Transcontinental and Western Air Flight 5
| Transcontinental and Western Air Flight 5 | |
|---|---|
 Fokker F.10 of sister airline Western Air Express |
|
| Accident summary | |
| Accident type | Structural failure |
| place | Chase County / Kansas , USA |
| date | March 31, 1931 |
| Fatalities | 8th |
| Survivors | 0 |
| Injured | 0 |
| Aircraft | |
| Aircraft type | Fokker F.10 |
| operator | Transcontinental and Western Air |
| Mark | NC999E |
| Departure airport | <Departure airport> |
| Stopover | (planned :) Wichita / Kansas , Amarillo / Texas , Albuquerque / New Mexico and Winslow / Arizona . |
| Destination airport | los Angeles |
| Passengers | 6th |
| crew | 2 |
| Lists of aviation accidents | |
Transcontinental and Western Air flight 5 (erroneously referred to as Transcontinental and Western Air flight 599) was a scheduled flight of Transcontinental and Western Air on 31 March 1931 by Kansas City , Missouri to Los Angeles . The plane, a three-engine Fokker F.10 , crashed into a wheat field in Kansas after a wing was torn off . All eight inmates died, including prominent football coach Knute Rockne .
Flight plan
The machine with two crew members and six passengers on board took off as scheduled on March 31, 1931 at 9:15 a.m. local time in Kansas City with the destination Los Angeles. Stopovers were planned in Wichita / Kansas , Amarillo / Texas , Albuquerque / New Mexico and Winslow / Arizona .
Plane and crew
The machine was a three-engine Fokker F.10, a further development of the Fokker F.VII , one of the first commercially successful passenger aircraft. Equipped with three Pratt & Whitney R-1340 engines , the F.10 reached a cruising speed of 198 km / h. The monoplane was provided with wooden wings that were manufactured using a special honeycomb technology. The aircraft manufacturer Anton Herman Gerard Fokker developed these wings for the warplanes of the First World War together with his manager Reinhold Platz .
The captain was Robert Fry, 32, who had more than the 2,000 hours of flying experience required by TWA for their newly hired pilots. The copilot was Jesse Mathias.
Start to Wichita
The machine took off in the direction of Wichita, Kansas, which is about 300 km southwest. The flight should take about 70 minutes. The weather conditions were uncomfortable: in Kansas City there was sleet with temperatures around freezing point, whereas Wichita reported sunshine. On the way to Wichita, the plane had to fly through a cold front in which fog, ice and low cloud cover were to be expected.
crash
Copilot Mathias radioed the TWA station in Wichita at 10:22 to give his position. The machine was about 50 km north of the village of Cassoday. The TWA agent informed Mathias that the weather in Wichita was good. Mathias then stated that they wanted to return to Kansas City due to the worsening weather conditions. This deterioration was confirmed by a mail plane that took off from Kansas City 15 minutes later and passed the Fokker over the city of Emporia.
The next radio message from the Fokker took place at 10:35 a.m. Mathias announced that they were trying to fly to Wichita after all. At about the same time, a rancher who was feeding his cattle near the village of Bazaar heard the sound of a plane heading for Wichita. At 10:45 am Mathias radioed the TWA station again and confirmed the intention to reach the original destination.
A short time later, the left wing of the Fokker broke off and the machine crashed into a wheat field near Bazaar. All eight occupants of the aircraft were killed.
Investigation and conclusion
Investigations of the wing fragment indicated that the glued fastening of the wing honeycomb was weakened by the action of liquid through rain or fog.
Reactions and consequences
The death of football coach Knute Rockne was a tragedy for most US citizens. B. President Herbert Hoover of a national loss. With the death of the coach, who is revered as a national hero, the crash of the machine moved into the focus of the population.
As a first response, all of the Fokker three-engine aircraft were kept on the ground. The wings were carefully examined, and the wooden wing systems were subsequently abolished.
The public interest led to the need for a more thorough investigation and publication of the results.
The aviation industry began to improve the quality of its aircraft by eliminating wood as a building material. Particular attention was paid to flight safety.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Transcontinental and Western Air, flight plan 1931 (in English), accessed February 6, 2018
- ↑ Flight accident data and report of the flight accident of Flight 599 of the TWA in the Accident Database of Plane Crash Info
- ↑ Quote on The American Presidency Project (English)
- ^ WG Eckert: The Rockne crash. American commercial air crash investigation in the early years . In: The American Journal of Forensic Medicine and Pathology . tape 3 , no. 1 , March 1982, ISSN 0195-7910 , p. 17-27 , PMID 7046424 .
- ↑ Richard Harris: Chapter The Revolution . [Aviation historian] (English)
- ↑ Article in: Modern Mechanix , July 1931 (English)
Coordinates: 38 ° 14 ′ 9 ″ N , 96 ° 35 ′ 12 ″ W.