How a 1960 plane crash in Boston Harbor launched ‘feather detective,’ reshaped aviation safety
By Leanna Scachetti
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BOSTON (WCVB) — A plane crash in Boston Harbor 65 years ago shocked a nation into taking the threat of bird strikes seriously.
It was a good weather day in October 1960, when Eastern Air Lines Flight 375 took off from Boston Logan International Airport and immediately nosedived into the harbor, killing 62 of the 72 people on board.
Investigators found bird carcasses at the end of the runway and feathers lodged in the engines. They concluded birds played a factor in bringing the plane down and were determined to find out what was flocking at the intersection of the harbor and the Logan runway.
Officials at the airport and the young Federal Aviation Administration sent those feathers to the Smithsonian. They landed on the desk of Roxie Laybourne, an older woman tasked with managing the museum’s enormous bird collection.
“When these Starling remains landed on her desk, it marked this huge turning point in her career,” said Chris Sweeney, a Boston author who recently published “The Feather Detective,” a book on the “mystery, mayhem and magnificent life” of Roxie Laybourne.
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