By Rick Wright
Staff Writer
 
Karen Allen cringes every time she hears a plane fly over her home in Portland’s west end. She lives directly under the flight path for planes headed for Portland International Jetport.
Each plane passing overhead reminds Allen of the day she survived Maine’s worst aviation disaster, the Long Creek air tragedy in South Portland.
The accident occurred July 11, 1944. Last Sunday, on the 66th anniversary of the crash, about 200 people attended a dedication ceremony for the Long Creek Air Memorial.
“Some of them (planes) that make a different noise really scare me. I have a police scanner and when I hear they’re calling the fire department to the airport because the landing gear’s not coming down or something, that scares me,” Allen said.
Allen was 2 years old when an Army bomber missed the Portland airport and crashed into the trailer park where she lived in South Portland’s Redbank neighborhood. The trailer park was built to provide temporary housing for South Portland shipyard workers who constructed Liberty Ships that carried troops and weapons to Europe during World War II.
Nineteen men, women and children were killed, including the pilot, Lt. Philip “Phee” Russell of South Portland. The plane’s navigator, Staff Sgt. Wallace Mifflin of Seattle, Wash., also was killed by the crash of the A-26 invader bomber.
Russell was trying to get home for a first glimpse of his 3-month old daughter, Patti-Ann, who was in the audience Sunday.
Many others were injured, including Allen and her brother, Walter Gurney, who was 3 years old. Both were rushed to the hospital with burns caused by fires on the ground ignited by the exploding aircraft.
“I knew my hands were burned. I was crying. I knew I went to the hospital,” Allen said. She still has scars from the burns on her hands. 
The memorial was built to pay tribute to all those who died or survived the catastrophe.
The official unveiling of the memorial ended a two-year effort by South Portland resident John Kierstead to raise the money to build it. Kierstead and his committee raised $11,500 – all from private sources – to subsidize the memorial.
It is a large, three-sided piece of native pink granite located on a circle of city-owned land bounded by Westbrook Street, Gorham Road and Macarthur Circle West.
Situated directly across from the Olde English Village apartment complex, the memorial stands at the entrance to the Redbank neighborhood.
One side of the memorial lists the names of all 19 who died and their ages, which ranged from 9-month-old George J. Robertson to 42-year old Gordon T. Gorham.
Another side shows a drawing of Russell, the pilot, holding two children by the hand and leading them into heaven.
A low granite bench sits behind the memorial with the words “For The Survivors” engraved across the seat.
“It means that I can come here and think about this, sit here on the survivors’ seat and think, ‘thank God how lucky I am. I am here.’ Thank God I happened to survive it,” Allen said.
The keynote speaker was U.S. Navy Capt. Richard Stratton. The captain, now retired, was a prisoner of war for six and a half years during the Vietnam War.
South Portland City Councilors Tom Blake, Jim Hughes and Mayor Tom Coward also made brief remarks, and state Sen. Larry Bliss, State Rep. Jane Eberle and South Portland Police Chief Ed Googins were among the speakers.
Survivors, witnesses and family members of the victims offered powerful testimonials.
Rachel Deans, 89 of South Portland, told the audience how she and her nursing staff treated victims when they were rushed to her ward at Maine General Hospital in Portland.
“They came pouring in just writhing in pain. We couldn’t identify anybody. We just had to medicate them and get them as comfortable as we could,” Deans said. “Transported first were the people that were most severely burned. We got them into beds and got them taken care of as best we could. You can’t ever forget that smell of burned flesh.”
One of the most dramatic and moving parts of the ceremony was called “Tolling of the Victims.” As Kierstead read the name and age of each person killed by the plane crash, a bell was rung one time to pay tribute to the deceased.
In his closing comments to the crowd, Kierstead, his booming voice filled with emotion, said, “We resolve to dedicate this ground to the memory of those who could not be with us. We etch their names in native stone and thus make them immortal. And Phee Russell, you are cleared for landing. Welcome home.”
 
Rick Wright can be reached at 282-4337, ext. 237 or news@inthesentry.com.