Los Banos Rotary Club History
Castle Pilot Tells Of Record Flight

Major Frank B. Bennett, one of nine Air Flight Commanders at Castle Air Base and Commander of the 359th Bombing Squadron, related to members of the Rotary Club here Tuesday noon some of the highlights of a record-breaking flight recently made by the Bombing Group, in which they traveled non-stop between 16,000 and 17,000 miles in 31 ½ hours. It was not the longest sustained flight on record, but was the longest ever made by a B-52 group.
Labeled as strictly a routine training mission, the flight started at Merced, eastward to the Atlantic coast, north over Canada and Greenland, across the North Pole, and southwestward across Alaska, south over Seattle and Portland, and making a simulated bomb run on San Francisco, then east again to finally land at the Air Base near Baltimore, Md.
Major Bennett, who has been in the air service for 15 years and has flown many types of planes, stated the B-52, despite the three tragic accidents to those based at Castle, are by far the best piece of flying machinery he has ever seen.
Most of the flight, he said, was made at an altitude of approximately 40,000 feet, well above all wind and weather conditions. One of the sidelight experiences on the trip was that of watching the moon rise twice in the same night, first over Baltimore and then again as they turned southward over Alaska.
Asked if their trip was generally publicized and flight route made known to military posts in the area over which they traveled, Major Bennett said that certain of the military knew of their flight plan, as did the Canadian military, and most certainly their movement was observed and reported continuously by the outpost radar stations, whose job it is to be constantly on the alert for all aircraft that might venture into the area.
Major Bennett was introduced to the Rotary group by W. H. Sloan, program chairman for the day.
December 14, 1956

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