New Details Uncovered in 1972 Disappearance of Congressman Hale Boggs

[Ed LeDoux]

Bransford didnt crash, the Helo didnt crash, and neither were over water, they were in the pass, over LAnD.

Please review the evidence.

Cheers, Ed

:p

[Ron Bulman]

On 8/20/2019 at 9:59 PM, Ed LeDoux said:

Bransford didnt crash, the Helo didnt crash, and neither were over water, they were in the pass, over LAnD.

Please review the evidence.

Cheers, Ed

:p

Thanks for your work Ed.  So for all the technological expertise of the US Government, U2 overflights or Russia and Cuba in the late 50 's - early sixties, they couldn't find a US Congress Majority leaders plane in the early 1970's.  In a pass leading to Juneau, not far away, not that big of an area relatively speaking.   

[Bob Ness]

On 2/19/2016 at 4:31 PM, Richard Gilbride said:

Something is dreadfully wrong, and it seems like the Air Accident Report.

According to the FBI telex, Engler contacted the FBI in Los Angeles at 8:51 AM Pacific Standard Time. He provided the whereabouts of the downed plane, and the FBI forwarded that information to the LA Coast Guard.

At 9:10 AM PST Engler re-contacted the FBI and said he was tracking men, not the plane. The Bureau also forwarded this information to the Coast Guard.

The description Engler gave is near the Malaspina Glacier beside Yakutat Bay. This is roughly 57-58% of the distance from Anchorage to Juneau.

The Report states that the pilot expected a 3 1/2 hr flight, using an airspeed of 170 knots. It states that the Cessna departed at 8:59 Alaska Standard Time, which is 7:59 PST.

If that is the true departure time, the Cessna was only in the air about 50 minutes before Engler reported it down. That is only about 23-24% of its expected flight time.

I suspect that the Report fudged the Cessna times. I also suspect that Engler was tracking it while it was in flight. I also suspect that Engler was working for TRW Systems in Los Angeles, which by the early 70's had developed the Rhyolite spy satellite for the CIA, which could read data on the ground.

October 16, 1972 was a Monday.

Isn't 859 AST actually 959:PST? If so, I think the math works out just about right.

Edited September 19, 2019 by Bob Ness

[W. Niederhut]

On 2/17/2016 at 6:15 PM, Richard Gilbride said:

Scott,

Thanks for the Aircraft Accident Report. What popped out at me was that the 100-hour inspection was completed on October 15th, up in Fairbanks, the day before the Cessna disappeared. It was apparently performed by employees of Pan Alaska Airways. The pilot, who was president of Pan Alaska, flew from Fairbanks to Anchorage the night of the 15th, and picked up Hale Boggs, Nick Begich & Russ Brown the morning of the 16th. The Report said it "cannot exclude the possibility of an in-flight malfunction or catastrophic component failure."

Poor weather was blamed, but the pilot was very experienced and chose to fly by Visual Flight Rules. I've been to Anchorage International 6 times and also flown in bush planes w/ pontoons in & out from Dutch Harbor in the Aleutians, wind or fog can materialize from out of nowhere, but anybody who flies in that terrain has to be top-notch.

The Washington publication Roll Call was investigating congressional deaths and found the FBI telexes through a Freedom of Information Act request. At the bottom was written- "Additional handling instructions: Information contained herein is not to be repeated or released to press or public at any time."

Clinton had given Boggs a ride to a Texas airport on the 15th, and Boggs flew to D.C. and connected with a flight to Anchorage. Eldest son Dr. Nick Begich gives a few more details in this 10-minute video:

 

       This weekend I got to thinking about Congressman Hale Boggs in the context of the recent forum thread about alleged "Democratic cowardice" in challenging the Warren Commission Report, and I found this fascinating Education Forum thread from 2016.  

       This commentary by Dr. Nick Begich, whose father disappeared in the plane with Boggs, is the first I had heard about Boggs allegedly wanting to re-open the Warren Commission Report prior to his death.

       It also reminded me of an article I read a few years ago in my Harvard Alumni Monthly magazine.  It was an interview of Al Franken, in which Franken talked about his belief that his friend, Senator Paul Wellstone, had been murdered by Dick Cheney and the CIA in October of 2002.

      Franken said that Wellstone had a very disturbing meeting with Dick Cheney prior to his death, in which Cheney had threatened Wellstone about his vote against authorizing military force against Iraq.  (The Iraq vote was held in the Senate two weeks before Wellstone's plane went down in Minnesota, and Wellstone was one of very few Senators-- along with Ted Kennedy-- who voted against authorizing military force in Iraq.) 

      Wellstone had also voted against the military intervention in the Persian Gulf War.  And he was 11 days away from being re-elected to the U.S. Senate when his plane crashed on October 25, 2002.  (The subsequent election was won by Wellstone's Republican opponent-- Coleman.)

      Did Hale Boggs get Paul Wellstoned by the CIA, for wanting to re-open the Warren Commission investigation?

Edited August 20, 2022 by W. Niederhut

[Joseph McBride]

At a book signing, I asked Cokie Roberts about what she

thought caused her father's death. She said,

"I have no conspiracy theories about my father's death,"

and went on to a long technical discourse she was taught

by some scientist about ice on the wings being the cause.

I think Roberts and her mother, Rep. Lindy Boggs, were intimidated into silence.

And part of that may have been payoffs, i.e., a House seat and an

ambassadorship (to the Vatican,

a first for the US) for Lindy Boggs and a lucrative TV gig for Roberts.

Edited August 20, 2022 by Joseph McBride

[W. Niederhut]

On 2/20/2016 at 5:14 PM, Richard Gilbride said:

There is also the following Coast Guard telex from October 18th-

http://www.check-six.com/lib/Famous_Missing/Images/Boggs-CG-3-emb.jpg

1. SITUATION: COGUARD RCC LONG BEACH, CALIF, RCVD A CALL FROM AN INFORMANT ADVISING THAT A CLASSIFIED PRIVATE ELECTRONICS FIRM OF WHICH HE HAD SOME KNOWLEDGE OR CONNECTION HAD DETERMINED THAT SUBJ WAS DOWN IN VIC YAKUTAT BAY WITH AT LEAST 2 POB STILL ALIVE.

2. ACTION TAKEN: RCC LONG BEACH HAS ATTEMPTED TO CONFIRM RELIABILITY OF INFORMANT AND HAS SECURED ASSISTANCE OF FBI IN THIS REGARD. INFORMANT WAS LEVEL HEADED ON PHONE AND GAVE HIS CORRECT NAME AND PHONE NUMBER. POSSIBILITY EXISTS THAT INFORMANT MAY BE SINCERE ALTHOUGH ACCURACY OF INFORMATION IS SUBJECT TO QUESTION.

Indeed, the informant, presumably Engler, may have badly misread the location of the Cessna crash, and badly misinterpreted data that showed 2 people-on-board had left the plane.

Yet even if he is a klutz with this "highly-sophisticated electronic surveillance" equipment, what is he doing alerting the FBI 50 minutes after the Cessna's reported takeoff?? i.e. it sure looks like he's been tracking the Cessna, and was likely assigned that task.

Jonathan Walczak, the author of the Seattle Weekly piece that Don Roberdeau posted, invested 3 years on this mystery and dropped $30,000. In this youtube he states that the Cessna was supposed to make a radio transmission from Hinchinbrook Island (which is off the coast of Cordova, Alaska, about halfway between Anchorage and Yakutat Bay)-

 

Walczak has concluded that because of extreme turbulence that morning in Portage Pass, from where he is broadcasting, that the Cessna crashed into Prince William Sound and never even made it as far as Hinchinbrook Island. The first page of the Coast Guard telex characterizes the pilot as a daredevil who would fly under any conditions-

http://www.check-six.com/lib/Famous_Missing/Images/Boggs-CG-1-emb.jpg

I am presently inclined to agree with Jonathan Walczak's conclusion- that the Cessna crashed into Prince William Sound not far from Portage Pass- and am forced to view the FBI informant as sadly mistaken. Nonetheless I have questions prepared and will attempt to contact him tomorrow.

There is even more to this story, which takes it into JamesFiles-esque land. Representative Nick Begich's widow Pegge fell for a "murderer and bomber with mafia ties" in 1974, Jerry Max Pasley. They had a brief marriage and split up in 1976. Pasley, convicted of murder in the 90's, began telling people Boggs' plane was brought down intentionally, suggesting that a bomb had been placed on board. Walczak pursued that angle and it probably cost him a lot of money.

http://www.seattleweekly.com/home/961602-129/story.html

As I was just studying this Walczak video (above) from Portage Pass, I suddenly recognized the tiny harbor town of Whittier, Alaska down below -- on the Cook Inlet of Prince William Sound.

My wife and I stopped here in Whittier on an Alaskan cruise (Norwegian) in the summer of 2005.  Middle of nowhere.

We rented a kayak in the harbor that day and rowed around Cook Inlet for a couple of hours.  A very wild place, like most of Alaska-- miles and miles of undeveloped wilderness.

I had no idea until this evening that Hale Boggs' plane had disappeared in the vicinity.  

 

Below:  Whittier, Alaska/Cook Inlet

 

 

 

[Benjamin Cole]

14 hours ago, W. Niederhut said:

       This weekend I got to thinking about Congressman Hale Boggs in the context of the recent forum thread about alleged "Democratic cowardice" in challenging the Warren Commission Report, and I found this fascinating Education Forum thread from 2016.  

       This commentary by Dr. Nick Begich, whose father disappeared in the plane with Boggs, is the first I had heard about Boggs allegedly wanting to re-open the Warren Commission Report prior to his death.

       It also reminded me of an article I read a few years ago in my Harvard Alumni Monthly magazine.  It was an interview of Al Franken, in which Franken talked about his belief that his friend, Senator Paul Wellstone, had been murdered by Dick Cheney and the CIA in October of 2002.

      Franken said that Wellstone had a very disturbing meeting with Dick Cheney prior to his death, in which Cheney had threatened Wellstone about his vote against authorizing military force against Iraq.  (The Iraq vote was held in the Senate two weeks before Wellstone's plane went down in Minnesota, and Wellstone was one of very few Senators-- along with Ted Kennedy-- who voted against authorizing military force in Iraq.) 

      Wellstone had also voted against the military intervention in the Persian Gulf War.  And he was 11 days away from being re-elected to the U.S. Senate when his plane crashed on October 25, 2002.  (The subsequent election was won by Wellstone's Republican opponent-- Coleman.)

      Did Hale Boggs get Paul Wellstoned by the CIA, for wanting to re-open the Warren Commission investigation?

Interesting. 

And then Al Franken is run out of political office for a years-old prank, photographed, of Franken putting his hands on the chest of sleeping female comedian---who was wearing a flak jacket. That's the joke---you can't feel anything through a flak jacket. It was funny.

A few women, some anonymous, made weak accusations (never verified) against Franken, such as he held one woman around the waist during a photo shoot. All allegations, however undocumented or weak, were run in the media as high drama. It was a witch-hunt, a prosecutorial fantasy. 

It was then that I began to wonder just who was running New Left media. 

Did Dick Cheney have Wellstone murdered? 

 

[Ron Bulman]

On 2/17/2016 at 7:15 PM, Richard Gilbride said:

Scott,

Thanks for the Aircraft Accident Report. What popped out at me was that the 100-hour inspection was completed on October 15th, up in Fairbanks, the day before the Cessna disappeared. It was apparently performed by employees of Pan Alaska Airways. The pilot, who was president of Pan Alaska, flew from Fairbanks to Anchorage the night of the 15th, and picked up Hale Boggs, Nick Begich & Russ Brown the morning of the 16th. The Report said it "cannot exclude the possibility of an in-flight malfunction or catastrophic component failure."

Poor weather was blamed, but the pilot was very experienced and chose to fly by Visual Flight Rules. I've been to Anchorage International 6 times and also flown in bush planes w/ pontoons in & out from Dutch Harbor in the Aleutians, wind or fog can materialize from out of nowhere, but anybody who flies in that terrain has to be top-notch.

The Washington publication Roll Call was investigating congressional deaths and found the FBI telexes through a Freedom of Information Act request. At the bottom was written- "Additional handling instructions: Information contained herein is not to be repeated or released to press or public at any time."

Clinton had given Boggs a ride to a Texas airport on the 15th, and Boggs flew to D.C. and connected with a flight to Anchorage. Eldest son Dr. Nick Begich gives a few more details in this 10-minute video:

 

 

Edited August 21, 2022 by Ron Bulman

[Michael Griffith]

The conspirators behind JFK's assassination may have had a motive for arranging Boggs' death. Boggs was the one who tipped off Jim Garrison that there were serious problems with the lone-gunman scenario. Boggs, not Senator Long, was the one who prompted Garrison to reopen the case. Maybe the conspirators discovered this in 1972. Perhaps the plotters feared that Boggs would start to strongly publicly challenge the Warren Report.

[Ron Bulman]

46 minutes ago, Ron Bulman said:

 

That was weird.  I couldn't get my keypad to work, here or elsewhere.  Shut down and re booted, here we are???

[Ron Bulman]

I know I posted in this thread in 2019 but wonder if I watched the 10 minute video of Dr. Begich.  He talks about Boggs mentioning in his Anchorage speech what none of them knew about at the time would become Watergate, which broke 3 weeks later.  Then he talks about Speaker of the House Carl Albert being an alcoholic and not qualified to become president should such a need arise.  I.E. that if Agnew hadn't resigned and he and Nixon had both been impeached Boggs could have been in line to become president.  I'm not sure I fully follow that.  But if true it adds an even more ominous aspect to the crash.

After re reading the whole thread and watching the videos, more especially the latter posts from 2019 I got the impression they were already past Portage pass.  Which is where the turbulent weather was as well as the possibility of icing.

 

Edited August 21, 2022 by Ron Bulman

[Paul Brancato]

6 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Interesting. 

And then Al Franken is run out of political office for a years-old prank, photographed, of Franken putting his hands on the chest of sleeping female comedian---who was wearing a flak jacket. That's the joke---you can't feel anything through a flak jacket. It was funny.

A few women, some anonymous, made weak accusations (never verified) against Franken, such as he held one woman around the waist during a photo shoot. All allegations, however undocumented or weak, were run in the media as high drama. It was a witch-hunt, a prosecutorial fantasy. 

It was then that I began to wonder just who was running New Left media. 

Did Dick Cheney have Wellstone murdered? 

 

The Al Franken event was shameful. Franken was a gentleman to his female colleagues, and by resigning without a fight showed great loyalty in my opinion. But the Congresswomen who ditched him showed at the very least a complete lack of courage. 
As for Wellstone, tragedy, maybe murder. It’s almost always the good guys who get offed, whether by murder or some other silencing means.

[Benjamin Cole]

4 hours ago, Ron Bulman said:

I know I posted in this thread in 2019 but wonder if I watched the 10 minute video of Dr. Begich.  He talks about Boggs mentioning in his Anchorage speech what none of them knew about at the time would become Watergate, which broke 3 weeks later.  Then he talks about Speaker of the House Carl Albert being an alcoholic and not qualified to become president should such a need arise.  I.E. that if Agnew hadn't resigned and he and Nixon had both been impeached Boggs could have been in line to become president.  I'm not sure I fully follow that.  But if true it adds an even more ominous aspect to the crash.

After re reading the whole thread and watching the videos, more especially the latter posts from 2019 I got the impression they were already past Portage pass.  Which is where the turbulent weather was as well as the possibility of icing.

 

The Agnew angle is often forgotten in the Watergate story. Agnew no doubt was a grifter, like Maryland pols of his generation (and probably today). 

So Agnew was run out of office as a prelude to the Watergate exit of Nixon, and then Ford was installed. 

I have no sympathy for Nixon---he should have been impeached for his war crimes in Laos alone, and possibly imprisoned. 

But in the US we do not impeach Presidents for war crimes, or maybe any crimes.

Impeachment is political warfare. 

The Watergate story is still mysterious, and may involve the CIA piggybacking, or even fomenting White House dirty ops. It may be the CIA wanted that Watergate office list of call girls and johns, for blackmail purposes (keeping pols in line). 

Keep this deeper backstory in mind when perusing current events. In the first few years, you may be just getting the cover story, the PR version of events, the approved M$M version.  

 

[Derek Thibeault]

On 8/20/2022 at 7:23 PM, Joseph McBride said:

At a book signing, I asked Cokie Roberts about what she

thought caused her father's death. She said,

"I have no conspiracy theories about my father's death,"

and went on to a long technical discourse she was taught

by some scientist about ice on the wings being the cause.

I think Roberts and her mother, Rep. Lindy Boggs, were intimidated into silence.

And part of that may have been payoffs, i.e., a House seat and an

ambassadorship (to the Vatican,

a first for the US) for Lindy Boggs and a lucrative TV gig for Roberts.

It is strange - it seems kids of parents who die in these ways often side on the conspiracy side. With Lindy Boggs in politics and Cokie on TV, it may have well been them playing conservative to not rock the boat. Is that what she really thought, I mean ABC was home of the Peter Jennings "special". Which was awful. Some deaths just happened as a natural way of life, but there were some very head scratching ones, and this falls into that category. The only Kennedy Assassination connection in my state that I know of is the William Sullivan death, which I also believe is head scratching. Hunting accident.

[Andrew Prutsok]

On 8/21/2022 at 6:40 PM, Benjamin Cole said:

The Agnew angle is often forgotten in the Watergate story. Agnew no doubt was a grifter, like Maryland pols of his generation (and probably today). 

So Agnew was run out of office as a prelude to the Watergate exit of Nixon, and then Ford was installed. 

I have no sympathy for Nixon---he should have been impeached for his war crimes in Laos alone, and possibly imprisoned. 

But in the US we do not impeach Presidents for war crimes, or maybe any crimes.

Impeachment is political warfare. 

The Watergate story is still mysterious, and may involve the CIA piggybacking, or even fomenting White House dirty ops. It may be the CIA wanted that Watergate office list of call girls and johns, for blackmail purposes (keeping pols in line). 

Keep this deeper backstory in mind when perusing current events. In the first few years, you may be just getting the cover story, the PR version of events, the approved M$M version.  

 

I know  a lot of people are critical of Russ Baker, but I think he had Watergate nailed - it was an intelligence operation. 

Totally agree with you on Nixon, no sympathy for him whatsoever but I'd bet my house Watergate was totally about "The Bay of Pigs Thing."

CIA spook HW Bush right in the middle of it all, both Ben Bradlee and Bob Woodward "former," Naval Intelligence, please.