Members of the Royal Canadian Air Force, the trio was supposed to deliver a forty-eight-foot, twin-engine A-20 attack bomber from Newfoundland to England, with a fuel stop in Greenland. Flying over water two hours after they left Newfoundland, the Canadians ran into thick fog and misfortune. First, the radio went dead. That prevented radioman Arthur Weaver, dark, compact, and handsome, from checking their course or sending a distress signal. Next, navigator Al Nash, tall and lean, with a Tintin-like pompadour, found it impossible to see through the fog to plot their position by sextant. Completing their woes, pilot Dave Goodlet, aristocratic-looking, with a high forehead and a cleft chin, struggled with ice-coated wings that made it impossible to gain enough altitude to fly above the weather. Flying lower wasn’t an option, either. Goodlet knew that Greenland lay ahead, and he didn’t want to slam into a fog-covered mountain. They flew onward at fifteen thousand feet, fear rising as they barreled off course for hours through the soupy haze.
