Turkish Airlines Flight 981 is the story of a design flaw that was known, documented, reported, partially corrected, and then allowed to kill 346 people. The aft cargo door of the McDonnell Douglas DC-10 had a fundamental latching mechanism defect. An incident two years earlier had revealed it. A service bulletin had been issued. A […]

United Air Lines Flight 173 ran out of fuel on a night approach to Portland International Airport while the captain and crew spent 68 minutes troubleshooting a landing gear anomaly. The fuel state had been known to be critical for over thirty minutes. The first officer and flight engineer mentioned it. Repeatedly. In language that

Aloha Airlines Flight 243 is the case study that created the discipline of ageing aircraft structural management. On 28 April 1988, at 24,000 feet over the Hawaiian islands, an 18-foot section of the upper fuselage of a Boeing 737 tore away. The aircraft had accumulated 89,680 flight cycles — more than any other commercial aircraft

Korean Air Cargo Flight 6316 crashed during a rejected takeoff at Shanghai Hongqiao Airport, killing all three crew members and five people on the ground. The rejection occurred at high speed after the crew received an incorrect takeoff clearance, began rolling, and then attempted to stop when they realised the clearance was wrong. At the

The Überlingen mid-air collision is the case study where two safety systems — the air traffic controller and the Traffic Collision Avoidance System (TCAS) — gave opposite instructions to the same aircraft, and the crew chose the controller. That choice cost 71 lives. On the night of 1 July 2002, a Bashkirian Airlines Tu-154 and

Eastern Air Lines Flight 401 is the case study that gave the aviation safety world the concept of channelised attention — the complete redirection of cognitive resources toward a single low-priority task, to the exclusion of everything else that matters. On 29 December 1972, a brand-new Lockheed L-1011 TriStar — one of the most advanced

China Airlines Flight 006 is one of the most dramatic automation-induced upsets in aviation history. Cruising at 41,000 feet over the Pacific, the Number 4 engine flamed out. The autopilot, attempting to maintain heading and altitude with asymmetric thrust, gradually increased bank angle to compensate. The bank angle reached the limit of autopilot authority. The

Asiana Airlines Flight 214 struck the seawall below San Francisco International Airport’s Runway 28L threshold at 116 knots — 37 knots below approach speed — in perfect visual conditions on a clear summer day. The aircraft had every technical advantage: good weather, a functioning aircraft, a clear visual approach. None of it helped, because the

Lufthansa Flight 2904 overran the end of Warsaw’s Runway 33 in a severe crosswind and rain storm, struck a bank beyond the runway, and caught fire. Two people died. The proximate cause was that the aircraft’s spoilers did not deploy on touchdown — the system that provides the majority of aerodynamic braking on a wet

The Gimli Glider is aviation’s most famous arithmetic error. On 23 July 1983, a brand-new Boeing 767 — Air Canada’s flagship aircraft — ran out of fuel at 41,000 feet over the Canadian prairies because its fuel load had been calculated in pounds when the calculation required kilograms. The actual fuel aboard was approximately half