Eastern Air Lines Flight 401
| Eastern Air Lines Flight 401 | |
|---|---|
 The crashed machine in 1972 |
|
| Accident summary | |
| Accident type | Controlled flight into terrain |
| place | Everglades , about 30 km from Miami away |
| date | December 29, 1972 |
| Fatalities | 101 |
| Survivors | 75 |
| Injured | 75 |
| Aircraft | |
| Aircraft type | Lockheed L-1011 TriStar |
| operator | Eastern Air Lines |
| Mark | N310EA |
| Surname | 310 "Whisperliner" |
| Departure airport | new York |
| Destination airport | Miami |
| Passengers | 163 |
| crew | 13 |
| Lists of aviation accidents | |
Eastern Air Lines flight 401 was a scheduled flight of the former American airline Eastern Air Lines , operated with a Lockheed L-1011 TriStar ( aircraft registration number: N310EA), which crashed on December 29, 1972 at night over the Everglades in Florida .
The cause was a strong distraction of the cockpit crew. The flight led from New York City to Miami Airport . 101 people were killed in the crash and 75 survived. It was the world's first wide-body aircraft crash.
Aircraft
The Lockheed L-1011 Tristar was a very new machine that was delivered to Eastern Air Lines on August 18, 1972. She had only completed 505 landings and 987 flight hours. The machine was powered by three Rolls-Royce RB211-22B engines .
procedure
The aircraft was at night in the final approach to Miami . When the cockpit crew extended the landing gear, a problem arose. The indicator light that is supposed to confirm that the nose gear is properly locked did not work. The flight engineer checked all the warning lights and again the nose gear control light did not come on. The crew therefore did not know if the nose gear was deployed correctly.
The crew asked to be allowed to abort the approach and put themselves on hold in order to address the problem. The control tower then instructed them to first climb back to 2,000 feet , maintain that altitude, and fly a holding pattern that led the machine out over the Everglades. The autopilot was then turned on to focus on the problem. The flight engineer went down to the maintenance room to investigate the problem. The tower gave instructions to remain at 2000 feet until the problem was resolved. A few minutes later, however, the air traffic controller noticed that the aircraft had left its original altitude and dropped to 900 feet. He contacted the crew but did not address the altitude loss directly. The crew confirmed that everything on board was okay. Shortly afterwards, however, she noticed that the machine was steering towards the ground. The attempt to regain altitude with full thrust came too late and the machine fell at a speed of about 197 knots (365 km / h ) into the swampy landscape of the Everglades. The crash site ( 25 ° 51 ′ 53 ″ N , 80 ° 35 ′ 43 ″ W ) was about 30 km from the Miami runway. A fire that occurred after the crash was quickly extinguished by the swamp water, but many air travelers suffered severe burns. Two of the first survivors drowned in the approximately 15 to 30 cm deep water. The situation was also threatening as there are many alligators in this landscape and many survivors were too badly injured to be able to save themselves.
Rescue operations
Robert Marquis, who was traveling in an airboat with his friend Ray Dickinsin , was in the area when the machine flew just a few meters above his head and crashed a short time later. They rushed to the crash site to investigate and possibly help survivors. He suffered severe burns to his face, arms and legs from his rescue efforts. He still managed to save people who would have drowned without his help, especially because of the kerosene floating on the surface of the water. He was awarded prizes for his heroic commitment. Survivors later often called him the "Angel of the Everglades".
Frank Borman - then Vice President of Eastern Air Lines - personally took part in the rescue operations that same night. He met flight attendant Beverly Raposa, recognized her as a crew member and asked what had happened. She replied, “Colonel, I have no idea. We had absolutely no warning ”. (" Colonel, I have no idea. We had absolutely no warning.")
Injuries
Robert Loft and Donald Repo, the flight captain and flight engineer of the plane, survived the crash but died shortly afterwards of their injuries. The fact that the crash site was not a concrete surface, but rather a resilient swamp, cushioned the impact and helped reduce the number of people suffering severe bone fractures. The mud closed the wounded's wounds so they couldn't bleed to death. However, bacteria in the swamp infected many wounds with gas burns . Eight people therefore had to be treated in pressure chambers afterwards. All of the survivors were injured, 16 of them minor, 14 moderately severe from burns, others from fractures of the ribs, spine, extremities and pelvis .
crew
- The captain Robert "Bob" Albin Loft has worked thirty years for Eastern Air Lines for more; 30,000 flight hours.
- The first officer was Albert Stockstill; 6,000 flight hours.
- Donald Repo was the flight engineer in charge ; 16,000 flight hours.
- In addition, maintenance engineer Donadeo was in the cockpit , but he was not on duty and was therefore counted among the 163 passengers.
- In addition to the cockpit crew, ten flight attendants belonged to the crew of Flight 401. They arrived late from Miami in New York as Flight 26 on another Lockheed TriStar of Eastern and only barely made it to the departure of Flight 401. The boarding process was monitored by another cabin crew , which was replaced by the crew taking over shortly before leaving the parking position.
The cabin crew included: Mercedes Ruiz (position door 3R), Sue Tebbs (position door 1R), Adrienne Hamilton (chief stewardess, position door 1L), Trudy Smith, Dorothy Warnock, Pat Ghyssels, Beverly Raposa (position door 4R), Patty Georgia, Stephanie Stanich, and Sharon Transue.
Eight of the ten flight attendants survived the crash with injuries of varying severity. The flight attendants Pat Ghyssels (position door 3L) and Stephanie Stanich (position door 4L) were killed.
The more lightly injured stewardesses managed to collect survivors, provide first aid and give the passengers hope and courage. For example, the stewardess Beverly Raposa sang Christmas carols with the survivors to keep hope alive and, on the other hand, to show the rescue teams the way to the crash site. The stewardesses were also immediately aware of the threatening situation due to the fuel spilled into the swamp water, and they repeatedly and loudly warned the survivors against lighting matches.
However, the selfless and quick-witted action of the flight attendants was made more difficult by the lack of flashlights. All of the surviving stewardesses later stated independently during the investigation that flashlights were one of the most important utensils for the crew after the accident. Today they are required by law worldwide as part of the equipment for standard flight attendant stations.
Last pilot dialogue
This is what the pilots said shortly before the crash (follows from the evaluation of the voice recorder )
| Stock still : | We did something to the altitude. | "We have changed something about the altitude." |
| Loft : | What? | "What?" |
| Stock still : | We're still at 2,000 feet, right? | "We're still at 2000 feet, aren't we?" |
| Loft : | Hey — what's happening here? | "Hey what's going on here?" |
Investigations
The NTSB's investigations revealed that the nose landing gear was extended and locked, as was the main landing gear. The two lamps were just burned out. The answer to the question why the automatic altitude maintenance was unintentionally deactivated was that moving the control horn had automatically switched off the autopilot. It is also possible that the aircraft turned a turn due to the captain's inadvertent movement of the control horn. Together with the regulation of the engine power (which the flight accident investigators also explained with an unintentional movement) the aircraft went into a descent. The flaps were extended to 18 degrees. The debris from the machine was scattered over a length of 500 meters and a width of 100 meters. Because of these results, the NTSB held the pilots responsible for the crash.
consequences
The air traffic controller was not accused of anything, although he had not told the pilots that they were going to fly too low. He just asked if everything was okay, whereupon the pilots agreed. The air traffic controller thus fulfilled its task.
Eastern Air Lines was advised to double-check all factors in the altitude warning system. Later a lamp was installed in the cockpit to control the light on the nose landing gear, which the NTSB considered safer. Overall, Eastern Air Lines Flight 401 was a very significant aircraft accident in the history of aviation , as it contributed early to the tightening of safety measures on aircraft.
For example, procedural changes can be attributed to this accident as well as technical changes (for example a changed acoustic signal when the autopilot is switched off) and the equipment of the aircraft cabins with flashlights for the flight attendants and shoulder straps for flight attendant seats that are opposite to the flight direction (until the flight crashes 401, only the flight attendant seats attached to the front in the direction of flight had such shoulder straps). In addition, all aircraft crews - both pilots and flight attendants - have been trained in crew resource management worldwide for many years .
review
- At that time it was the worst accident involving an L-1011 .
- At the time, it was the second worst accident in the United States.
Others
After the crash, parts of the aircraft were used as spare parts for other Eastern Airlines machines. Reports of ghostly apparitions are said to have accumulated in these and other aircraft of the airline . Officially, the reports were presented as ridiculous by the airline, but they are said to have resulted in the spare parts being removed again. Several books and films deal with the alleged apparitions.
reception
- In the Canadian television program Mayday - Alarm im Cockpit , the accident was shown under the title Fatal Distraction Reconstructed. As usual in the series of disasters, the problem was shown and pilots and radio communications were retold.
- The book "The Ghost of Flight 401", in German "Das Gespenst von Flug 401", by John G. Fuller ( ISBN 978-0-285-62924-0 ) deals with the accident at night.
- The book "The Mystery of Ghosts of Flight 401", in German "The Secret of the Ghosts of Flight 401", by the author Kathryn Walker ( ISBN 978-0-7787-4155-8 ) is also a narrative of the catastrophe.
- The feature film Der Geist von Flug 401 ( The Ghost of Flight 401 ) from 1978 with Ernest Borgnine deals with the myth of ghost appearances on later flights with airplanes in which still usable spare parts from the accident machine were installed.
- Also in 1978 was the feature film Todesflug 401 ( Crash ), the plot of which deals with the crash and the investigation work. William Shatner plays the lead role of an investigative officer , while the actresses Adrienne Barbeau and Sharon Gless play two surviving stewardesses.
- Bob Welch, a musician from America, recorded the song "The Ghost of Flight 401" in his 1979 album.
There are many other books and pieces of music about this crash because it repeatedly called aviation safety into question.
Web links
- Official investigation report of the NTSB (PDF; 3.3 MiB; accessed on June 26, 2016)
- Aircraft accident data and report in the Aviation Safety Network (English)
- Eastern Air Lines Flight 401 on Google Sites
- L1011 Accidents / Eastern 401 in the German Lockheed L1011 TriStar Information Center
Notes and individual references
- ↑ Frank Borman's military rank in the US Air Force
Coordinates: 25 ° 52 ′ 0 ″ N , 80 ° 36 ′ 0 ″ W.
- ↑ See Section 1.12 Aircraft Wreckage
- ↑ Mayday alarm in the cockpit S05E09