Hometown: Durand, IL
Branch: U.S. Navy
Unit:  USS Forrestal (CVA-59), Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Maryland
Date of Sacrifice: April 12, 1956 - at sea, off the coast of Virginia, USA 
Age: 31
Conflict: No declared conflict

Robert McMahon grew up with his three brothers—Maurice, Lawrence, and Jack—in the small farming community of Durand, Illinois, just south of the Illinois-Wisconsin border. Their father, Ray, was a farmer and worked for the National Lock Company. Their mother, Blanche (Scott), McMahon sold insurance.

“Bob” was a busy and popular student-athlete at Durand Community High School. He enrolled in the Vocational Agriculture program and was a member of the Future Farmers of America (FFA). He was student body president, senior class vice-president, played basketball, softball—and wrestled in the 125 lb. weight class. He also broke his leg playing football.

After graduating from high school in 1942, McMahon was interested in engineering. He signed up for the training program at the American Aircraft Institute in Chicago, Illinois, and completed the course in November of that year.

He enlisted in the United States Navy on March 29, 1943, and reported for Air Force Training School at Milligan College in Tennessee in July.

On March 13, 1946, McMahon graduated from Flight Training at Naval Air Station Corpus Christi, Texas. He received his wings and was commissioned as an ensign in the Navy. Five days later, McMahon married his Durand high school classmate, Bernita Baker. Bernita graduated from Nursing School in Rockford that spring.

McMahon’s training and service required frequent moves within the U.S. and gave him an opportunity to see the world. As his family grew with the additions of sons Michael, Gregory, and Terrance, they’d move the household to Florida, Virginia, South Carolina, and Rhode Island.

As a Navy aviator trained to fly from aircraft carriers, tours of duty took McMahon to the North Atlantic, the Mediterranean, and nearly to the Arctic Circle. He trained other pilots, and over time would be attached to nearly every aircraft carrier in the Navy’s Atlantic Fleet.

Over his 13-year Navy career, McMahon served as an Advanced Flight Training Instructor and Landing Signal Officer.

McMahon was chosen by the Navy for Test Pilot Training at the U.S. Naval Air Test Center in Maryland—a selection reserved for only the top naval aviators. After six months of rigorous academic and practical study, he completed the course on January 13, 1956.

Under normal circumstances, there are inherent dangers in landing a fighter jet on an aircraft carrier. Extremely short takeoffs and landings on a deck that moves with the swells of the sea give pilots little margin for error—and must be executed in all types of weather.

Promoted to lieutenant, Bob McMahon was asked to take on even higher risk when he was assigned as a test pilot attached to the aircraft carrier USS Forrestal (CVA-59). Test pilots were the first to attempt new maneuvers, techniques, and aircraft in the already challenging circumstances of carrier takeoffs and landings.

In 1956, while attached to Forrestal, McMahon and his family lived in officers’ quarters at Naval Air Station Patuxent River on Maryland’s Chesapeake Bay, just outside of Washington, D.C.

On the morning of April 12, 1956, LT McMahon was flying his FJ-3 Fury fighter jet during “suitability trials” on the Forrestal, 125 miles off the coast of Virginia. The vessel was on a “shakedown cruise”—testing catapult takeoffs and arresting wire landings before the ship and aircraft began regular service.

As LT McMahon attempted to land, the arresting wire snapped, sending his aircraft careening across the Forrestal deck. His left rear landing gear broke, plunging the plane over the edge and into the Atlantic waters. LT Robert S. McMahon, age 31, sank with the aircraft and was never recovered.

A little more than four months after Lt. McMahon was lost, his wife Bernita gave birth to their fourth son, Jeffrey.

Sources
Details and original photo provided by Mrs. Carla Vendel, LT McMahon’s niece
The Durand Gazette, April 8, 1943: Enters Training
The Durand Gazette, March 13, 1952: Completes Duty As Instructor
The Durand Gazette, March 14, 1946: McMahon—Baker
The Durand Gazette, September 11, 1952: Notice
The Durand Gazette, April 26, 1956: Lt. Robert McMahon Killed Sat. April 21 In Jet Plane Crash
The Evening Star, April 22, 1956: 2d Forrestal Pilot Lost As Arresting Gear Snaps