by Kevin Burton
The 21-year-old pilot of the plane that crashed on this day in 1959, taking the lives of three famous young musicians was not qualified for the flight, according to published accounts.
The crash, which took the lives of Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and J.P. Richardson (The Big Bopper) has been immortalized in Don McLean’s 1971 masterpiece “American Pie,” perhaps the best song of the decade.
A lot has been written about the musicians (especially Holly), their shortened careers, the Day The Music Died, and what might have transpired in rock and roll music had they lived. Less is known about the pilot, Roger Peterson.
Peterson had four years of flying experience before the ill-fated flight.
“Though he had recently completed Flight Instructor certification, he was not qualified to fly at night, or in poor visibility conditions,” according to beyondthedash.com. “He was also not properly briefed on the weather conditions prior to takeoff, and had not seen the weather advisory.”
“The official investigation was carried out by the Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB), precursor to the NTSB. It emerged that Peterson had over four years of flying experience, of which one was with Dwyer Flying Service, and had accumulated 711 flying hours, of which 128 were on Bonanzas,” reads an account on Wikipedia of the crash investigation. “He had also logged 52 hours of instrument flight training, although he had passed only his written examination, and was not yet qualified to operate in weather that required flying solely by reference to instruments.”
“Peterson and Dwyer Flying Service itself were certified to operate only under visual flight rules, which essentially require that the pilot must be able to see where the aircraft is going,” reads the Wikipedia account. “On the night of the accident visual flight would have been virtually impossible due to the low clouds, the lack of a visible horizon and the absence of ground lights over the sparsely populated area.”
“Furthermore, Peterson, who had failed an instrument checkride (test to assess capability to operate an aircraft without outside visual reference) nine months before the accident, had received his instrument training on airplanes equipped with a conventional artificial horizon as a source of aircraft attitude information, while the accident aircraft was equipped with an older-type Sperry F3 attitude gyroscope.
“Crucially, the two types of instruments display the same aircraft pitch attitude information in graphically opposite ways. As a result, when the aircraft took off, Peterson, observing the older model Sperry F3 gyroscope, thought he was climbing when in fact he was descending. “
“Another contributing factor was the ‘seriously inadequate’ nighttime weather briefing provided to Peterson, which ‘failed to even mention adverse flying conditions which should have been highlighted”.
“The CAB concluded that the probable cause of the accident was ‘the pilot’s unwise decision’ to attempt a flight at night that required skills he did not have.
“Just five months prior to the crash, Roger Peterson married Deanne Lenz. The two had no children. He was survived by his wife, as well as parents Arthur E. Peterson and Pearl I. Kraemer Peterson,” according to beyondthedash.com.
There was another, secondary victim of the plane crash. María Elena Holly learned of her husband’s death via a television news report. A widow after only six months of marriage, she suffered a miscarriage shortly after, reportedly due to psychological trauma, according to Wikipedia.
“A stainless-steel guitar and a set of three stainless steel records marks the exact spot where the plane carrying Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, & JP ”The Big Bopper” Richardson came to rest following their final concert at the Surf Ballroom,” according to the website of the City of Clear Lake, Iowa “In 2009, a second monument was erected on the 50th anniversary of the tragedy honoring their pilot, Roger Peterson.”
The outdoor memorial stretches just under half a mile along the fence row in a field north of Clear Lake, according to the city’s website.
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