WEEK OF MAY 22, 2025
VOLUME 80 | ISSUE 31
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CELEBRATING THE CLASS OF 2025 Drive underway Lighting grads and fans fill CU Event Center P4
to remember the Flight 629 bombing First ever plane bombing over U.S. soil killed 44, changed lives of rescuers BY MONTE WHALEY MWHALEY@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM
The ECMC is overseeing the investigation and the remediation of the site, but deferred to state air regulators on emissions. Both Chevron and the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment have been conducting air quality tests and have not detected levels as high as those measured by the CSU team.
A group of Coloradans are helping to erect a memorial to mark the bombing of United Air Lines Flight 629 on November 1955 over southwest Weld County. A dynamite bomb placed in the checked luggage of the airliner – also known as the Denver Mainliner – exploded and became a fireball seen from as far as 20 miles away, only 10 minutes after the flight left Denver’s Stapleton Airport. All 44 passengers and crew of Flight 629 were victims of the first plane bombing on U.S. soil and at the time, one of the worst mass murders in American history. “This is such a part of Colorado history, and American history, but most people have no idea this even happened,” said Greg Raymer, whose father was a United Airlines mechanic who passed on the story of Flight 629 to his son. Raymer is leading a small committee of residents who are trying to raise money for the memorial, at 11413 Weld County Road 13 near Longmont. The committee – called Flight 629 Memorial And Unsung Heroes Across America – wants to create “meditative and esthetically beautiful place” on the former beet fields where the bodies and pieces of the aircraft fell after the bombing, according to the group’s website. The memorial will honor not only those on the flight but also the 500 or so Weld County residents who rushed to the fields the night of the bombing and worked in freezing darkness throughout the night in search and rescue operations, said Becky Tesone, vice president of the committee. “These are people from all walks of life, from farmers to volunteer firemen, police officers, veterans from
SEE OIL WELL, P9
SEE FLIGHT 629, P7
Oil well blowout in Weld exposed people to benzene Chemical plume in tiny Galeton flowed for almost five days before the well was secured and sealed BY MARK JAFFE THE COLORADO SUN
The oil well blowout last month in rural Galeton, which sparked the evacuation of nearby homes, spewed dangerous levels of toxic chemicals as far as 2 miles away, according to preliminary tests by a Colorado State University team. Benzene, a known carcinogen and respiratory irritant, was found in concentrations 10 times above federal standard for chronic exposure, and was among dozens of chemicals detected. “People were potentially exposed to a chemical soup,” said Emily Fischer, a CSU professor of atmospheric science.
The uncontrolled blowout of the Chevron Bishop well in Galeton, a community of 256 about 7 miles northeast of Greeley, began the evening of April 6, sending a white geyser of water, crude oil and gas high into the air. It was almost five days before the well was secured and sealed. The failure of wellhead equipment caused the blowout and it was not related to either drilling or fracking the well, Chevron said in its preliminary assessment. “We know the when,” said Kristen Kemp, a spokesperson for the Colorado Energy and Carbon Management Commission, which oversees oil and gas drilling. “And we know the what: an uncon-
VOICES: PAGE 8 | CULTURE: PAGE 10 | CALENDAR: PAGE 19
trolled release of wellbore fluid due to a failed barrier. … We are still investigating the why.” Chevron, CDPHE report lower emissions levels
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