[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 47 (Wednesday, April 10, 2013)]
[House]
[Pages H1897-H1899]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




           CLEARING THE NAMES OF JOHN BROW AND BROOKS GRUBER

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 3, 2013, the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Jones) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
  Mr. JONES. Mr. Speaker, on April 8, which was 2 days ago, 13 years 
ago, 19 marines crashed and burned in Marana, Arizona. It was a very 
tragic time.

[[Page H1898]]

  The Osprey, Mr. Speaker, is the plane that goes from a helicopter 
mode to a plane mode. At the time of the accident, it was actually in 
an experimental phase.
  Two years after the accident--I was here at the time the accident 
took place--I received a letter from the wife of Brooks Gruber. He's on 
my far left. He was the copilot. At the time of the accident, Colonel 
John Brow was flying the plane. The sad thing about it is why they had 
19 marines on the back. The families do not know. And quite frankly, 
the former commandant of the Marine Corps during the time of this 
accident, General Jim Jones, not a relation to me, but I think the 
world of him, he said to me, I don't know why in the world they did not 
have sacks of weight in the back instead of those 17 marines sitting 
back there.

                              {time}  1700

  Mr. Speaker, the problem is the lawsuits are over. I've spoken to the 
lawyer in Texas, Jim Furman, himself a helicopter pilot during the 
Vietnam war, and he represented the families of Connie Gruber and Trish 
Brow. In addition, Brian Alexander of New York represented 17 families. 
Mr. Speaker, I always believe this--I might be wrong because I'm not an 
attorney--that when a substantial settlement is made, then somebody was 
seen as being at fault.
  The press release has created the problem. On July 27 of the year 
2000, in the release, they make reference to a combination of human 
factors that caused the April 8 accident. Further stated by Marine 
Corps Commandant General James Jones:

       The tragedy is that these were all good marines joined in a 
     challenging mission. Unfortunately, the pilots' drive to 
     accomplish that mission appears to have been the fatal 
     factor.

  What the family and myself have been battling for since the year 2000 
is that the experts have said that the pilots did not understand vortex 
ring state and how it impacts the V-22. Vortex ring state is understood 
in most helicopters, but the V-22 was new, and they had not done any 
testing at all.
  Mr. Speaker, I want to read the paragraph from Connie Gruber when she 
asked me to look into this. This was dated December 10 of 2002:

       With so many wrongs in the world we cannot make right, I 
     ask that you prayerfully consider an injustice that you can 
     help make right. I realize you alone may not be able to amend 
     the report, but you can certainly support my efforts to 
     permanently remove this black mark from my husband's 
     honorable military service record. Military leaders continue 
     to refuse to amend this report, but I am certain there must 
     be other means of making this change. Given the controversy 
     of this aircraft and the Marine Corps' vested interest, 
     surely there is an unbiased, ethical way to rightfully 
     absolve these pilots. Please help me by not only forwarding 
     my request but by also supporting it.

  When I received that letter from Mrs. Gruber, I called and told her 
that I am a strong man of faith, and there was some reason that God put 
my name in her letter and that I would do everything I could to clear 
the names of Colonel John Brow and Major Brooks Gruber.
  I'm not a pilot, Mr. Speaker--and I don't know--but I cannot really 
understand being a pilot or a copilot in a situation where you have not 
been trained, where you didn't understand the vortex ring state and how 
it would impact the V-22 and what you should do. That's the fault of 
the United States Marine Corps, and that's the fault of Bell-Boeing. 
Again, the lawsuits are settled, and Bell-Boeing settled for big bucks, 
if I can say it that way.
  I want to give you just another idea. I have talked to so many people 
in 10 years that sometimes it gets confusing; but I think what I'm 
going to read, Mr. Speaker, probably tells the story as well as 
anything. It's from a publication called ``V-22: Wonder Weapon or Widow 
Maker.'' I'll read:

       That the tests addressing flying qualities and a phenomenon 
     called ``vortex ring state'' were reduced from 103 mandated 
     test conditions to the 33 actually flown represents a 
     cancellation of almost 68 percent of the tests in this key 
     area, including the crucial two at 20 and 40 knots at high 
     gross weight specifically applicable in this accident.

  This article further states:

       That aircrews were tasked with participating in that April 
     8 night operation without benefit of such highly relevant 
     test results and experience represents real--and what some 
     might label criminal--negligence on the part of those NAVAIR 
     and Marine Corps leaders who knew both the parameters of the 
     missing tests and the nature of this nighttime exercise. 
     Without this prior testing experience, data and subsequent 
     analysis, these pilots should not have been flying such a 
     mission.

  Mr. Speaker, what makes this so ironic is that, as I've shared with 
you, I'm in my 12th year of trying to get a letter from the United 
States Marine Corps that clearly states--and the facts support this--
that Colonel John Brow, pilot, and Major Brooks Gruber, copilot, were 
not prepared to handle vortex ring state in the V-22 Osprey. That's all 
the wives want. You would think that we were going to be sued or 
something. I've got letters from the lawyers who say, No more suits. 
It's over.
  Trish has two young boys, Michael and Matthew, and Connie has a 
little girl who is just as precious as she can be. It's just one of 
those things that, as a man of faith, you just wonder: Where is the 
guilt of those who ordered that mission that night? It made no sense. 
Dick Cheney was opposed to the Osprey, and he was really trying to 
scrap the program. He was Secretary of Defense at the time. So the 
Marine Corps ordered a mission where these three planes would go to 
Marana, Arizona, and they would play that they were going to recapture 
some Americans being held by terrorists. Really, sometimes you just 
wonder: Where is the heart? Where is the feeling? These gentlemen, 
truthfully, were known as two of the best Osprey pilots that the Marine 
Corps had at that time.
  By the way, Mr. Speaker, I actually contacted the three marine 
investigators for the JAGMAN report. That is the official evaluation of 
the accident. Major Phil Stackhouse, Colonel Ron Radish, and Colonel 
Mike Morgan have all given me letters in the last year. Each one 
clearly states that nothing in the JAGMAN report should indicate that 
the pilots did anything in a deliberate way, because the pilots had not 
been trained.
  Bell-Boeing, after being sued, hired an experimental test pilot, Tom 
MacDonald, who is pretty well known in the area of planes. Tom 
MacDonald spent 700 hours studying one issue: What happens when the V-
22 gets in the vortex ring state? In 700 hours, he discovered how they 
should handle it, and he received a national award known as the 
Kincheloe.
  I've talked to a lot of people in the 12 years on this issue, and the 
one thing that God has allowed me to understand is that His children 
deserve to be cleared. I am hopeful. We have back and forth sent a 
letter that the Marine Corps is reviewing and that the two wives have 
said they would be satisfied with, and our hope is that sometime in the 
next few weeks we will get that letter. I will go to the Secretary of 
Defense, Chuck Hagel, whom I know and have a friendship with, and I 
will ask him to assign someone on his immediate staff to work with me 
on this issue.
  I hope that the Marine Corps understands that I do not want to do 
that, because it would bring more peace to Trish and Connie if the 
Marine Corps writes the letter. Again, we're probably talking about at 
most three sentences. Trish has said, for the public, I do not want my 
children, Michael and Matthew, to go on Google and read that pilot 
error was the cause of this accident on April 8 of 2000.

                              {time}  1710

  Quite frankly, Mr. Speaker, that is what would happen if any of us on 
this floor tonight Googled ``Osprey'' and ``April 8,'' you would see 
that. It indicates it was pilot error.
  Sometimes I have some kids in my office, as I did today from my 
district, some 4-Hers, and they were asking about the things that a 
Member of Congress gets involved in. And I said not everything we get 
involved in should be or needs to be in the press. Some things that we 
get involved in, it's simply because our heart tells us that if you 
don't do it, who is going to do it? Who's going to do it if you, 
Congressman Walter Jones, don't take it up?
  I hope and pray that John Brow and Brooks Gruber and the 17 marines 
in the back will be able to rest in peace, Mr. Speaker.
  Voltaire said:

       We owe the living respect; we owe the dead the truth.

  That's all we're asking, is that these two marines can rest in peace.
  Mr. Speaker, I have said if this comes to be a reality, that I want 
to go to the

[[Page H1899]]

graves--John is buried in Arlington--with his wife and their two boys, 
and say, Colonel Brow, it's over. Then with Major Gruber, with his wife 
and little girl--he's buried in Jacksonville--is to go with them and 
say, Sleep, you're not at fault. Sleep.
  Mr. Speaker, I apologize for getting emotional, but I just feel so 
passionate about this.
  With that, I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________