Officials say 8 people killed in B-52 crash after takeoff from California air base

A B-52 wedge crashed mon and bust into flames, cleanup all octad people aboard, shortly after takeoff at a U.S. Air Force base in Southern California's Mojave Desert, military officials said.

Aerial footage showed virtually nothing left of the aircraft that went down around 11:20 a.m. Local time during a routine test mission at the base, which is north of Los Angeles. Black smoke rose from a large swath of charred desert near what appeared to be a runway on the base, with emergency vehicles nearby.

After reviewing footage of the crash, it was determined that no one could have survived, Col. James Hayes, the deputy commander at Edwards Air Force Base, said at a news conference.

"We lost eight great Americans," Hayes said, adding that officials were working to notify their families.

On board was a mix of military service members and government and civilian contractors, Hayes said.

It was not immediately clear what caused the crash, and it could take up to six months to complete an investigation, Hayes said, but he shared that the B-52 was supporting the "radar modernization program."

The Boeing B-52 Stratofortress is a long-range bomber that entered service in 1955. Designed to carry both conventional and nuclear weapons, it has been used in conflicts involving the U.S. Military from Vietnam to Iran.

In 2025, a B-52 flew to Edwards with a new, modernized radar system. A test team planned to conduct ground and flight test activities on the aircraft throughout 2026 to feed a production decision, the air force said in a 2025 news release. The modern active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar system replaced the aircraft's antiquated radar for efficacy.

Edwards Air Force Base is home to a large portion of the U.S. Air force's aircraft test and development efforts and is about 160 kilometres north of Los Angeles. The 412th Test Wing, which runs the base, also conducts developmental testing of all U.S. Air force aircraft, weapons systems, software and components before purchase by the service as well as throughout their lifespan.

The vast desert base is also where Chuck Yeager broke the speed of sound in 1947.

The airfield remained closed and all inbound aircraft were being diverted, but it reopened by late afternoon. Non-commercial visitor passes for the base were suspended as emergency crews doused the flames.

It's too soon to say what might have happened.

The way the B-52 crashed so quickly after takeoff without getting very high or going far makes aviation safety expert Jeff Guzzetti suspect an some kind of flight control malfunction. But it's too soon to say what might have caused the control problem.

"I think it was definitely a controllability issue. Now, whether that was tied to an engine failure, a flight control failure or some new testing device failure, I'm not sure," said Guzzetti, who used to investigate crashes for both the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration and the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board.

Although the air force has been flying B-52 bombers for more than 70 years, testing out new equipment on a plane can create new challenges.

"A flight test is always riskier than normal operations, so that's why you have specially trained test pilots, and you should have other safety protocols," Guzzetti said.

Monday's incident marked the first crash ​of a B-52 Stratofortress since the same type of bomber crashed on the island of Guam in May 2016, according to the ⁠Bureau of Aircraft Accidents Archives, a Geneva-based organization that collects global aviation accident data. All seven crew ⁠members aboard that aircraft survived.

The crash on Monday also comes almost a year after the pilot of a regional airliner flying over North Dakota last July made an unexpected sharp turn to avoid a possible mid-air collision with a military B-52 bomber that was in its flight path.

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