TWA crash site in the Sandia Mountains

The Dukes Track Club had a fantastic adventure on Saturday heading up to the site of a plane crash from 1955 in the Sandia Mountains.  Twenty-three of us met early and headed up the hill for an eleven mile, 3K feet, trek that included a couple of wrong turns, some bumps, bruises, and scrapes, and good memories.  

This excerpt is from Wikipedia with some history of the plane crash.

On February 19, 1955 at 7:03 am, TWA flight 260 en route from Albuquerque, New Mexico to Santa Fe, New Mexico received an IFR clearance from the Albuquerque tower ("ATC clears TWA 260 for approach at the Santa Fe Airport via Victor 19 climb northbound on the back course of the ILS localizer"). There were no further communications after the aircraft took off at 7:05. It was last seen in a high speed shallow climb toward the cloud-shrouded Sandia Ridge at an estimated altitude of 3,000 feet above ground level.

At 7:13 the flight crashed into the Sandia Mountains killing all 13 passengers and three crew members on board instantly. Due to the complex mountainous terrain, a day after the crash several members of the New Mexico Mountain Club, along with other volunteers assisted the New Mexico State Police in the recovery efforts leading to the formation of the Albuquerque Mountain Rescue Council, a voluntary organization still active today.

Kinvara Trail...full o' rocks