[2] The B-36B had been en route from Eielson Air Force Base near Fairbanks, Alaska, to Carswell AFB, more than 3,000 miles southeast, on a mission that included a simulated nuclear attack on San Francisco.

The plan for the 24-hour flight was to fly over the North Pacific, due west of the Alaska panhandle and British Columbia, then head inland over Washington state and Montana.

Here the B-36 would climb to 40,000 feet (12,000 m) for a simulated bomb run to southern California and then San Francisco, it would continue its non-stop flight to Fort Worth, Texas.

The aircraft carried a Mark 4 atomic bomb, containing a substantial quantity of natural uranium and 5,000 pounds (2,300 kg) of conventional explosives.

[2] Cold weather (−40 °F/−40 °C on the ground at Eielson AFB) adversely affected the aircraft involved in this exercise, and some minor difficulties with 44-92075 were noted before takeoff.

The remaining four airmen were believed to have bailed out of the aircraft earlier than the surviving crew members, and it was assumed that they landed in the ocean and died of hypothermia.

[8] In 1997 one of the surveyors provided the coordinates[8] to two distinct expeditions, one American and one led by the Canadian Department of National Defence, seeking to conduct an environmental analysis of the site.

[11] In late October 2016 a diver reported he had discovered something looking like a segment of the partially disarmed Mark IV nuclear bomb which the co-pilot said had been dumped before the crash.