On 7/2/47, the AT-6C #42-48918 of the California National Guard while on a flight from Long Beach Army airfield crashed in the rugged Grand Canyon, west of Mount Lowe, north of Pasadena, California. The accident started a 90 acre forest fire which prevent the rescue party from reaching the crash site until fire crews were able to get the flames under control. The accident occurred in bad weather killing the pilot 1st Lieutenant Edward Brickford 23 of Altadena.

My hike to the crash site started here on Chaney Trail. Last month I tried to locate the crash site, but was only able to find a couple pieces of wreckage.

Following the trail that leads down into Millard Canyon.

Hiking up Millard Canyon. I could have followed the Mount Lowe Road up and then droped down into the Grand Canyon, but it's really hot today and decided to follow the cooler canyon to the site.

Millard Canyon has a lot of remains of old water pipe and pieces from the old mining operations that started over a hundred years ago.

This piece of tin roofing made me stop and check it out. From a disance it looked like an airplane piece.

This flat head engine is in the stream bed below the Dawn Mine.

Water pump outside the Dawn Mine. This mine was started in 1895 and was worked on and off till the early 1950s. Like most mines in the San Gabriels, it produced more sweat than gold.

Just a short way past the Dawn Mine, I saw something that caught my eye. I been seeing a lot of things that looked like aluminum but decided to check it out. Soon as I got close, I could tell it was a piece from an airplane.

Taking a close look at the piece, I found a part number with the 58 prefix. The 58 indicates that it came from a North American BT-14. This piece is about a mile from where I finally found the crash site. The BT-14 was a fixed gear version of the AT-6. Wondering if this piece is from another plane, or it was used on the AT-6?