By J. Dennis Robinson
It’s enough to make anyone believe in miracles. On Jan. 30, 1981, a $10.5 million FB-111A jet bomber plummeted directly toward the most densely populated section of Portsmouth. Roughly 2,500 people lived in the low-rent apartment complex then known as Sea Crest and Mariner’s Village. A spray of jet fuel set buildings on fire as the pilotless plane ripped into the earth. But 40 years later, what might have been the world’s worst aviation disaster is scarcely a footnote in local history. There was a cascading liquid fire burning across the tops of the buildings, police officer Albert Pace recalled years later. It looked like a great wave at the beach coming in only it was all flames of liquid fuel. It was pretty spectacular.