Air Disasters

Emery Worldwide Flight 17 leaves Sacramento Mather Airport in February 2000 while carrying a load of freight containers. Upon takeoff, the aircraft dives repeatedly and banks to the left. The pilots attempt to regain control of the crippled plane and return to the airport, but the DC-8 crashes a mile from the runway, killing all three crewmembers. Investigators suspect the cargo was loaded improperly, until a much more troubling cause is discovered upon closer examination.

The landing of a TransAsia commuter flight in bad weather goes horribly wrong in July 2014. The plane crashes less than a mile from Magong Airport in the Penghu archipelago, a popular Taiwanese vacation spot. The media quickly claims the storm caused the disaster, but investigators aren’t so certain. When another TransAsia crash occurs just seven months later, their suspicions are confirmed: there is a systemic problem with the airline, and if it isn’t corrected soon, the lives of more passengers and crew members will be at risk.

A Boeing 727 leaving Dallas for Salt Lake City on August 31, 1988 crashes just moments after takeoff, killing 14 of the 108 passengers and crew on board. The NTSB is fast to arrive on the scene, but finding the answers to what went wrong won’t come nearly as quickly. Revisit the disaster of Delta Airlines Flight 1141, recounted by one of its fortunate survivors, and follow the inquiry, which uncovers a fatal error made during takeoff.

A commercial airliner whisks 283 passengers from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur on a flight path that will take them over a conflict zone in eastern Ukraine. Mid-flight, the aircraft suddenly breaks up and crashes to Earth, killing all aboard. Signs point to a surface-to-air missile strike, but with the wreckage resting in the heart of a war zone, finding evidence proves challenging. See how investigators, against all odds, were able to literally piece together the story of what caused the 2014 crash of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17.

In Indonesia, 36 guests are getting the gold-star treatment on a demonstration tour for a brand-new Russian airliner. But the celebratory flight turns catastrophic when the pilots lose their way in the clouds and slam into the side of a mountain. Investigators struggle to understand why an advanced plane flown by an expert crew using a sophisticated navigation system could veer so far off course. The answers rest in the plane’s black box, but navigating the notorious Mount Salak to get to it will be an enormous challenge.

Qantas Airways Flight 72 is in trouble. High above the Indian Ocean, the A-330’s primary flight computer fails, causing the plane to go into a series of sudden nosedives. Violent G-forces pull passengers up from their seats. The pilots miraculously gain enough control of their crippled airplane to execute an emergency landing, but 119 passengers and crew are injured during the free falls. Investigators face extreme pressure to find a glitch buried deep in the software that could endanger all A-330s in service.

On its approach to Zurich’s Kloten Airport, Alitalia Flight 404 plows into a forested hillside, killing all 46 people on board. Close analysis of the DC-9’s flight data and cockpit recordings only raise more questions. Did a hidden flaw deep inside the airplane lead the pilots down a deadly path? Why weren’t the two pilots warned that they were flying too low? And why did the captain call off the one maneuver that would have averted disaster? The conclusions lead to swift changes, not just for the airline and airport, but for the entire aviation industry.

China Airlines Flight 140 is less than three minutes from touching down at Japan’s Nagoya Airport. Suddenly, the highly automated A300 gains speed and won’t respond to the pilots’ nose-dive commands. After an aborted landing and attempted go-around, the aircraft stalls and crashes into the ground, killing 264 passengers and crew. With so many A300s in service around the world, investigators must determine what happened before a similar accident occurs.

As air traffic controllers struggle to keep departures on schedule amid heavy snow in Denver, a DC-9 is delayed on the tarmac. When the crew is finally cleared for takeoff, the plane gets only 20 feet off the ground before banking sharply and slamming back down, killing 28 of the 82 people on board. Follow investigators as they uncover why Continental Airlines Flight 1713 crashed in bad weather while others safely took off. The discovery will change commercial flight, and the teams flying these aircraft, forever.

In the skies above the Mojave Desert, the VSS Enterprise accelerates toward the outer reaches of Earth's atmosphere, guided by test pilots. Suddenly, the aircraft breaks apart and falls from the sky, killing the flight's co-pilot. Follow NTSB investigators as they determine exactly what caused the test flight to go so horribly wrong.