gave a more personal feel to it.
Probably the most touching feature of this sundial, however, is this little heart-shaped plaque noting the date and time when the aircraft hit the water. Every January 31 at 4:22pm, the sundial casts a shadow over this marker.
I haven’t seen many accident memorials — though Tell City was an adventure — but this one struck me as one of the more thoughtful designs. If you’re ever driving through the area, it’s worth a diversion off the 101 to go and visit.
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