Braniff International Flight 352
Dawson, Navarro County, Texas
Marker Inscription
The tragic crash of Braniff International Flight 352 traveling from Houston's Hobby Airport to Dallas' Love Field in 1968 left a lasting influence on Braniff, the citizens of Dawson and the aviation industry. Flight 352 originated at Houston with a final destination of Memphis, Tennessee, with intermediate stops scheduled in Dallas, Tulsa, Fort Smith and Little Rock. The four-engine propjet-powered Lockheed L-188 Electra II airliner departed Houston on May 3, 1968, at 4:11 p.m. for the flight to Dallas. Twenty-three minutes into the flight, the aircraft approached an area of developing and intensifying thunderstorms. Attempting to bypass the storm, the crew decided to descend and deviate to the west, despite being notified that other flights were deviating east. At 4:47 p.m., Flight 352 encountered severe weather, including hail, and began to make a 180 degree turn. At that time, the plane began to roll with the nose pitched down. A roll recovery maneuver was initiated but the right wing failed, then the tail section, causing the plane to break in half. At 4:51 p.m., Fort Worth air traffic control reported the plane missing from radar. The citizens of Dawson were first on the scene to offer assistance. Many witnessed the horrific event that claimed the lives of 80 passengers and five crew members. On June 19, 1969, the National Transportation Safety Board issued the official accident report which determined that passage into a known area of severe weather was the cause. The crash and investigation led to an update of safety and training programs and operational procedures, as well as new federal regulations to address how pilots use radar to avoid storms, all making air travel safer. (2019)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
On May 3, 1968, Braniff International Flight 352, a Lockheed Electra bound from Houston to Dallas, flew toward a line of intensifying thunderstorms. Attempting to skirt the weather, the crew descended and turned into severe turbulence and hail; the aircraft rolled, its wing and tail failed, and it broke apart, killing all 85 aboard. The people of Dawson were first on the scene, and the ensuing investigation drove new federal rules on how pilots use radar to avoid storms.
Why it matters
The disaster's lasting legacy was safer skies — its investigation reshaped pilot training and federal weather-avoidance regulations that protect air travelers to this day.
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Related events
- · Braniff Flight 352 crash
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Britton Dawson Home
Dawson, TX
Rewarded with a bounty of Navarro County land for fighting at San Jacinto in 1836, cattleman Britton Dawson settled here in 1847 and first lived in a three-room cabin. In 1858–59 he raised a two-and-a-half-story Greek Revival house of cypress hauled by oxcart from the Gulf Coast, complete with an unusual suspended second-floor gallery; the home sheltered his large family and doubled as a stage stop, and his sons later gave land for the town of Dawson.
Town of Dawson
Dawson, TX
Dawson grew out of Spring Hill, the oldest settlement in Navarro County, which Republic of Texas Indian agent Dr. George Washington Hill founded in 1838 as a trading post to ease relations with Native peoples. Britton Dawson, a San Jacinto veteran who claimed his land as service bounty, settled at Spring Hill in 1846 and built a home that served as a stagecoach stop. When the Texas & St. Louis Railroad — the "Cotton Belt" — laid tracks through in 1881, Dawson's sons donated 100 acres for a townsite, and the population of Spring Hill promptly picked up and moved to the new railroad town.
Former Site of Liberty Hill Settlement
Dawson, TX
Liberty Hill grew up in the 1840s as an Anglo-American farming community, taking firmer root when Samuel and Prudence Wright arrived from Tennessee in 1849 and drew in pioneer neighbors. By 1860 several founding families had organized a Cumberland Presbyterian church, and Wright later donated land for a cemetery and a public school. When the railroad towns of Dawson and Hubbard rose as Cotton Belt shipping points, they drained away Liberty Hill's population until its school and church closed and the fields returned to grazing.
Hubbard
Hubbard, TX
Hubbard was founded in 1881 as a shipping center and supply point on the St. Louis and Southwestern Railway. It took its name from Richard B. Hubbard, a Civil War colonel of the 22nd Texas Infantry who became governor of Texas and later U.S. minister to Japan. A banking and market town, it was also known for its mineral waters.