Or……

He was flying an 80 ish year old airplane that’s powered by an Allison V-12 which even when new wasn’t the most reliable engine. He had an engine failure shortly after takeoff. He had limited options available and put it down where he could, unfortunately something went wrong during that forced landing. I’d be interested to know if he was wearing a helmet Without a helmet your chances of survival go way down in a forced off field landing.

There is nothing “fishy” about an engine failure on take off. Especially not with these old V-12’s and radials. I had an R-1340 on a 1943 SNJ-4 completely seize up on me, with no warning, just after lift off. I flew a B-25 for a couple of seasons hauling paying passengers. I don’t any longer simply due to the fact that the airplane has a couple R-2600’s on it, an engine that is going to fail at some point and the B-25 has a very bad coffin corner on take off between lift off and VMCA. It’s only a matter of time before something bad is going to happen.

When I was a kid my dad owned an A-36 Apache which is also powered by an Allison V-12. That engine requires constant attention and even with proper care it sometimes just quits. When you fly these old warbirds you’ve got to count on the fact that it’s when not IF you’re going to have an engine failure.