Buddy Holly, Richie Valens and J.P. Richardson's 4-week tour of the midwest, played the Surf Ballroom in Clearlake, Iowa. Although February 2 was originally to be a night off following 10 straight shows, agent Irvin Field and General Artists Corporation added a performance date, which cost the Surf Ballroom $319.




After the show, on a cold winter's night a small private plane took off from Clear Lake, Iowa bound for Fargo, N.D.

It never made its destination.

The single engine plane crashed in a cornfield near Clear Lake, Iowa, killing the pilot and three of the brightest stars of rock'n'roll -- J.P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson, Buddy Holly and Richie Valens.


The Big Bopper, Buddy Holly, Richie Valens

Performing in concert was very profitable, and Buddy Holly needed the money it provided. "The Winter Dance Party Tour" was planned to cover 24 cities in a short 3 week time frame (January 23 - February 15) and Holly would be the biggest headliner. Waylon Jennings, a friend from Lubbock, Texas and Tommy Allsup would go as backup musicians.



Ritchie Valens, probably the hottest of the artists at the time, The Big Bopper, and Dion and the Belmonts would round out the list of performers.

The tour bus developed heating problems. It was so cold onboard that reportedly one of the drummers developed frostbite riding in it. When they arrived at the Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake, Iowa, they were cold, tired and disgusted.


Buddy Holly, Winter Tour Bus

Buddy Holly had had enough of the unheated bus and decided to charter a plane for himself and his guys. At least he could get some laundry done before the next performance!



That night at the Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake Iowa was magical as the fans went wild over the performers.


Jiles P. Richardson, known as The Big Bopper to his fans, was a Texas D.J. at Texas radio station KTRM. He found recording success and fame in 1958 with the song Chantilly Lace.


J.P. Richardson, The Big Bopper

Richie Valenzuela was only 16 years old when Del-Fi record producer, Bob Keane, discovered the Pacoima, California singer. Keane rearranged his name to Ritchie Valens, and in 1958 they recorded Come On, Let's Go. Far more successful was the song Valens wrote for his girlfriend, Donna, and its flip side, La Bamba, a Rock and Roll version of an old Mexican standard. This earned the teenager widespread popularity.


Richie Valens

Charles Hardin "Buddy" Holley (changed to Holly due to a misspelling on a contract) and his band, The Crickets, had a number one hit in 1957 with the tune That'll Be The Day. This success was follwed by Peggy Sue and an appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show. By 1959, Holly had decided to move in a new direction. He and the original Crickets parted company. Holly married Maria Elena Santiago and moved to New York with the hope of concentrating on song writing and producing.


Buddy Holly

Dwyer Flying Service got the charter. $36 per person for a single engine Beechcraft Bonanza.


Roger Peterson

Roger Peterson was the 21 year old pilot who one year earlier recieved his commercial pilot's licence though he was still working on his instrument rating. It was later discovered that his records noted a hearing disability and a tendency to panic during night flights when forced to rely solely on his instruments.

It was also later noted that the Dwyer planes weren't licensed for instrument flying, plus Peterson was not rated for night-time flying commercially.


Waylon Jennings/Buddy Holly

Waylon Jennings gave his seat up to Richardson, who was running a fever and had trouble fitting his stocky frame comfortably into the bus seats.

When Holly learned that Jennings wasn't going to fly, he said, "Well, I hope your old bus freezes up." Jennings responded, "Well, I hope your plane crashes." This friendly banter of friends would haunt Jennings for years.

Allsup told Valens, I'll flip you for the remaining seat. On the toss of a coin, Valens won the seat and Allsup the rest of his life.

The plane took off a little after 1 A.M. from Clear Lake and never got far from the airport before it crashed, killing all onboard.



A cold N.E wind immediately gave way to a snow which drastically reduced visibility. The ground was already blanketed in white. The pilot may have been inexperienced with the instrumentation.

One wing hit the ground and the small plane corkscrewed over and over. The three young stars were thrown clear of the plane, leaving only pilot Roger Peterson inside.

Deciding that the show must go on at the next stop, Moorhead, MN, they looked for local talent to fill in. Just across the state line from Moorhead, in Fargo ND, they found a 15 year old talent named Bobby Vee.


Bobby Vee

The crash that ended the lives of Holly, Valens and Richardson was the break that began the career of Vee.

Dion di Mucci would enjoy a long lived solo career.


Dion/Bobby Vee

Tommy Allsup would one day open a club named "The Head's Up Saloon," a tribute to the coin toss that saved his life.

Waylon Jennings would become a hugely popular Country singer.

Inscribed on Ritchie Valens' grave are the words, "Come On, Let's Go."


Dion Dimucci

Dion remembers, in his own words:

" I was about as cold as I've ever been. The Midwest was in the midst of a bitter snow storm in February of 1959. The wind was punishing, trees were freezing up and snapping, and the little yellow school bus I was riding in with Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and the Big Bopper had been breaking down. After our "Winter Dance Party" appearance in Duluth, Minnesota, our bus broke down again.

Buddy had had enough. He talked to the club manager into chartering a plane to fly the headliners to our next show in Fargo, North Dakota and tried to recruit us to get on board. The more people on the plane, he told us, the lower the cost per person. The Big Bopper agreed, as did Ritchie, who had a bad case of the flu. When Buddy came to me, I thought about the $36.00 price. My parents paid $36.00 a month for rent back in the Bronx. I just couldn't bring myself to spend the same amount on a 45 -minute plane ride; so I told them no.

The next day, I stood in the lobby of the hotel in Moorhead, Minnesota. There was a television on the wall announcing that the plane carrying Buddy, Ritchie and the Big Bopper had gone down in the storm. There were no survivors. From that moment on, I knew God had a plan for me."

Analysis

There is no evidence to indicate that very important flash advisories regarding adverse weather conditions were drawn to the attention of the pilot. There is evidence that the weather briefing consisted solely of the reading of current weather at en route terminal and terminal forecasts for the destination. Failure of the communicators to draw these advisories to the attention of the pilot and to emphasize their importance could readily lead the pilot to underestimate the severity of the weather situation.

It must be pointed out that the communicators' responsibility with respect to furnishing weather information to pilots is to give them all the available information, to interpret this data if requested, but not to advise in any manner. Also, the pilot and the operator in this case had a definite responsibility to request and obtain all of the available information and to interpret it correctly.

At Mason City, at the time of takeoff, the barometer was falling, the ceiling and visibility were lowering, light snow had begun to fall, and the surface winds and winds aloft were so high one could reasonably have expected to encounter adverse weather during the estimated two-hour flight.

It was already snowing at Minneapolis, and the general forecast for the area along the intended route indicated deteriorating weather conditions. Considering all of these facts and the fact that the company was certificated to fly in accordance with visual flight rules only, both day and night, together with the pilot's unproved ability to fly by instrument, the decision to go seems most imprudent.

It is believe that shortly after takeoff pilot Peterson entered an area of complete darkness and one in which there was no definite horizon; that the snow conditions and the lack of horizon required him to rely solely on flight instruments for aircraft attitude and orientation.

The high gusty winds and the attendant turbulence which existed this night would have caused the rate of climb indicator and the turn and bank indicator to fluctuate to such an extent that an interpretation of these instruments so far as attitude control is concerned would have been difficult to a pilot as inexperienced as Peterson. The airspeed and altimeter alone would not have provided him with sufficient reference to maintain control of the pitch attitude. With his limited experience the pilot would tend to rely on the attitude gyro which is relatively stable under these conditions.

Service experience with the use of the attitude gyro has clearly indicated confusion among pilots during the transition period or when alternating between conventional and attitude gyros. Since Peterson had received his instrument training in aircraft equipped with the conventional type artificial horizon, and since this instrument and the attitude gyro are opposite in their pictorial display of the pitch attitude, it is probably that the reverse sensing would at times produce reverse control action. This is especially true of instrument flight conditions requiring a high degree of concentration or requiring multiple function, as would be the case when flying instrument conditions in turbulence without a copilot. The directional gyro was found caged and it is possible that it was never used during the short flight. However, this evidence is not conclusive. If the directional gyro were caged throughout the flight this could only have added to the pilot's confusion.

Conclusion

At night, with an overcast sky, snow falling, no definite horizon, and a proposed flight over a sparsely settled area with an absence of ground lights, a requirement for control of the aircraft solely by reference to flight instruments can be predicated with virtual certainty.

The Board concludes that pilot Peterson, when a short distance from the airport, was confronted with this situation. Because of fluctuation of the rate instruments caused by gusty winds he would have been forced to concentrate and rely greatly on the attitude gyro, an instrument with which he was not completely familiar. The pitch display of this instrument is the reverse of the instrument he was accustomed to; therefore, he could have become confused and thought that he was making a climbing turn when in reality he was making a descending turn. The fact that the aircraft struck the ground in a steep turn but with the nose lowered only slightly, indicates that some control was being effected at the time. The weather briefing supplied to the pilot was seriously inadequate in that it failed to even mention adverse flying conditions which should have been highlighted.

Probable Cause

The Board determined that the probable cause of this accident was the pilot's unwise decision to embark on a flight which would necessitate flying solely by instruments when he was not properly certificated or qualified to do so. Contributing factors were serious deficiencies in the weather briefing, and the pilot's unfamiliarity with the instrument which determines the attitude of the aircraft.

By the Civil Aeronautics Board: James R. Dupree/ Chan Gurney/Harmar D. Denny/ G. Joseph Minetti/ Louis J. Hector

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