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s25e10 · 2026-03-25
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Air Crash Investigation
National Geographic Documentary
What it is
Flying is one of the safest forms of transport. But what happens when tragedy strikes? From human error and accidents to mechanical faults and design flaws, the success of aviation history is punctuated with disaster and catastrophe. It's rare, but it does happen. Follow experts as they determine what went wrong and work out how to prevent these horrific tragedies from happening again. Examine the wrecks and official records, and hear from eyewitnesses, passengers and aviation experts as we reconstruct some of the most tragic disasters in aviation history. Air Crash Investigation looks at what went wrong and how future disasters can be averted.
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13 this season · 261 totals10e01 Deadly Reputation 2011-08-13 01:00
Deadly Reputation
July 17th, 2007 TAM Airlines Flight #3054 is on its final approach to Sao Paolo's notorious Congonhas Airport. Runway 35-L at Congonhas is one of the busiest and most treacherous airports in the world. It's built on a hilltop, completely surrounded by tall buildings. The crew of Flight #3054 gets a report that the runway is wet and slippery. Captain Henrique Stephanini brings his Airbus A-320 down at the foot of the 1,945 meter long runway, activates the one working reverse thruster and applies the brakes, but his plane doesn't slow down. It hurtles down the runway at top speed, crosses a highway and slams into a building and adjacent gas station. No one on the plane survives. Twelve people on the ground are also killed. This is the worst aviation disaster in South American history. Investigators are under enormous pressure to figure out what went wrong on Brazil's busiest runway, before it claims any more lives.
s10e02 The Plane That Flew Too High 2011-08-20 01:00
The Plane That Flew Too High
August 16th, 2005 Several hours behind schedule, West Caribbean Airways Flight #708 finally takes off from Panama City en route to Martinique. The aircraft flies through weather so severe that the pilots must divert to avoid it. In addition to the turbulence, the pilots have another problem; their engines are not providing enough thrust. To solve this issue the pilots drop down to a lower altitude, but before they can reach it a Stall Warning fills the cockpit. The plane is flying too slowly to remain airborne. Before the pilots can figure out what has caused the problem, the aircraft drops from the sky and crashes on a remote Venezuelan farm. By far the worst aviation disaster in the country's history, a small team of Venezuelan investigators must now determine what brought down one of the safest airplanes in the world.
s10e03 Split Decision 2011-08-27 01:00
Split Decision
December 12th, 1985 After a six-month peace keeping mission in the Middle East, 248 elite American soldiers are on their way home for the Christmas holidays. Destined for Fort Campbell, Kentucky, they are travelling on Arrow Air Flight #1285, a discount air carrier contracted by the military to transport troops. En route from Cairo, the DC-8 eventually touches down for a routine refueling stop in Gander, Newfoundland. But just seconds after taking off again for the last leg of its journey, the plane immediately loses airspeed and altitude and crashes into a heavily wooded area just outside the remote Canadian town. An unprecedented disaster, it is one of the deadliest aviation accidents of all time and the resulting investigation ignites a storm of controversy that continues to this day.
s10e04 Break Up Over Texas 2011-12-30 02:00
Break Up Over Texas
On its second routine trip of the morning, Continental Express Flight #2574 is nearing the end of its 90-minute flight from Laredo to Houston, Texas. A state-of-the-art Embraer 120 Brasilia, the commuter plane is scheduled to make several more short flights. But just as the pilots are preparing to land, the plane falls out of the sky. Dropping thousands of feet in mere seconds, there is a massive explosion as the aircraft crashes into a farmer's field. All 14 people on board die in the disaster, and the impact is so violent that the wreckage is not recognizable as an airplane. Investigators first suspect there was a bomb on board, but when the theory is dismissed, they dig deeper and eventually reveal a chilling story of good intentions gone horribly wrong.
s10e05 Munich Air Disaster 2011-12-30 02:00
Munich Air Disaster
On 6 February 1958, British European Airways Flight 609, carrying members of the famed Manchester United football team, crashed shortly after taking off from Munich, killing 23 aboard.
s10e06 Turning Point 2011-12-30 02:00
Turning Point
On 9 October 2002, Northwest Airlines Flight 85 is cruising above the Bering Sea before problems develop and pilots must make an emergency landing in Anchorage, Alaska.
s10e07 Bad Attitude 2012-01-21 02:00
Bad Attitude
On 22 December 1999, a cargo flight operating as Korean Air Cargo Flight 8509 left London Stansted Airport for Milan, Italy, crashed about 55 seconds after taking off. All 4 crew members died in the disaster.
s10e08 Blind Spot 2012-01-28 02:00
Blind Spot
Just minutes from landing in San Diego, PSA Flight # 182 collides with a Cessna and both planes crash in a residential area; investigators must determine what went wrong in the biggest airline disaster in American history.
s10e09 Under Pressure 2012-02-04 02:00
Under Pressure
On 11 July 1991, shortly after taking-off from Jeddah's King Abdulaziz International Airport, Nigeria Airways Flight 2120 suffered an in-flight fire. The crew unsuccessfully tried to return to the airport, the plane breaking up within sight of the runway. The plane was carrying 247 Nigerian pilgrims and 14 crew who all perished.
s10e10 I'm the Problem 2012-02-11 02:00
I'm the Problem
On 7 December 1987, an angry former USAir employee by the name of David Burke boarded its parent airline, PSA Flight 1771 en route to San Francisco. The hijacker killed the pilots and shot himself after take off. Shortly afterwards the CVR picked up increasing windscreen noise as the airplane began to dive rapidly and shortly thereafter the plane crashed in a cattle ranch in San Luis Obispo County, California. All 43 people onboard were killed.
s10e11 Nowhere to Land 2012-03-10 02:00
Nowhere to Land
On 24 May 1988, TACA Airlines Flight 110, a Boeing 737 flew through a thunderstorm and suffered a dual engine flameout. The pilots amazingly managed to land on a grass levee close to a nearby stream at NASA's Michoud Assembly Facility in the Michoud area of eastern New Orleans, USA. All onboard survived.
s10e12 The Linate Airport Disaster / The Invisible Plane 2012-03-24 01:00
The Linate Airport Disaster / The Invisible Plane
On 8 October 2001, Scandinavian Airlines Flight 686, a McDonnell-Douglas MD-87 airliner carrying 110 people bound for Copenhagen, Denmark collided on take-off at Milan's Linate Airport into an Air Evex Cessna Citation CJ2 business jet carrying four people bound for Paris, France. The MD-87 plane suffered major damage and crashed into a hangar shortly afterwards. All 114 people on board the two aircraft were killed, the crash and subsequent fire killed a further more four Italian ground personnel in the hangar, and injured four more.
s10e13 Impossible Landing 2012-04-14 01:00
Impossible Landing
On 19 July 1989, United Airlines Flight 232's DC-10 was crippled when an engine explodes causing serious damage to the vital hydraulics system causing the plane to go out of control. The plane managed to land at Sioux City but the plane erupted into a fireball shortly after.