| Accident | |
|---|---|
| Date | October 30, 1941 |
| Summary | Crashed following icing conditions |
| Site | Moorhead, Minnesota, United States 46°54′55″N 96°44′33″W / 46.91525°N 96.74242°W (approximate) |
| Aircraft | |
| Aircraft type | Douglas DC-3A-269 |
| Registration | NC21712 |
| Flight origin | Chicago |
| 1st stopover | Minneapolis, Minnesota |
| 2nd stopover | Fargo, North Dakota |
| 3rd stopover | Billings, Montana |
| 4th stopover | Butte, Montana |
| Last stopover | Spokane, Washington |
| Destination | Seattle |
| Passengers | 12 |
| Crew | 3 |
| Fatalities | 14 |
| Injuries | 1 |
| Survivors | 1 (Clarence F. Bates) |
Northwest Airlines Flight 5 was a regularly scheduled, multiple stop flight from Chicago Municipal Airport to Boeing Field, Seattle. It had intermediate stops at Minneapolis; Fargo, North Dakota; Billings, Montana; Butte, Montana; and Spokane, Washington. On October 30, 1941, on the flight's leg between Minneapolis and Fargo, the Northwest Airlines Douglas DC-3A-269 operating the route crashed into an open field about 2 1/2 miles east of the Fargo airfield, just after 2:00 am local time. All 12 passengers and two of the three crewmembers aboard were killed.[1] The flight's captain Clarence Bates, the sole survivor, would end up dying himself a year later from another aviation accident in St. Paul, Minnesota, test-flying a Consolidated B-24.[2]
The cause of the crash was determined to be an excessive buildup of ice on the aircraft's wings.[1]
