killing all 15 on board and six on the ground (including four children)."18 Killed In Air Accident." Times [London, England] 19 Oct. 1942: 4. The Times Digital Archive. Web. 30 December 2013. 21 October Boeing B-17D Flying Fortress, 40-3089, of the 5th Bomb Group/11th Bombardment Group Heavy (H), with Captain Eddie Rickenbacker, America's top-scoring World War I ace (26 kills), aboard on a secret mission, is lost at sea in the central Pacific Ocean when the bomber goes off-course. After 24 days afloat, Rickenbacker and surviving crew are rescued by the U.S. Navy after having been given up for lost and discovered by a Vought-Sikorsky OS2U Kingfisher crew. 23 October Mid-air collision at altitude between American Airlines Douglas DC-3, NC16017, "Flagship Connecticut", flying out of Lockheed Air Terminal (now Burbank Airport) en route to Phoenix, Arizona, and New York City, and USAAF Lockheed B-34 Ventura II bomber, 41-38116, on a ferry flight from Long Beach Army Air Base to Palm Springs Army Air Field. Pilot of B-34, Lt. William N. Wilson and copilot Staff Sergeant Robert Leicht, were able to make emergency landing at Palm Springs, but DC-3, carrying nine passengers and a crew of three, its tail splintered and its rudder shorn off by B-34's right engine, went into a flat spin, clipped a rocky ledge in Chino Canyon, California, below San Jacinto Peak, and exploded in desert, killing all on board. Among the passengers killed was Academy Award-winning Hollywood composer Ralph Rainger, 41, who had written or collaborated on such hit songs as "Louise", "Love in Bloom" (comedian Jack Benny's theme song), "Faithful Forever", "June in January", "Blue Hawaii" and "Thanks for the Memory", which entertainer Bob Hope adopted as his signature song. Initial report by Ventura crew was that they had lost sight of the airliner due to smoke from a forest fire, but closed-door Congressional investigation revealed that bomber pilot knew the first officer on the DC-3, Louis Frederick Reppert, and had attempted to wave to him in mid-air rendezvous. However, Wilson misjudged the distance between the two aircraft and triggered the fatal collision when, in pulling his B-34 up and away from the DC-3, its right propeller sliced through the airliner's tail. The Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB) placed the blame directly on the "reckless and irresponsible conduct of Lieutenant William N. Wilson in deliberately maneuvering a bomber in dangerous proximity to an airliner in an