The bomb dropped about two feet onto the Bombay doors, and it rested there for a couple seconds,
and the Bombay doors gave way, and the bomber won't.
Right about the time the O-Fated B-47, flying out of Savannah's Hunter Air Force Base,
inadvertently dropped its 7600-bomb atomic payload.
It was flying over the sparsely populated community of Mars Bluff.
Just a few miles east of Florence.
It landed about a hundred yards from the family home of Walter Gregg, practically in their backyard.
While the bomb's nuclear core did not detonate, the massive TNT trigger did, leaving a 35 feet deep, 70 feet wide crater.
Homes and other buildings within a five-mile radius were damaged by the blast.
Unclassified Air Force documents describe the Gregg home as having sustained total property damage.
Walter Gregg, his wife, Ethel May, their three children, and one of their friends were all home at the time.
Miraculously, no one was killed.
Smoke covered the yard. You couldn't see 10, 12 feet around it, because all the smoke in the dust from the trees.
But left arm, I had my arm holding up, trying to keep stuff from hitting the sun in themself.
I got a fairly good cut under the saw here.
The wife was in the house.
On the right side, she got a nice cut over the right ear, around the hairline all across from there.
All I can remember is that I was sewing.
And then the next thing I knew, I was trying to get out of the house.
And I had all this plastering and stuff to climb over and try to work my way out.
And I finally got to what had been our front porch.
And Bill was there yelling and telling me to come this way.
In spite of the devastating nature of the blast, only nine-year-old Ella Davies, a cousin of the Greggs,
required an overnight stay in the hospital.
It blew our spleen loose.
They had taken it to the hospital and have all it put back together.
And the rest of it sure wasn't seriously hurt other than the brain was all shook up.
Within a few short hours, what seemed like the entire world descended above Mars Bluffs.
An atomic bomb breaks loose from a mounting shackle in a B-47 jet over Florence, South Carolina,
plummets to earth, causing a sensational freak accident.
There was near disaster for those within range of the TNT, that is the bomb's trigger.
Six were injured, the home of Walter Gregg was turned into a shambles.
While the Air Force put their spin on the accident and the international press continued its coverage,
Walter Gregg and his family were as good-spirited as any family could expect to be,
considering everything they own had been blown up by an atomic bomb.
They lived off the generosity of neighbors and family and waited patiently for the compensation that was surely coming their way.
Now, Winston Filter Cigarettes, bringing you America's number one panel show.
I've got a secret, starring Gary Moore.
Gary Moore's show, they called and we made arrangements with them,
go up on train one night and stay a couple of days up there and then come back.
You read about these folks in every newspaper, every news magazine, every newsreel.
This is the family from Florence, South Carolina, who miraculously escaped injury when their house was hit by an atom bomb on March 11.
What is the government's government to offer at any remuneration?
They are estimating damages and will rebuild.
They'll take care of all your bills.
Well, these are perilous times in which we live.
What is your viewpoint toward that, sir? Do you feel resentment? Are you angry about it?
No. The bomb's a good thing to have, just to use them in proper places.
Here's the money. Here are two cartons of Winston's for the grown-ups.
And, Greggs, thank you all very much for sharing your time with us.
The $80 and two cartons of cigarettes that the Greggs walked away with that night were fairly easy to come by.
But getting reasonable compensation from the United States Air Force would prove to be much more difficult.
We were getting tired of the whole deal, so nobody would come across with anything or tell you anything.
In early 2009, a ceremony was held in Mars Bluff to unveil the marker commemorating the historic blunder.
For Bill Gregg and his wife, Effie, the occasion was bittersweet.
Until recently, they've been reluctant to discuss that day in 1958.
I think one reason I didn't talk, we had so much less now than we had then.
And maybe it made me a little, maybe it hurt enough I just couldn't talk about it.
I don't feel the Greggs got a fair shake over the deal.
I think after the press died down after a month or so, I think the Air Force personnel were ill-trained and very insensitive to their needs.
They were made to feel un-American by not being appreciative of being the victims of this accident.
And in my mind, they are victims.
Actually, they treated us like a bunch of criminals.
We didn't have anything to do with it. They started off in Savannah with it, came up and dropped it, and that left us with nothing.
Maybe it's been enough time that I'm just ready to finally accept it.
