Accident | |
---|---|
Date | January 12, 1955 |
Summary | Mid-air collision |
Site | Boone County, Kentucky |
Total fatalities | 15 |
Total survivors | 0 |
First aircraft | |
A TWA 2-0-2 similar to the accident aircraft | |
Type | Martin 2-0-2A |
Operator | TWA |
Registration | N93211 |
Flight origin | Boone County Airport |
Destination | Cleveland-Hopkins International Airport |
Occupants | 13 |
Passengers | 10 |
Crew | 3 |
Fatalities | 13 |
Survivors | 0 |
Second aircraft | |
A Douglas DC-3C similar to the accident aircraft | |
Type | Douglas DC-3 |
Operator | Castleton Inc. |
Registration | N999B |
Flight origin | Battle Creek |
Destination | Lexington, Kentucky |
Occupants | 2 |
Passengers | 0 |
Crew | 2 |
Fatalities | 2 |
Survivors | 0 |
The 1955 Cincinnati mid-air collision occurred on January 12, 1955, when Trans World Airlines Flight 694 Martin 2-0-2 on takeoff from Boone County Airport (now the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport) collided in mid-air with a privately owned Douglas DC-3 that had entered the airport's control space without proper clearance. None of the occupants of either plane survived the collision.
The TWA plane, flown by Captain J. W. Quinn and co-pilot Robert K. Childress, with air hostess (flight attendant) Patricia Ann Stermer, was a regularly scheduled flight bound for Dayton, Ohio, en route to Cleveland. Ten passengers were aboard. [1] [2]
The DC-3 was piloted by Arthur "Slim" Werkhaven of Sturgis, Michigan, with co-pilot Edward Agner of Battle Creek, Michigan, and was being flown from Battle Creek en route to Lexington, Kentucky. They were to pick up Mr. and Mrs. Fredrick Van Lennep. Mrs. Van Lennep, the former Frances Dodge, was an officer of the firm that owned the plane and founded the Dodge Stables at Meadow Brook Farm, later moving Dodge Stables to Castleton Farm in Lexington. The plane would have carried the Van Lenneps to Delray Beach, Florida.
The Martin 2-0-2A had just taken off from the airport on Runway 22 and was climbing in a right turn through a cloud base at 700–900 ft when the collision occurred about 9:00 am. [3] The DC-3 was en route from Michigan flying VFR heading roughly south towards Lexington. The right wing of Flight 694 struck the left wing of the DC-3, which caused the right wing of the Martin to separate and the DC-3 experienced fuselage, rudder, and fin damage. Following the collision, both aircraft crashed out of control, hitting the ground about two miles apart. The wreckage of one of the aircraft fell along Hebron-Limaburg Road, two miles northeast of Burlington, Kentucky. The crash had no survivors from either aircraft.
The control tower, operated by the Civil Aeronautics Authority (CAA), reported that it had no record of a flight plan for either aircraft. A CAA spokesman said that radio messages from the TWA plane shortly after takeoff indicated the pilot was "alarmed and excited". [4] The spokesman also said the pilot was cleared for takeoff and to make a right turn out.
TWA later filed a $2 million damage suit against the Castleton Corporation of Kentucky. [5]
The probable cause was determined to be operating the DC-3 in a controlled zone with unknown traffic, i.e. no clearance received and no communication with the airport tower. [6]
The Douglas DC-7 is an American transport aircraft built by the Douglas Aircraft Company from 1953 to 1958. A derivative of the DC-6, it was the last major piston engine-powered transport made by Douglas, being developed shortly after the earliest jet airliner—the de Havilland Comet—entered service and only a few years before the jet-powered Douglas DC-8 first flew in 1958. Unlike other aircraft in Douglas's line of propeller-driven aircraft, no examples remain in service in the present day, as compared to the far more successful DC-3 and DC-6.
This is a list of aviation-related events from 1996:
On August 16, 1987 a McDonnell Douglas MD-82, operating as Northwest Airlines Flight 255, crashed shortly after takeoff from Detroit Metropolitan Airport, about 8:46 pm EDT, resulting in the deaths of all six crew members and 148 of the 149 passengers, along with two people on the ground. The sole survivor was a 4-year-old girl who sustained serious injuries. It was the second-deadliest aviation accident at the time in the United States. It is also the deadliest aviation accident to have a sole survivor.
On December 16, 1960, a United Airlines Douglas DC-8 bound for Idlewild Airport in New York City collided in midair with a TWA Lockheed L-1049 Super Constellation descending toward LaGuardia Airport. The Constellation crashed on Miller Field in Staten Island and the DC-8 in Park Slope, Brooklyn, killing all 128 aboard the two aircraft and six people on the ground. The accident was the world's deadliest aviation disaster at the time, and remains the deadliest accident in the history of United Airlines.
Comair Flight 5191 was a scheduled United States domestic passenger flight from Lexington, Kentucky, to Atlanta, Georgia. On the morning of August 27, 2006, at around 06:07 EDT, the Bombardier Canadair Regional Jet 100ER crashed while attempting to take off from Blue Grass Airport in Fayette County, Kentucky, 4 miles (6.4 km) west of the central business district of the city of Lexington.
Trans World Airlines (TWA) Flight 159 was a regularly scheduled passenger flight from New York City to Los Angeles, California, with a stopover in Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport, Kentucky, that crashed after an aborted takeoff from Cincinnati on November 6, 1967. The Boeing 707 attempted to abort takeoff when the copilot became concerned that the aircraft had collided with a disabled DC-9 on the runway. The aircraft overran the runway, struck an embankment and caught fire. One passenger died as a result of the accident.
The Martin 2-0-2 was an airliner introduced in 1947. The twin piston-engined fixed-wing aircraft was designed and built by the Glenn L. Martin Company.
A Zantop Air Transport Douglas DC-4 was on its final approach to Greater Cincinnati Airport runway 18, when it clipped some trees and crashed into a wooded area north of the airport. This was the first of at least three aircraft on their final approach that failed to reach runway 18 at the Greater Cincinnati Airport, becoming victims of the area's hilly terrain with steep changes in elevation from the Ohio River, the others being American Airlines Flight 383 and TWA Flight 128.
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The Grand Canyon mid-air collision occurred in the western United States on Saturday, June 30, 1956, when a United Airlines Douglas DC-7 struck a Trans World Airlines Lockheed L-1049 Super Constellation over Grand Canyon National Park, Arizona. The first one fell into a canyon and the other one slammed into a rock face. All 128 on board both airplanes perished, making it the first commercial airline incident to exceed one hundred fatalities. The airplanes had departed Los Angeles International Airport minutes apart for Chicago and Kansas City, respectively. The collision took place in uncontrolled airspace, where it was the pilots' responsibility to maintain separation. This highlighted the antiquated state of air traffic control, which became the focus of major aviation reforms.
TWA Flight 427 was a regularly scheduled TWA passenger flight departing St. Louis Lambert International Airport (STL) in Bridgeton, Missouri on November 22, 1994, operated using a McDonnell Douglas MD-82. On the takeoff roll it struck a Cessna 441 Conquest II, killing both of its occupants.
The 1990 Wayne County Airport runway collision involved the collision of two Northwest Airlines jetliners at Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport on December 3, 1990. Flight 1482, a scheduled Douglas DC-9-14 operating from Detroit to Pittsburgh International Airport, taxied by mistake onto an active runway in dense fog and was hit by a departing Boeing 727 operating as Flight 299 to Memphis International Airport. One member of the crew and seven passengers of the DC-9 were killed.
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