AIR CRASH INVESTIGATION

April 4, 1977. Southern Airways flight 242 is en-route from Huntsville, Alabama to Atlanta, Georgia. Ten minutes into the flight the crew notices a menacing storm in their path. Their radar shows them a "hole" in the middle of the storm, the crew believes that "hole" is an area of better weather, and decides to fly towards it. Suddenly the plane is in the midst of a punishing rain and hailstorm. The hail is so severe that it cracks the cockpit windshield, and visibility is nonexistent. They crew has lost power to many of their instruments, and one by one they have lost both of their engines. They’re now trying to glide to a safe landing. The tower suggests heading towards Dobbins Air Force Base, 20 miles away. En route to Dobbins the crew realizes they aren’t going to make it, they decide to put the DC-9 down on a nearby highway. Almost immediately though, it clips a tree with its left wing, ploughs into a car at service station, breaks up and bursts into flames. An inferno erupts. The flight crew, 62 passengers, and 8 people on the ground are killed. Astoundingly, 21 people on board survive.

In 1985, an Air India flight vanishes off the coast of Ireland. The rescue mission discovers that the crew had no warning before the jet vanished.

Due to neligence, a Birgenair Flight smashed into an ocean in 1996. And the data recorder revealed confusing sound of multiple alarms

Description: December 29, 1972. Eastern Airlines Flight 401 is coming in for a landing in Miami. On the crews instrument panel, one of the three green lights confirming the planes landing gear is down and locked remains unlit. Captain Robert Loft decides to have the auto pilot fly the plane in a holding pattern while he and his crew work to fix the problem. Flying at 2,000 feet all four men in the cockpit focus their attention on the troublesome bulb. None of them notice that the plane is slowly descending to the ground, until its too late. The brand new L-1011 slams into the remote swampland of the Florida Everglades. Miraculously 77 people survive the initial crash. Investigators determine that the plane was mechanically sound, and that its auto pilot was working. So why had the state of the art jetliner fallen from the sky? The clues would lead investigators to a very troubling cause.

A party of Russian school children is on board a Tupolev 154 on its way to a holiday in Spain. A DHL courier plane is flying from Italy to Belgium. Their paths cross on the German/Swiss border. Back at the traffic control room, a lone controller is left to supervise two screens a meter apart. The planes head toward each other and pilots radio the controller. Unfortunately, he is at the other screen and doesn't hear them until it's too late. The two planes descend into each other and 71 people die, most of them children. The TCAS (Traffic Collision Avoidance System) could have saved them - what went wrong?

A passenger jet is a traveling life-support system that contains the highly pressurized atmosphere we need to survive in the sky. But if that pressure escapes, it can be a nightmare come true… Featuring gripping reenactments, archival footage, and eyewitness accounts, "Ripped Apart" revisits some of the most spectacular aviation disasters of the last fifty years to expose the explosive power of decompression. Along the way, the documentary reveals the many breakthroughs and design innovations that were implemented only after something went horribly wrong..

Marvels of engineering, todays modern jetliners are made up of hundreds of thousands of parts. Keeping these behemoths in the sky requires constant maintenance and repair. And if just one tiny flaw is overlooked, the result can be catastrophic. Featuring gripping reenactments, archival footage, and eyewitness accounts, Deadly Shortcuts revisits some of the most troubling aviation disasters that were caused by just a tiny, almost unseen problem.

When pilots climb into the cockpit of a modern jetliner, they put their trust in an automated computer system that can control virtually every aspect of flight. Its a complicated relationship between man and machine and when it doesnt work perfectly, disaster can strike in an instant. Featuring gripping reenactments, archival footage, and eyewitness accounts, Whos Flying the Plane? revisits some of the most troubling aviation disasters that resulted from problems with autopilots and computerized systems.

Bad weather can turn an ordinary flight into a fight for survival. And the right information and equipment - both on the ground and in the air - can mean the difference between life and death. In December 2008 the United Sates was battered by a series of fierce storms. Cruel Skies brings viewers inside the U.S. Aviation Weather Center in Kansas City Missouri throughout the worst of those storms to see how forecasts are made, how information is passed on to pilots, and how planes are diverted around the most dangerous weather. Cruel Skies also revisits four pivotal aviation disasters and near-misses that have taught the industry on how to get planes in the air safely.

Clear communication is essential to safe flying. When it doesn't take place - disaster strikes. All Clear revisits five pivotal aviation disasters - and charts the changes they've forced air traffic controllers to make. All Clear also looks into the future - and takes viewers on an FAA test flight with NextGen - an all-new, digital air traffic control system that will revolutionize the airline industry. The race to fix a broken system is on -- before disaster strikes again.

November 12th, 1996 - Shortly after take off from New Delhi, Saudi Airways Flight 763 levels off at 14,000 feet. As the crew waits for clearance to climb to their cruising altitude, the plane is hit by a Kazakhstan Airlines jet. The collision cripples both planes. They spiral violently to the ground, killing all 349 people on board. It's the worst mid-air collision in the history of aviation. The two wreckage fields are five miles apart. As investigators comb through the charred debris for evidence, they try and answer troubling questions: Why did the two planes collide? Who's responsible? And can they stop it before it happens again?

It's August 6th, 2005. Tuninter Flight 1153 is flying to the Tunisian resort island of Djerba. It's high above the Mediterranean when suddenly, its right engine fails. As the pilots begin an emergency descent, their situation gets much worse. Their second engine also stops working -- the plane begins falling towards the sea. Despite numerous attempts, the crew can't restart their engines. They make a desperate choice - to attempt a landing at sea. Twenty people survive - but fourteen of the 34 passengers are killed. Investigators discover a shocking mistake - that could effect one of the most popular turb-prop passenger planes in the world.

October 31, 1994 - It's a frigid Halloween night in the skies above Chicago. Bad weather is delaying dozens of flights, including American Eagle 41-84. Suddenly - the plane spins wildly out of control. The pilots fight desperately to right their plane - but can't. It smashes into a cornfield. All 68 people on board are killed instantly. Investigators eventually discover the cause is a rare weather phenomena - and a fatal design flaw.

Twenty minutes after taking off from Taipei, Taiwan a China Airlines 747 suddenly disappears from radar. A massive rescue mission is launched, ut all 225 passengers and crew are dead. After ruling out both a bomb and a gas tank explosion, investigators are stumped. They examine hundreds of pieces of wreckage until they discover a single piece of the hull that solves the riddle. Tragically, the crash of Flight 611 began with a problem that began twenty-two years earlier.

September 8, 1989 - On a charter trip from Oslo to Hamburg, Partnair Flight 94 is cruising at 22,000 feet -- when it suddenly begins diving toward the sea. The aging propeller plane crashes into the water. All 55 people on board are killed. It is the biggest airline disaster in Norwegian history. As investigators piece together what happened, they uncover a problem so serious, it sends shock waves through the industry. How had a single bolt caused the plane to fall out of the sky? And why is it a potential problem for every passenger plane in the world?

April 4, 1975. In the final, chaotic days of the Vietnam War, US President Gerald Ford orders an urgent mission of mercy called 'Operation Babylift'. Its goal: to rescue Vietnamese orphans from the chaos of the war and take them back to the safety of the US. Nearly 250 Vietnamese babies and children are loaded onto an Air Force C5A Galaxy, one of the world's largest planes. But after a steep and rapid ascent to get out of missile range, the aircraft's cargo door is violently blown off and the plane crashes to the ground. What caused the tragic accident? And can investigators find out before they have to flee the country?

January 1st, 2007 - After taking off from Indonesia's Suribaya airport, Adam Air Flight 574 settles in for the two-hour trip to Manado. The Boeing 737 is loaded with New Year's travelers taking advantage of the country's recent discount travel boom. But somewhere over the Java Sea, the plane hits turbulence, and air traffic controllers notice the jet is hundreds of miles off course…and headed for a major storm. Air traffic controllers get in touch with the lost plane - and try guiding it back on course. But the jet's navigational systems aren't working. And the bad weather is closing in. The crew struggle to find their way - when suddenly, flight 574 disappears from radar. Rescue teams search a section of the sea the size of Ireland - but it's a fisherman who finds the first piece of wreckage. There's no hope of survivors - 102 people are killed. After months of arguing over who will pay for the salvage operation, investigators eventually retrieve the aircraft's data and voice recorders. The rest of the wreckage is left behind. When they study the black boxes, investigators realize that the crew made a series of small mistakes that doomed their plane. When they took manual control of their jet, they were betrayed by a poor understanding of their automation systems - and flew the aircraft into the sea. But pushing further, investigators find that Adam Air did not properly maintain their jets. Problems with the navigational system were well known - but never fixed. Pilots also received poor training when it came to dealing with mechanical problems. Investigators conclude that the country's entire fleet of discount carriers - not just Adam Air -- was riddled with safety issues. The investigation eventually brings about Adam Air's suspension, and large-scale reforms to Indonesia's airline industry.