Category: Accidents and Incidents –  Page 35

Turning a Runway Overrun into a Crash (East Coast Jets flight 81)

Last week, I went through the details of the fatal runway overrun of East Coast Jets flight 81. This is one of those accidents where it seems easy to blame the pilots for not following procedure and then, when it went wrong, making bad decisions. I needed to split the posts in order to have…

Read more… 5 Oct 18

Fatal Runway Overrun (East Coast Jets flight 81-2008)

On the 31st of July in 2008, East Coast Jets flight 81 departed Atlantic City International Airport carrying two pilots and six passengers for a non-scheduled domestic passenger flight to Owatonna Degner Regional Airport in Owatonna, Minnesota. Two and a half hours later, they were dead. This crash is interesting to me because at first…

Read more… 28 Sep 18

High Altitude Rescue Gone Wrong

In 2015, the Utah Department of Public Safety reported that one of its helicopters nearly crashed during a recovery operation in Draper UT. The NTSB report reference GAA15CA258 and the raw video were released in 2016 but I’ve only just seen this, thanks to the excellent feed of aviation videos run by What You Haven’t…

Read more… 21 Sep 18

Runway Not In Sight at Princess Juliana International

Princess Juliana International Airport handles only about 60,000 aircraft movements a year (compared to almost 500,000 at Heathrow) but it is renowned the world over because of its layout. One end of the 2,000 m/7,000 foot runway (10/28) is very close to Maho Beach and the low approaches are very popular on Youtube. There are…

Read more… 7 Sep 18

The Long Fall of One-Eleven Heavy

I received an interesting Esquire article by email from a reader who thought I would enjoy the detailed story of Swissair Flight 111. Published in 2000, it’s called The Long Fall of One-Eleven Heavy and is a very emotional and literary description of the crash of Swissair flight 111. Swissair flight 111 was a scheduled…

Read more… 24 Aug 18

Details of the Horizon Air Dash 8 stolen and crashed by employee

On Friday, the 10th of August 2018, Seattle looked on in horror as a de Havilland Dash 8-400 flew what appeared to be aerobatics over the Puget Sound before crashing onto Ketron Island. At about 19:35 local time, the controller at Seattle Tacoma Airport (SEATAC) realised there was an unidentified aircraft on runway 16C. You…

Read more… 17 Aug 18

Accident Reports

Bomber 139's Third Run: What the Investigation Found

In order to follow this analysis, you’ll need to have the details of the flight and the crash from last week’s article about the flight. When we last saw Bomber…

Bomber 139's Third Run: Downhill to Disaster

On the 6th of February 2023, a Boeing 737-3H4 Large Air Tanker crashed into a ridge line of 222 feet elevation in Fitzgerald River National Park in Western Australia. There…

Demystifying

Another quick round of questions and answers

It’s time for another Questions and Answers session. I started this series a few years back, when a reader asked if there was a way to pose aviation questions outside…

Durga Puja Pandal Shows Air India Flight 171 Crash

The following video from a religious festival in West Bengal, India, has caught a lot of social media attention. It shows a detailed representation of an Air India Boeing Dreamliner…

History

Gladys Ingle Inflight Wheel Change: Emergency Action or Stunt?

This video of a mid-air wheel exchange goes viral once a year or so, but I never get tired of watching it. Last week, it showed up on Reddit and…

The Disappearance of the Hawaii Clipper May Not Be as Mysterious as Was Thought

This week, we have a guest post by J.B. Rivard who wrote an article for the American Aviation Historical Society (AAHS) and used one of my articles as a reference.…

Fun Stuff

The Mystery of the Caged Tyres and the Porcupine Who Flew Home

This photograph was posted to r/shittyaskflying, a subreddit dedicated to asking silly questions and giving silly answers. In this case, the photograph is enough to make one wonder what’s going…

Songs About Failed Spacecraft and Space Disasters

This week, I’m handing over Fear of Landing to my friend Jack Keller who promised me a playlist of music relating to my interests. All of the titles except one…