The Chicken Warhead Incident

Bomb Misses Home at R.C. by Few Feet

Practice Missile Explodes without Damage in Back Yard

(Times Redwood City Bureau)

REDWOOD CITY, July 17 --

     A practice bomb dropped from a military plane fell and exploded in the backyard of a Friendly Acres residence yesterday afternoon, after the missile had skimmed over the heads of a trio of persons standing in the street, Sheriff McGrath's office reported today.

     The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), army and navy officials were called by Chief Deputy Sheriff Walter Moore into an investigation of the incident.

Near Coop

     Deputy John O'Brien said the bomb crashed near a chicken coop in the yard of W. M. Brookfield at 745 Haven Street, a scant 150 feet from the house, a few minutes before 3 p.m.

     Warhead of the bomb and splintered fragments were discovered buried two feet below the surface by a neighbor, Harry Nelson of 3435 Page street, Friendly Acres, last night.  Nelson organized a neighborhood searching party to locate the bomb.

Whining Noise

     T.H. Ferris of 3431 Page street, a shipfitter employed at Bethlehem steel; his daughter Barbara Ann, 7, and a neighbor, Mrs. Walter Deal of 3446 Page street, were standing in the street when the bomb passed at angle 50 feet over their heads.

     "Our attention was attracted by a whining noise" said Mrs. Deal. "The object passed just over our heads and fell to earth some distance away.  We saw smoke coming from the spot were it fell."

Found in Yard

     Ferris notified the Sheriff's office, but an immediate search failed to locate the bomb.  Ferris later told his neighbor, Nelson about the incident, and the latter conducted a search of yards in the area until the missile was found.

Warhead recovered

     Chief Deputy Moore and Deputy O'Brien said the missile "evidently was a practice bomb."  The warhead and fragments recovered were made of lead.  There was no doubt, they said, that it contained an explosive charge.  The fragments were dug out by Nelson and Brookfield.

     Moore, who declined to guess the probable weight of the bomb, said it was a miracle it missed the Brookfield house.

     Army and Navy air bases in the Bay region were being checked in an effort to clear up the mystery, and John Cost, San Mateo resident FBI agent, was called into the case.

What was the outcome of the investigation on the dropped bomb? Unknown. And there's no information on this. The eyewitnesses and parties involved seemed pretty convinced that they had found a "practice" bomb.

For any conspiracy theorists out there, it does seem rather strange that the plane was circling up above in the south eastern section of Redwood City.  And the notion of a practice bomb hitting a train station, albeit a flagstop, does raise a few eyebrows.  The train stop, (now Marsh Manor), was a Southern Pacific flag station, on the east-bound line over the Dumbarton bridge, where trainwagons trundled from San Francisco and Redwood City transporting cargo from the northern end of the peninsula.  All things considered, damage to the Dumbarton Bridge or to the train tracks just west of it, would have represented a relatively strategic target to dismantle.

But the "practice bomb" theory is not so far-fetched.  What is common knowledge is that the Naval Air Base at Moffett Field in Mountain View was known to use the wreck of the USS Thompson as target practice to train pilots, using dummy bombs.  The old destroyer which had been built around 1918-1919 had been decommissioned in the 30s, used as a floating restaurant, sold for scrap, and then subsequently repurchased by the Navy during WWII specifically for use in training.  In 1944, the Navy scuttled her in the middle of the bay, three miles north of the Dumbarton Bridge and directly east of the port of Redwood City, on the San Mateo side of the line dividing the Bay from Alameda.

USS Thompson

The wreckage, known as "The South Bay Wreck" is still very much visible today and is in fact used as a reference point in tidal maps.  It has become a popular destination for kayakers.

The wreck and hull of the USS Thompson in the San Francisco Bay, known today as the "South Bay Wreck".

As a final coincidental note, the same day the bomb dropped over Redwood City, on July 16 1945, the first atomic bomb was exploded over a New Mexico desert in a unique test that was to change the world, and modern history forever.

• Street numbering changed somewhere in the twilight of the ensuing decades.  I have as yet to comb through the Polk Directories and find out when exactly.  745 Haven doesn't exist today - if it does somebody please correct me - but I think the Brookfield property must have been closer to Page St.  

1. NavSource Naval History - Photographic History of the U.S. Navy:  http://www.navsource.org/archives/05/305.htm
2. Kayak Tours for guided kayak tours to the South Bay Wreck and for information on kayak put-ins around the San Francisco bay: http://gotoes.org/kayaktours/20060715_SouthBayWreck/