On May 25th 1979, American Airlines Flight 191 (N110AA) is getting prepared for take-off. It's 2:00, and Captain Walter Lux, First Officer James Dillard, and Flight Engineer Alfred Udovich are getting ready for the big journey from Chicago to Las Angeles. They were all highly experienced with the aircraft they were flying, the McDonnell-Douglas DC-10. The DC-10 was one of the 3 original jumbo jets. The Boeing 747, the only one still flying today, was a 4 engined aircraft known for its hump that was originally used to store the cockpit because they thought the future for the 747 was a freighter and wanted to be able to load cargo through the nose. They thought the future was Supersonic transport, which they invested so much money into and yet it never left the ground. The Lockheed L-1011 Tristar is my personal favourite. It was a beautiful sleek aircraft that was almost identical to the DC-10 but it was said to be one of the safest planes in existence. The DC-10, on the other hand, was another 3-engined aircraft with a more troubled past. It had a history of accidents and a fair amount of cargo doors falling off causing a rapid decompression. Never the less, it was still a favourite of pilots and aviation enthusiasts around the globe.
At 3:02PM, the airplane is given permission to take-off from Chicago's O'Hare International Airport. The plane hurdles down the runway, increasing speed. After about a minute, the aircraft reaches V1 speed, meaning it's to fast to abort and the pilots are committed. Next up is "Rotation" speed, where pilots are fast enough to maintain a steady amount of lift to take off. Suddenly, the crew find they've lost power in engine one. The air traffic controllers watch in horror. They see something the pilots don't. But, they had already reached V1. The pilots and controllers discuss the airplane coming around and doing an emergency landing. The Dc-10 was design to maintain Flight with the loss of an engine. Figuratively anyway. Let's just say this incident proves that if the plane literally loses an engine, it is unlikely to maintain flight. The airplane begins to roll to the left, due to the loss of power. Captain Walter Lux evens it out by using the rudder to keep the plane steady.
First Officer James Dillard brings the speed down to V2 speed, the minimum speed for climbing. V2 is the fallout for, "We've reached a speed where we can climb smoothly, so we're now in Flight." It is standard procedure to reduce the speed after the loss of an engine to prevent the other engine(s) from over-revving. Suddenly, the plane roles violently to the left. The captain tries with the rudder, then the ailerons to roll the plane in the other direction, but nothing's working. The plane enters a stall, meaning "a speed which is too low to maintain lift and begins to fall to Earth", and plummets toward the ground. It lands with a BANG!
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Fatal Occurrences: Book One
Non-FictionFatal Occurrences is a series explaining Aircraft Disasters. Book 1 reports the fatal occurrences that took place during the flight of American Airlines Flight 191 on May 25th, 1979.
