AirCraft Casualty Emotional Support Services ("ACCESS") is an American nonprofit support group based in New York City that helps surviving family members of aircraft crash victims. [1]
The organization was created by Heidi Snow, then fiancee of French hockey player Michel Breistroff, who died in the TWA Flight 800 disaster. [2] The American Red Cross provided services for two weeks, after which survivors were left to arrange support on their own. Snow contacted Rudolph Giuliani, then Mayor of New York City, who in turn suggested that she contact families of victims of an earlier crash, Pan Am Flight 103. After organizing the nonprofit, she arranged meetings between these families and those of victims of other major aviation disasters, including 9/11. [2] [3] The nonprofit also conducts sensitivity and support training for airlines and other companies that regularly deal with bereaving families and survivors. [2]
Trans World Airlines Flight 800 was a Boeing 747-100 that exploded and crashed into the Atlantic Ocean near East Moriches, New York, on July 17, 1996, at about 8:31 p.m. EDT, 12 minutes after takeoff from John F. Kennedy International Airport on a scheduled international passenger flight to Rome, with a stopover in Paris. All 230 people on board died in the crash; it is the third-deadliest aviation accident in U.S. history. Accident investigators from the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) traveled to the scene, arriving the following morning amid speculation that a terrorist attack was the cause of the crash. Consequently, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and New York Police Department Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) initiated a parallel criminal investigation. Sixteen months later, the JTTF announced that no evidence of a criminal act had been found and closed its active investigation.
Trans World Airlines (TWA) was a major American airline that existed from 1930 until 2001. It was formed as Transcontinental & Western Air to operate a route from New York City to Los Angeles via St. Louis, Kansas City, and other stops, with Ford Trimotors. With American, United, and Eastern, it was one of the "Big Four" domestic airlines in the United States formed by the Spoils Conference of 1930.
Air Florida Flight 90 was a scheduled U.S. domestic passenger flight operated by Air Florida from Washington National Airport to Fort Lauderdale–Hollywood International Airport with an intermediate stopover at Tampa International Airport. On January 13, 1982, the Boeing 737-222 registered as N62AF crashed into the 14th Street Bridge over the Potomac River.
This is the year of the deadliest air disaster in history, the September 11 attacks. This is a list of aviation-related events from 2001:
Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571, later known as Andes flight disaster and The Miracle of the Andes, was a chartered flight that originated in Montevideo, Uruguay, bound for Santiago, Chile. On October 13, 1972, while crossing the Andes, the inexperienced co-pilot of the Fairchild FH-227D who was in command mistakenly believed they had reached Curicó, Chile, despite instrument readings that indicated otherwise. The aircraft began descending too early to reach Pudahuel Airport, and struck a mountain, initially shearing off both wings and the tail section. The remaining portion of the fuselage slid down the mountain about 725 metres (2,379 ft) before striking ice and snow on a glacier. The flight was carrying 45 passengers and crew, including 19 members of the Old Christians Club rugby union team, along with their families, supporters, and friends.
Aeroméxico Flight 498 was a scheduled commercial flight from Mexico City to Los Angeles, with several intermediate stops. On Sunday, August 31, 1986, the McDonnell Douglas DC-9 operating the flight was clipped in the tail section by N4891F, a Piper PA-28-181 Archer owned by the Kramer family, and crashed into the Los Angeles suburb of Cerritos, killing all 67 on both aircraft and an additional fifteen on the ground. Eight on the ground also sustained minor injuries from the midday crash.
Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 2501 was a DC-4 propliner operating its daily transcontinental service between New York City and Seattle when it disappeared on the night of June 23, 1950. The flight was carrying 55 passengers and three crew members; the loss of all 58 on board made it the deadliest commercial airliner accident in American history at the time.
On Friday, 16 December 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 into the city's LaGuardia Airport. The Constellation crashed on Miller Field in Staten Island and the DC-8 into Park Slope, Brooklyn, killing all 128 people on the two aircraft and six people on the ground. It was the deadliest aviation disaster in the world at the time. The death toll would not be surpassed until a Lockheed C-130B Hercules was shot down in May 1968, killing 155 people. In terms of commercial aviation, the death toll would not be surpassed until the crash of Viasa Flight 742, which crashed on takeoff and killed all 84 people onboard the aircraft, as well as 71 people on the ground. The accident became known as the Park Slope plane crash or the Miller Field crash, after the crash sites of each plane respectively. The accident was also the first hull loss and first fatal accident involving a Douglas DC-8.
The Flight 93 National Memorial is located at the site of the crash of United Airlines Flight 93, which was hijacked in the September 11 attacks, in Stonycreek Township, Somerset County, Pennsylvania, about 2 miles (3.2 km) north of Shanksville, and 60 miles (97 km) southeast of Pittsburgh. The memorial was made to honor the passengers and crew of Flight 93, who stopped the terrorists from reaching their target by fighting the hijackers. A temporary memorial to the 40 victims was established soon after the crash, and the first phase of the permanent memorial was completed, opened, and dedicated on September 10, 2011. The design for the memorial is a modified version of the entry Crescent of Embrace by Paul and Milena Murdoch.
TWA Flight 800 data, physical and observational, that are absent in official reports suggest that the crash of Trans World Airlines Flight 800 was due to causes other than those determined by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB). The NTSB found that the probable cause of the crash of TWA Flight 800 was an explosion of flammable fuel/air vapors in a fuel tank, most likely from a short-circuit. An alternative explanation posits that the crash was due to a U.S. Navy missile test gone awry. On June 19, 2013, a documentary presented evidence the government investigation into the crash was a cover-up and made news headlines with statements from six members of the original investigation team, now retired, who also filed a petition to reopen the probe. Other possible causes, a terrorist missile strike or an on-board bomb, have not produced supporting evidence.
Pamela Sue Rogers Lychner was a real estate agent from Greater Houston who promoted the "Pam Lychner Sexual Offender Tracking and Identification Act of 1996" bill. She died in the crash of TWA Flight 800.
Kreindler & Kreindler LLP is a U.S. law firm founded in 1950 with offices in New York, California and Massachusetts. The firm specializes in air disaster litigation and has represented plaintiffs in most major aviation disaster litigations. According to the New York Times, Lee Kreindler, a named partner of the firm, was "considered the founder of air disaster law."
Michel Breistroff was a French professional ice hockey defenceman.
American Airlines Flight 11 was a domestic passenger flight that was hijacked by five al-Qaeda members on September 11 in 2001, as part of the September 11 attacks. Mohamed Atta deliberately crashed the plane into the North Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City, killing all 92 people aboard and an unknown number in the building's impact zone. The aircraft involved, a Boeing 767-223ER, registration N334AA, was flying American Airlines' daily scheduled morning transcontinental service from Logan International Airport in Boston to Los Angeles International Airport in Los Angeles.
The 1938 Yosemite TWA crash involved a Transcontinental & Western Air Douglas DC-2. On March 1, 1938, during a scheduled passenger flight from San Francisco to Winslow, Arizona, TWA's interstate hub, the flight encountered severe weather. The pilot radioed his intention to land in nearby Fresno. The aircraft subsequently crashed on a mountain in Yosemite National Park, and was found three months later.
Transcontinental and Western Airways Flight 1 , a Douglas DC-2, crashed into Cheat Mountain, near Uniontown, Pennsylvania, approximately 10:20 a.m. Eastern Standard Time on April 7, 1936, killing 12 of the 14 passengers and crew aboard. Flight 1 was a regularly scheduled TWA Sun Racer flight from Newark, New Jersey, to Los Angeles, California, with almost a dozen intermediate stops between. Approaching the flight's second stop, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania's Allegheny County Airport, pilot Otto Ferguson lost contact with the airport's radio navigation signal, and tracked several miles in a southwestern line off course. Fearing icing conditions, he descended in an attempt to find visual landmarks for navigation. Thick fog hindered him, and his descent continued until Flight 1 hit ice-covered trees atop Cheat Mountain, about 40 miles (64 km) south of Pittsburgh on the West Virginia line and near Uniontown, Pennsylvania. When the plane crashed it was aiming in a northern flight direction indicating that the pilot finally realized he had tracked south of his flightplan and may have been trying to correct it.
The Tachikawa air disaster occurred on the afternoon of Thursday, June 18, 1953 when a United States Air Force (USAF) Douglas C-124 Globemaster II aircraft crashed three minutes after takeoff from Tachikawa, Japan, killing all 129 people on board. At the time, the crash was tied for the deadliest in aviation history, and is notable for being the second aviation accident to kill more than 100 people; the crash of a Luftwaffe Me-321 Gigant glider and its three Bf-110 tow planes during operational trials in 1941 also resulted in 129 fatalities.
On 11 February 2014, a C-130 Hercules military transport aircraft of the Algerian Air Force, carrying 74 passengers and 4 crew members, crashed into Djebel Fertas mountain near Aïn Kercha, Algeria. Only one person survived.
The Ramada Plaza JFK Hotel was a Ramada-branded hotel at John F. Kennedy International Airport, located in South Ozone Park, Queens, New York City, New York, United States.
Safe Horizon, formerly the Victim Services Agency, is the largest victim services nonprofit organization in the United States, providing social services for victims of abuse and violent crime in 57 locations throughout the five boroughs of New York City. Safe Horizon provides social services to over 250,000 victims of violent crime and abuse and their families per year. It has over 800 employees, and has programs for victims of domestic violence, child abuse, sexual assault, and human trafficking, as well as homeless youth and the families of homicide victims. Safe Horizon's website has been accessible for the Spanish-speaking population since 2012. Safe Horizon has an annual budget of over $63 million.