Major Robert Alexander Arrington

Robert Alexander Arrington

Major George A. May was the pilot, and Major Robert A. Arrington was the co-pilot, flew a Texas Department of Corrections airplane to Oregon to pick up W.A. Johnson who had escaped from a Texas prison on March 31, 1970 and was captured in Oregon. The officers stopped in Pueblo, Colorado en route back to Huntsville, Texas. On the morning of September 17, 1971, the TDC plane left the airport and crashed around 9:04 a.m. 15-25 miles southwest of Fowler in Pueblo County, Colorado. All three men were killed. The airplane flew into a late summer storm that dropped the earliest snowfall in the Pueblo area since record keeping in 1888. Search planes were delayed because of low visibility.

Arrington was survived by his wife, Myrtle Ann Arrington. He was buried in the Erwin Cemetery in Grimes County. His marker indicates he served as a 1st Lieutenant, Battery A, 5th Battalion, 57th Artillery, Viet Nam.