David Steeves was an U.S. Air Force first lieutenant who was based at Hamilton Air Force Base near San Francisco, California. On 9 May 1957 during a training flight something went wrong and he ejected from his Lockheed Northrop T-33 Shooting Star jet trainer over California's Kings Canyon National Park landing in Dusy Basin, near the 12,000 ft. level.
Badly injuring both ankles, David for 15 days crawled nearly 20 miles over almost impassable mountains without food in freezing weather down the Middle Fork of the Kings River. Here, he fortunate, and found a ranger's cabin at Simpson Meadow that had fish hooks, beans and a canned ham.
Presumed dead and declared as such by the Air Force who have been unable to find any trace of the plane or Steeves, he after 54 days, was found by a group of campers on horseback near Granite Basin and brought out of the mountains. He became a national hero until the news media raised doubts about his story.
The wreckage of Steeves' jet was never found, and during elevated Cold War tensions, there was said to be speculation among uninformed observers that Steeves had sold his jet to Russia or shipped it piecemeal to Mexico. This speculation was not entertained by serious observers, however, given that Steeves' T-33 was a low-tech training jet that the Russians would not have wanted. Even so, the Air Force's accident report mentioned, as one of three probable causes for the jet crash, that Steeves had carried out a hoax; however, the accident report did not offer any explanation as to what the hoax might have involved. Even though no charges were brought against Steeves, he requested discharge from the Air Force, which was granted.
Steeves moved to Fresno, west of where he ejected and established an aviation firm that flew skydivers and modified light airplanes. In the following years, he took hiking trips to Kings Canyon and flew over the area in a search for the wreckage of his jet. In October 1965, Steeves was killed at the Boise, Idaho airport in the crash of a Stinson airplane that he had modified.
In the summer of 1977, some Boy Scouts from Los Angeles on a hiking trip in Dusy Basin in Kings Canyon National Park came across an aircraft canopy. In October the following year it was announced the serial number on it matched the missing T-33A jet that Steeves had piloted.
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