Death of Roberto Clemente

Date: December 31, 1972 • Location: Carolina, United States

Puerto Rican baseball player Roberto Clemente (pictured) died in a plane crash en route to deliver aid to victims of that year's Nicaragua earthquake.

Roberto Enrique Clemente Walker was a Puerto Rican professional baseball player who played 18 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Pittsburgh Pirates, primarily as a right fielder. On December 31, 1972, Clemente was killed when his Douglas DC-7 airplane, which he had chartered for a flight to deliver emergency relief goods for the survivors of a massive earthquake in Nicaragua, crashed and plunged into the water off the coast of Isla Verde, Puerto Rico. He was 38 years old. After his death, the National Baseball Hall of Fame changed its rules so that a player who had been dead for at least six months would be eligible for entry. In 1973, Clemente was posthumously inducted, becoming the first Latino and Caribbean player and second of Hispanic descent to be honored in the Hall of Fame. He is widely referred to as "the Great One."