TWA Flight 514

Last updated
TWA Flight 514
TWA BOEING727 N54328 1974.jpg
N54328, the aircraft involved
Accident
DateDecember 1, 1974 (1974-12-01)
11:09:22 am EST
Summary Controlled flight into terrain due to pilot error and ATC error
Site Mount Weather,
Clarke County, Virginia, U.S.
39°04.6′N77°52.9′W / 39.0767°N 77.8817°W / 39.0767; -77.8817
Aircraft
Aircraft type Boeing 727-231
Operator Trans World Airlines
IATA flight No.TW514
ICAO flight No.TWA514
Call signTWA 514
Registration N54328
Flight origin Indianapolis International Airport, Indianapolis, Indiana
Stopover Port Columbus International Airport, Columbus, Ohio
Destination Washington Dulles International Airport
diverted from
Washington National Airport
Occupants92
Passengers85
Crew7
Fatalities92
Survivors0
Usa edcp relief location map.png
Red pog.svg
class=notpageimage|
Location in the United States
USA Virginia relief location map.svg
Red pog.svg
class=notpageimage|
Location in Virginia

Trans World Airlines Flight 514, was a Boeing 727-231 en route from Indianapolis, Indiana and Columbus, Ohio to Washington Dulles International that crashed into Mount Weather, Virginia, on December 1, 1974. All 92 occupants aboard, 85 passengers and 7 crew members, were killed. [1] [2] In stormy conditions late in the morning, the aircraft was in controlled flight and impacted a low mountain 25 nautical miles (46 km; 29 mi) [3] northwest of its revised destination. [4] [5] The accident was one of two crashes involving Boeing 727 aircraft in the United States that day, the other being the crash of Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 6231 later that evening near Haverstraw, New York.

Contents

Aircraft

The aircraft involved was a Boeing 727-231, registered as N54328. It was manufactured by Boeing Commercial Airplanes in 1970 and was powered by three Pratt & Whitney JT8D-9A engines. [6] [7]

Accident

On Sunday morning of Thanksgiving weekend, the eastern half of the United States experienced severe weather, with high winds, snow, and rain. [8] [9] The flight was scheduled for arrival at Washington National Airport, but was diverted to Dulles when high crosswinds, east at 28 knots (32 mph; 52 km/h) and gusting to 49 knots (56 mph; 91 km/h), prevented safe operations on the main north–south runway at Washington National. [5]

The aircraft was flown by Captain Richard I. Brock (44), First Officer Leonard W. Kresheck (40), and Flight Engineer Thomas C. Safranek (31); the flight was being vectored for a non-precision instrument approach to runway 12 at Dulles, a heading of east-southeast. Air traffic controllers cleared the flight down to 7,000 feet (2,130 m) before clearing them for the approach while not on a published segment. [3]

The jetliner began a descent to 1,800 feet (550 m), shown on the first checkpoint for the published approach. The cockpit voice recorder later indicated there was some confusion in the cockpit over whether they were still under a radar-controlled approach segment which would allow them to descend safely. After reaching 1,800 feet (550 m) there were some 100-to-200-foot (30 to 60 m) altitude deviations which the flight crew discussed as encountering heavy downdrafts and reduced visibility in snow. [3]

Shortly after 11 a.m. EST (UTC −5), the plane impacted the west slope of Mount Weather at 1,670 feet (510 m) above sea level at approximately 230 knots (265 mph; 425 km/h). The wreckage was contained within an area about 900 by 200 feet (275 by 60 m). The evidence of first impact were trees sheared off about seventy feet (20 m) above the ground; the elevation at the base of the trees was 1,650 feet (505 m). [3]

The wreckage path was oriented along a line 118 degrees magnetic. Calculations indicated that the left wing went down about six degrees as the aircraft passed through the trees and the aircraft was descending at an angle of about one degree. After about 500 feet (150 m) of travel through the trees, it struck a rock outcropping at an elevation of about 1,675 feet (510 m). Numerous heavy components of the aircraft were thrown forward of the outcropping, and numerous intense post-impact fires broke out which were later extinguished. [3] The mountain's summit is at 1,754 feet (535 m) above sea level. [10]

Investigation

The accident investigation board was split in its decision as to whether the flight crew or Air Traffic Control were responsible. [11] The majority absolved the controllers as the plane was not on a published approach segment; the dissenting opinion was that the flight had been radar vectored. [11] Terminology between pilots and controllers differed without either group being aware of the discrepancy. It was common practice at the time for controllers to release a flight to its own navigation with "Cleared for the approach," and flight crews commonly believed that was also authorization to descend to the altitude at which the final segment of the approach began. No clear indication had been given by controllers to Flight 514 that they were no longer on a radar vector segment and therefore responsible for their own navigation. [12] Procedures were clarified after this accident. Controllers now state, "Maintain (specified altitude) until established on a published segment of the approach," and pilots now understand that previously assigned altitudes prevail until an altitude change is authorized on the published approach segment the aircraft is currently flying. Ground proximity detection equipment was also mandated for the airlines.

During the NTSB investigation, it was discovered that a United Airlines flight had very narrowly escaped the same fate during the same approach and at the same location only six weeks prior. This discovery set in motion activities that led to the development of the Aviation Safety Reporting System (ASRS) by the FAA and NASA in 1976 to collect voluntary, confidential reports of possible safety hazards from aviation professionals.

The flight is also of note in that the accident drew undesired attention to the Mount Weather facility, [2] [5] [13] which was the linchpin of plans implemented by the federal government to ensure continuity in the event of a nuclear war. The crash did not damage the facility, since most of its features were underground. Only its underground main phone line was severed, with service to the complex being restored by C&P Telephone within 2+1⁄2 hours after the crash. [14]

Aftermath

In the wake of dozens of lawsuits filed with the US District Court in Alexandria, Virginia by families of the victims, a deal brokered one year after the crash by the Justice Department had TWA and the FAA agreeing to share damages and settle any lawsuits out of court. [15]

The crash, its aftermath, and its repercussions are the subject of the 1977 book Sound of Impact: The Legacy of TWA Flight 514 by Adam Shaw. TWA Flight 514 is also mentioned in the closing of the second chapter of Mark Oliver Everett's book Things the Grandchildren Should Know and in F. Lee Bailey's book Cleared for the Approach: In Defense of Flying . In 2015, a documentary entitled Diverted: TWA 514 was released. [16]

This was one of two Boeing 727s to crash in the U.S. that day; the other was Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 6231 in New York state, on its way to pick up the Baltimore Colts football team in Buffalo. [17]

Roscoe Cartwright, one of the U.S. Army's first black generals, was killed in the crash; [14] he had retired from active duty several months earlier and was accompanied by his wife. [5]

Crash site then and now

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richmond International Airport</span> Airport in Virginia, U.S.

Richmond International Airport is a joint civil-military airport in Sandston, Virginia, United States, an unincorporated community. The airport is about 7 miles (11 km) southeast of downtown Richmond, the capital of the Commonwealth of Virginia. Richmond International Airport is the busiest airport in central Virginia and the third-busiest in the state behind Washington Reagan and Washington Dulles. RIC covers 2,500 acres of land.

This is a list of aviation-related events from 1974. 1974 had been deemed as "the single worst year in airline history" although this has since been surpassed.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eastern Air Lines Flight 66</span> 1975 aviation accident

Eastern Air Lines Flight 66 was a regularly scheduled flight from New Orleans to New York City that crashed on June 24, 1975, while on approach to New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport, killing 113 of the 124 people on board. The crash was determined to be caused by wind shear caused by a microburst, but the failure of the airport and the flight crew to recognize the severe weather hazard was also a contributing factor.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pan Am Flight 214</span> 1963 aviation accident

Pan Am Flight 214 was a scheduled flight of Pan American World Airways from San Juan, Puerto Rico, to Baltimore, and then to Philadelphia in the United States. On December 8, 1963, while flying from Baltimore to Philadelphia, the Boeing 707-121 crashed near Elkton, Maryland. All 81 passengers and crew on the plane were killed. The crash was Pan Am's first fatal accident with the 707, which it had introduced to its fleet five years earlier.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ketchikan International Airport</span> Airport

Ketchikan International Airport is a state-owned, public-use airport located one nautical mile (2 km) west of the central business district of Ketchikan, a city in Ketchikan Gateway Borough in Alaska, that has no direct road access to the outside world or to the airport. The airport is located on Gravina Island, just west of Ketchikan on the other side of the Tongass Narrows. Passengers must take a seven-minute ferry ride across the water to get to the airport from the town.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">United Air Lines Flight 553</span> 1972 aviation accident

United Air Lines Flight 553 was a scheduled flight from Washington National Airport to Omaha, Nebraska, via Chicago Midway International Airport. On December 8, 1972, the Boeing 737-222 serving the flight City of Lincoln, registration N9031U, crashed while approaching Midway Airport.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sosoliso Airlines Flight 1145</span> 2005 aviation accident

Sosoliso Airlines Flight 1145(SO1145/OSL1145) was a scheduled Nigerian domestic passenger flight from Nigeria's capital of Abuja (ABV) to Port Harcourt (PHC). At about 14:08 local time on 10 December 2005, Flight 1145 from Abuja crash-landed at Port Harcourt International Airport. The aircraft, a McDonnell Douglas DC-9-32 with 110 people on board, slammed into the ground and burst into flames. Immediately after the crash, seven survivors were recovered and taken to hospitals, but only two people survived.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">American Airlines Flight 383 (1965)</span> 1965 aviation accident in the United States

American Airlines Flight 383 was a nonstop flight from New York City to Cincinnati on November 8, 1965. The aircraft was a Boeing 727, with 57 passengers, and 5 crew on board. The aircraft crashed on final approach to the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport located in Hebron, Kentucky, United States. Only three passengers and one flight attendant survived the accident.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Piedmont Airlines Flight 22</span> 1967 mid-air collision

Piedmont Airlines Flight 22 was a Piedmont Airlines Boeing 727-22 that collided with a twin-engine Cessna 310 on July 19, 1967, over Hendersonville, North Carolina, United States. Both aircraft were destroyed and all passengers and crew were killed, including John T. McNaughton, an advisor to U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara. The aircraft were both operating under instrument flight rules and were in radio contact with the Asheville control tower, though on different frequencies. The accident investigation was the first of a major scale conducted by the newly created National Transportation Safety Board. A review of the investigation conducted 39 years after the accident upheld the original findings that had placed primary responsibility on the Cessna pilot.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">TWA Flight 840 bombing</span> 1986 airliner bombing

Trans World Airlines Flight 840 was a regularly scheduled international flight from Los Angeles to Cairo via New York City, Rome, and Athens on April 2, 1986. About 20 minutes before landing in Athens, a bomb was detonated on the aircraft while it was over Argos, Greece, blasting a hole in the plane's starboard side. Four passengers died after being blown out, while another seven were injured by flying shrapnel and debris. The dead were identified as Alberto Ospino, a Colombian-born American from Stratford, Conn.; Demetra Stylian, 52; her daughter, Maria Klug, 25, and her granddaughter, Demetra, 18 months old, all from Annapolis, Md. The aircraft then made a successful emergency landing with no further loss of life.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">National Airlines Flight 193</span> 1978 aviation accident off the coast of Florida

National Airlines Flight 193, registration N4744, Donna, was a Boeing 727-235 en route from Miami, Florida to Pensacola on May 8, 1978. It was scheduled with stops at Melbourne, Florida; Tampa; New Orleans, Louisiana and Mobile, Alabama. The accident occurred at night in low visibility from fog. During the descent into Pensacola Regional Airport it impacted Escambia Bay, sinking in 12 feet (3.7 m) of water.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Independent Air Flight 1851</span> 1989 plane crash on Pico Alto, the Azores

On 8 February 1989, Independent Air Flight 1851, a Boeing 707 on an American charter flight from Bergamo, Italy, to Punta Cana, Dominican Republic, struck Pico Alto while on approach to Santa Maria Airport in the Azores for a scheduled stopover. The aircraft was destroyed, with the loss of all 144 people on board, resulting in the deadliest plane crash in Portugal's history. All of the passengers on board were Italian and all of the crew were Americans. The crash is also known as "The disaster of the Azores".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alaska Airlines Flight 1866</span> 1971 fatal jet airliner crash

Alaska Airlines Flight 1866 was a regularly scheduled passenger flight operated by Alaska Airlines from Anchorage, Alaska, to Seattle, Washington, with several intermediate stops in southeast Alaska. The aircraft was a Boeing 727-100 with U.S. registry N2969G manufactured in 1966. On September 4, 1971, the aircraft operating the flight crashed into a mountain in Haines Borough, about 18 miles west of Juneau, Alaska, while on approach for landing. All 111 people aboard were killed. The subsequent investigation found that erroneous navigation readouts led the crew to descend prematurely. No definitive cause for the misleading data was found. It was the first fatal jet aircraft crash involving Alaska Airlines, and remained the deadliest single-aircraft accident in United States history until June 24, 1975, when Eastern Air Lines Flight 66 crashed. It is still, however, the worst air disaster in Alaska state history.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 6231</span> 1974 aviation accident

Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 6231 was the fatal crash of a Boeing 727 in the eastern United States on December 1, 1974 in Harriman State Park near Stony Point, New York, just north of the New York City area. The Northwest Airlines 727 had been chartered to pick up the Baltimore Colts professional football team in Buffalo in western New York.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">American Airlines Flight 514</span> 1959 aviation accident in New York

American Airlines Flight 514 was a training flight from Idlewild International Airport, to the Grumman Aircraft Corp. airfield. On the afternoon of August 15, 1959, the Boeing 707 operating the flight crashed near the Calverton airport, killing all five crew members aboard. This was the first accident to involve a Boeing 707, which had only gone into service in October of the previous year, and the first of three accidents involving American's 707s in the New York area within three years, followed by Flight 1502 and Flight 1.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">FedEx Express Flight 1478</span> Boeing 727 hull loss accident

FedEx Express Flight 1478 was a scheduled domestic cargo flight from Memphis International Airport to Tallahassee International Airport. On July 26, 2002, the Boeing 727-232F aircraft flying this route crashed during landing at Tallahassee. All three flight crew members survived the accident with serious injuries, but the aircraft was destroyed.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alaska Airlines Flight 60</span> 1976 aviation accident

The crash of Alaska Airlines Flight 60 was an accident involving a Boeing 727-81 of the American airline Alaska Airlines at Ketchikan International Airport in Ketchikan, Alaska, United States, on April 5, 1976, resulting in the death of a passenger with 32 serious and 17 minor injured survivors among the initial 50 passengers and crew on board.

References

  1. ↑ "Plane crash in Va. kills 92". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Associated Press. December 2, 1974. p. 1.
  2. 1 2 "Virginia jet crash kills 92". Chicago Tribune. December 2, 1974. p. 1, sec. 1.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 Aircraft Accident Report Trans World Airlines, Inc. Boeing 727-231, N54328 Berryville, Virginia December 1, 1974 (PDF) (Report). National Transportation Safety Board. November 26, 1975 – via Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University.
  4. ↑ Jones, Edward (December 2, 1974). "Weather hampers air crash probe". Free Lance-Star. (Fredericksburg, Virginia). p. 1.
  5. 1 2 3 4 "All 92 On Board Killed When Jetliner Crashes in Rain Near Washington". The New York Times. Vol. 124, no. 42681. December 2, 1974. Archived from the original on December 8, 2024.
  6. ↑ "Accident Boeing 727-231 N54328, Sunday 1 December 1974". asn.flightsafety.org. Retrieved 2024-08-28.
  7. ↑ "N54328 Aircraft Inquiry". registry.faa.gov. Retrieved October 27, 2024.
  8. ↑ "Bad storm hits much of East". Lewiston Daily Sun. (Maine). Associated Press. December 2, 1974. p. 1.
  9. ↑ "Two jets crash as storm howls over East". Eugene Register-Guard. (Oregon). Associated Press. December 2, 1974. p. 1A.
  10. ↑ "Storm hampers grim search". Eugene Register-Guard. Associated Press. December 2, 1974. p. 3A.
  11. 1 2 Perkins, Jay (January 22, 1976). "Misunderstanding blamed for crash near Dulles". Free Lance-Star. (Fredericksburg, Virginia). Associated Press. p. 10.
  12. ↑ Blumenthal, Ralph (January 22, 1976). "'Confusion' Cited in Crash of Jet". The New York Times. Vol. 125, no. 43097. Archived from the original on December 8, 2024.
  13. ↑ Gay, Lance (December 4, 1974). "Jet crash pinpointed top-secret base". Eugene Register-Guard. (Oregon). (Washington Star-News). p. 9A.
  14. 1 2 "In a Place that Doesn't Exist - The Crash of TWA Flight 514". Check-Six.com. Retrieved 9 April 2019.
  15. ↑ "U.S., Airline Agree To Share Damages". The New York Times. Vol. 125, no. 43037. November 23, 1975. Archived from the original on December 8, 2024.
  16. ↑ Mary Stortstrom (November 16, 2015). "Documentary tells the story of TWA Flight 514". The Journal . Retrieved December 23, 2016.
  17. ↑ Thomas Jr., Robert Mcg (December 2, 1974). "Crash of 727 in Harriman Park Kills 3". The New York Times. Vol. 124, no. 42681. Archived from the original on December 8, 2024.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.