King Nine Will Not Return

An errant piece of flak tore a hole in the wing tank and, like a wounded bird, this is where she landed, not to return on this day, or any other day.It's World War II, and the King Nine, a B-25 Mitchell bomber, has crashed in the desert.

While searching for his crew, Embry finds the grave of one of his men, and recognizes in the sky Navy F9F Cougar jets, which are impossible for 1943.

Enigma buried in the sand, a question mark with broken wings that lies in silent grace as a marker in a desert shrine.

The episode was based on the discovery of the B-24 Liberator bomber Lady Be Good and her crew's remains, which had crash-landed at night, deep in the Libyan desert after running out of fuel, while returning from a World War II bombing mission over Naples, Italy.

In the episode, the marker of a grave of a member of the crew of King Nine is dated "5 April 1943," the day on which the Lady Be Good was lost.

The bomber aircraft used in this episode was a North American Aviation B-25C-10NA 42-32354, which still exists in storage with Aero Trader, Borrego Springs, California.