Two airplane crashes in 1970 devastated two college football teams

On Saturday, Nov. 14, 1970, a plane carrying members of the Marshall University Thundering Herd football team and coaching staff crashed in West Virginia killing all 75 people on board and plunging the university and community into grief.

The chartered Southern Airways DC-9 was returning from a game the team played earlier in the day against East Carolina University in North Carolina. Marshall lost, 17-14.

The plane crashed while trying to land at Tri-State Airport in Kenova, W.Va.

According to history.com, on the plane were 37 football players, head coach Rick Tolley, team doctors, the university athletic director and 25 football boosters from the Huntington, W.Va. community.

Many of us are familiar with the Marshall University story from the 2006 movie “We Are Marshall.”

Fewer people are familiar with another football tragedy that happened the month before – the crash of an airplane carrying Wichita State University football players.

On Oct. 2, 1970, two airplanes, dubbed “Gold” and Black” for the colors of Wichita State University, were carrying players, boosters, coaches and others to Utah for a football game against Utah State.

The university had a contract with Golden Eagle Aviation to provide a Douglas DC-6B to transport the team to away games. However, the aviation company did not own a DC-6 so it made arrangements to use one. But, the DC-6 was damaged so the aviation company opted to use two Martin 4-0-4 aircraft.

The “Gold” aircraft carried the starting players, head coach and athletic director. The “Black” airplane carried the reserve players and assistant coaches.

The two planes traveled to Denver, Colo., to refuel.

The “Gold” plane was taking a more scenic route, but the pilot encountered difficulty and was unable to pull the overweight aircraft out of a canyon. The plane crashed on Mount Trelease, west of Denver in the Arapaho National Forest.

Of the 40 people on board, 29 died at the scene and two died later. Of the 31 people killed, 14 were Wichita State football players. Another 14 were university staff members and football boosters.

The National Transportation Safety Board issued this executive summary,

“The Board determines that the probable cause of this accident was the intentional operation of the aircraft over a mountain valley route at an altitude from which the aircraft could neither climb over the obstructing terrain ahead, nor execute a successful course reversal. Significant factors were the overloaded condition of the aircraft, the virtual absence of flight planning for the chosen route of flight from Denver to Logan, a lack of understanding on the part of the crew of the performance capabilities and limitations of the aircraft, and the lack of operational management to monitor and appropriately control the actions of the flight crew.”

Pennsylvania had a connection to the Marshall tragedy – No. 84 defensive end Pete Naputano was a junior from Altoona who was on the injured list and not on the plane.

Last year, the Tampa Bay Times, published a story about another player, David Withers, who also was not on the plane because of an injury.

Withers, according to the story, “hooked up with junior defensive end Pete Naputano, who also stayed behind while nursing a biceps injury. Instead of hanging around campus, the two traveled to Naputano's hometown of Altoona, Pa., with Withers making a detour to visit his maternal grandparents who lived in nearby Johnstown.”

Naputano was one of four players who led the team onto the field in the spring of 1971 – the others were Felix Jordan, Ed Carter and Nate Ruffin.

The 2006 movie, “We Are Marshall,” depicted the aftermath of the crash. Matthew McConaughey stars as new head football coach Jack Lengyel who was brought in to rebuild the team.

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