Airmen Memorial Bridge

At 7:40 on the morning of November 30, 1944, two B-24 Liberator bombers collided in the air over the Pantano Wash, and eighteen airmen from Davis-Monthan Field died at once. They were not in combat; they were training, as thousands of crews did in the clear desert skies around Tucson during the Second World War. Davis-Monthan fed bomber crews to the war from these fields, and not all of them survived the practice. This bridge carries their memory across the wash where they fell.

What the plaque says

November 30, 1944, at 7:40 A.M., 18 airmen from Davis-Monthan Army Air Field died following a mid-air collision between two B-24 Liberator bombers over the Pantano Wash. This bridge is dedicated to those brave men who lost their lives while on a training mission to serve the United States during World War Two.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Tucson — 7.9 mi
  The Old Pueblo — four thousand years of farming under the sky islands
• Mission San Xavier del Bac — 13 mi
  The White Dove of the Desert — the finest Spanish Baroque church in the country
• Saguaro National Park — 14 mi
  The giant cactus, and the O'odham who count it as kin

More markers nearby

• Fort Lowell — 2.3 mi
• Cavalry Barracks and Band Barracks — 2.4 mi
• Chapel of San Pedro at Fort Lowell — 2.7 mi
• El Conquistador Water Tower — 4.8 mi