Härnösand and northern Ångermanland, November 1952

Röd Niklas

In November 1952 a division of nine Saab B 18B bombers from Halland's wing left Västerås for Luleå and flew straight into a snowstorm no forecast had promised. Fuel ran low. The order came: 'Nödlanda där ni kan.' Eight came down on lake ice and frozen fields around Härnösand and northern Ångermanland; their crews survived. One, Röd David, settled on the ice outside Härnösand and was later recovered from the harbour — today it is the only B 18 left in the world. The ninth, Röd Niklas, and its three crewmen, never arrived. Theories place it in the Bothnian Bay or in the forests of inland Jämtland. Searchers still look.