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Aftermath
by
Robert Firth
Copyright 2012 Robert Firth,
All rights reserved.
Published in eBook format by eBookIt.com
ISBN-13: 978-1-4566-0714-2
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.
FOREWORD
by
Captain Maynard P. Longworth , B747-400
Tenerife, the worst accident in aviation history; like all pilots, Captain Van Zanten‘s decision to go for the take-off was only one of the many thousands of decisions he had made in his career. Rain, snow or fog obscuring the view of the entire runway was not uncommon and something he had experienced many times. He was thinking about many things; the delays, his inconvenienced passengers, the schedule, and the flight legs facing him after dropping his passengers just 25 minutes away.
Of course, he was 100% certain that the Pan Am aircraft was clear of the runway. As his aircraft was gaining speed, he was readying himself for the mental switch from visual to instruments as he would be climbing through the fog. The instant he saw the Pan Am aircraft looming into view directly ahead of him he knew, he knew right then and right there, he knew he was dead, he knew they were all dead……everything flashed through his mind… Instinctually, he pulled back on the yoke……but he knew…
No pilot would ever consider, for a moment, initiating a take-off unless he was absolutely certain the runway was clear. Van Zanten‘s decision to shove those power levers forward began a terrible and inevitable chain of horrendous events sending a enormous shock wave of loss and sorrow down through the decades.
His two children never saw their dad again. Consider the hundreds dead, each with many close friends, wives and children, relatives and associates, all suffering from this captain’s fateful decision. As the wrecked, tortured and doomed fuselage hurled itself toward its’ fiery destruction, he, in those last seconds, understood everything….
The survivors and relatives of the dead have to live for the rest of their lives with their losses and, every hour of every day, they remember and are, in this sense, forever damaged.. the changes are profound and permanent, deep scars in the psyche. AFTERMATH, speaks to these things……
In a way, the accumulated grief and loss of the aftermath eventually eclipses the enormity of the horrendous event itself …
PREFACE
I flew commercial airliners for 42 years, logging over 22,000 hours. During that time, I’ve trained literally, hundreds of pilots, both in actual aircraft and simulators. I’ve been an IP (Instructor Pilot) like Captain Van Zanten, for many of those years and have made it a point to study the mind-set of airline pilots.
I have flown over a hundred different aircraft and I’m rated and instructed in the following aircraft;
•DC-3
•CV-440, Convair 240, 340, 440
•DC-6, 7
•Boeing 707
•Boeing 727
•L-188 Lockheed Electra
•Astra Jet
In my view, almost all aviation accidents are caused by inadequate training, poor maintenance or mechanical failure. The majority however are caused by human error, by the pilot or by the controller. Of course, weather plays a role but that’s what we train for- how to survive in bad weather and how to avoid it.
Accidents in aircraft usually result in high loss of life. These aluminum tubes, moving at high rates of speed are relatively fragile compared to ‘cumulo-granite’ (rocks in clouds) and good old terra firma.
Most of us are familiar with the NTSB (National Transportation Safety Board). These are the guys that go to any accident site involving American aircraft immediately on notice. In Tenerife, on March 27, 1977, two 747’s collided on the runway. The NTSB team arrived the very next day. Their job is to study the evidence and determine the probable cause. Once their investigation is complete, they publish their findings in what they call a “Blue Book.”
There’s a string of coincidences involved in this tragedy that, one by one, lead the two aircraft, like lambs to slaughter into a no-win situation wherein death awaits them. Earnest Ghan, wrote a flying book called Fate Is The Hunter., in the case of Tenerife, it seems to me that death was indeed the hunter.
We will discuss this disturbing occurrence and focus our attention on what happened after the accident- the Aftermath.
Robert J. Firth
CHAPTER 1
“Aviation in itself is not inherently dangerous. But to an even greater degree than the sea, it is terribly unforgiving of any carelessness, incapacity or neglect.”
— Captain A. G. Lamplugh, British Aviation Insurance Group, London. c. early 1930's
The Tenerife airport disaster occurred on March 27, 1977 at 17:06:56 local time. Two 850,000 lb Boeing 747 passenger aircraft collided on the runway of Los Rodeos Airport (now known as Tenerife North Airport) on the Spanish island of Tenerife, one of the Canary Islands. On that fateful day, and at that moment in time, 583 human beings instantly ceased living. The carnage was spread over the tarmac in what was then and remains, the deadliest accident in aviation history.
KLM Flight 4805 and Pan Am Flight 1736 were, along with other aircraft, diverted to Tenerife from Gran Canaria Airport after some whacked out terrorist detonated a bomb there. The sick bastards called in a threat of a second bomb forcing the authorities to close the airport while they searched for the remaining bomb- which, in the end, turned out to be a hoax.
So many airplanes were diverted to the smaller Tenerife airport that the local controllers were forced to park many of them on the taxiways, thereby blocking them and further complicating the situation. While waiting for authorities to reopen Gran Canaria, a dense fog developed at Tenerife reducing visibility to a few hundred feet.
When Gran Canaria reopened about 4:00 in the afternoon, the parked aircraft blocking the taxiways at Tenerife required both 747s to back- taxi on the only runway in order to get into position for takeoff. Due to the fog, neither aircraft could see the other, nor could the controller in the tower see the runway or the two 747s. As the airport didn’t, at that time, have ground radar, the only means for the controller to identify the location of each airplane was via radio. As a result, several misunderstandings ensued, resulting in the KLM flight beginning its take off roll while Pan Am was still on the runway.
The KLM 747, more than three quarters of a million pounds of aluminum, engines, fuel and passengers,
