How Pan Am's Criminal Negligence Crashed A Jet | Pan Am Flight 160

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707 Image: Rob Hodgkins
This is the story of Pan Am flight 160. On the 3rd of november 1973 a pan am cargo 707 was on the ground at JFK on its way to frankfurt with a stopover in prestwick scotland . The cargo on the flight was mostly innocuous but it held in its cargo holds 15000 pounds or 6800 kilos of chemicals. The plane took off with no issues whatsoever and once in the air the controllers asked flight 160 to climb and maintain 31000 feet.
As flight 160 continued its climb at 9:04 am the pilots noticed something strange. Smoke was starting to accumulate near the electrical compartment. The plane at this point was 100 miles east of montreal and the pilots thought that the best course of action would be to divert to boston. Immediately they let pan am operations or panop know about the smoke in the cockpit. Montreal center immediately cleared the plane to make a 180 degree turn. But as the plane made a bee line for boston the smoke in the cockpit was growing thicker and thicker. Within minutes the smoke was so thick that the pilots made another radio call to the operations center they said “the smoke is getting too thick”. The back of the cockpit was full of smoke at this time, no one knew how much time they had in the air before the fire would consume everything onboard. The controllers at boston knew that flight 160 was in some serious trouble so much so that they gave flight 160 preferential treatment even though they had not declared a formal emergency. Onboard the 707 things were going from bad to worse, the DME or the distance measuring equipment no longer worked and so the pilots asked the controllers for the distance boston. The 707 was starting to fail. The controller replied with "You're passing abeam, Pease Air Force Base, right now, s i r , and you're about 40 to 45 miles to the northwest of
Boston”. The controller asked the pilots if they wanted to declare an emergency but the pilots said “ Negative on the emergency, and may we have runway 33L”. The controllers were more than willing to give this crew anything they needed to get the burning plane on the ground, the pilots were now shutting down all non essential systems.
The crew and the controllers were coordinating on the best and fastest way to get the plane on the ground. Soon the plane was nearing Boston, they were almost down. The controller said “"Clipper 160, advise anytime you have the airport in sight. " But the crew didnt reply. The controller transmissitted again “"Clipper 160, this is Boston approach control. If you read, squawk ident on any transponder. I see your transponder just became inoperative. Continue
inbound now for runway 33 left, you're No. 1”. Still no reply. From the tower other controllers got a glimpse of flight 160, the left hand cockpit window was open and smoke was billowing out from it. The plane looked like it was barely under control. Yawing and rolling from side to side. Then it crashed short of the runway. The controller who had been talking to flight 160 transmitted “' A l l aircraft on the frequency, the airport is closed at Boston”. None of the 3 crew members on flight 160 survived.
The wreck of the plane showed tell tale signs of a fire onboard. Parts of the plane were caked with soot. The CVR showed that the pilots had donned the oxygen masks but the smoke still overcame them over the course of the flight. Just to put into context how hard it was for the crew, the crew asked if they could stay on the current radio frequency because it was too hard for them to see the radio stack through the smoke. But despite this they all remained calm and professional and kept working the problem at hand.

[@TheRockprincess1697]

My Chemical Engineer heart just sank hearing about the way the nitric acid was transported. Even if the laws are not good, the logistics company should at least be aware of the hazards of transporting chemicals.

[@evilkidd174]

I'm surprised they even let it be transported by air. Nitric acid is nightmare fuel.

[@phils4634]

Nitric acid's always a problem, since it is relatively non-viscous (unlike sulphuric acid) and WILL easily leak from even the most carefully-closed threaded seals. Apart from the (obvious) nitration potential it's also an amazing oxidiser, and will certainly cause ignition of finely-divided organic material (as we see).

[@oxcart4172]

I'll just leave this here (and hope that you haven't already seen it!) kzbin.info/www/bejne/mZy2oHeNZ5KqqMU

[@M167A1]

I hear you, I know that hazmat regulations are kind of Byzantine but this is just unfathomable.

[@skylined5534]

It's just a bit of nitric acid, what could go wrong?! As it turns out, a lot. RIP to those who lost their lives in this wholly preventable debacle.

[@vicstick75]

If a cockpit full of smoke is not an emergency, I don't know what is.

[@Its_Danny-]

Yeah, burning alive, 'you want to declare an emergency?' 'Nah I'm good' like how is that not an emergency 😂

[@warrenclement5240]

I was a witness to the approach to Bos and at the same time heard all the radio transmissions between the tower and the 707. I was about to taxi a Convair 580 from a gate for maintenance purposes when I heard the tower offering landing clearance to the Clipper starting with 22R, 22L then 33, the airplane was not responding on the radio and finally was given the clear to land any runway. The airplane turned final to Rwy. 33. and it began a number of Dutch Rolls, alternating from left to the right wing. The intensity of the rolls was increasing as it continued to get closer to the runway. The final roll was a complete one and the airplane crashed inverted into the ground at an almost vertical attitude. Later while reliving the event, I couldn’t remember if the landing gear was up or down.

[@MrSuzuki1187]

Professional pilots DECLARE AN EMERGENCY when they are experiencing an emergency! I am a retire airline pilot and at my airline, we would declare an emergency even if the situation was not dire, just in case things got worse. Also, why would the flight engineer switch essential power to the ground mode when they were still in flight? I was a B-727 flight engineer instructor and we would never have switched to the ground mode, because the checklist said GROUND. Man... A very well done presentation and I commend you for making things clear even to the non-pilot.

[@cchris874]

With five fatal events in 9 months, it seems Pan Am was anything but professional back then.

[@steinarjonsson_]

There is no such thing as a non-serious fire on board a plane. There is only one type of fire and it is ALWAYS dead serious!

[@mikekeenan8450]

That was the first thing that came to my mind. Why did they insist on going as far as Boston? Wouldn't it have made more sense to land at Montreal, or Bangor, or Portsmouth, or...?

[@fleetwin1]

My uncle flew for Pan Am back then and told me about this accident, he had just flown with this poor captain a few weeks earlier.

[@davef.2811]

"Unfortunate" captain.

[@fleetwin1]

@@davef.2811 along with the rest of the cockpit crew...

[@juliemanarin4127]

😢

[@savroi]

Yes, criminally negligent, no doubt. The transportation of hazardous chemicals are on the same level as bombs. They can't be treated as ordinary cargo and must be handled with extreme precaution. I am amazed nothing happened whilst they were set inside the cargo bay.

[@pibbles-a-plenty1105]

Bombs are a lot safer. You have to fuse them first.

[@savroi]

​@@pibbles-a-plenty1105 ​True, that's because bombs are known to explode if not handled appropriately which means they are not active until launch, everybody in a mile around knows you're loading bombs including the captain. To be clear, bombs are usually a lot safer to handle because everyone involved knows what would happen otherwise. At any rate this happened: kzbin.info/www/bejne/hpiugJeNosqqqbM Chemicals on the other hand are a mixed bag. Storing Nitric acid in a container full of sawdust is criminal, the captain not being aware is criminal. It would be the equivalent of loading armed bombs and not telling anyone. Cargo handling has improved a lot since the seventies (my father was a cargo manager for SAS during the fifties and sixties) He didn't have to deal with bombs but he would freak out and fire people if baggage and cargo were not properly secured. Not handling cargo appropriately just leads 99% of the time to it being broken or damaged. Unloading 150 broken bottles of vodka in a hot summer evening was, according to my father, hilarious. But that's not always the case. kzbin.info/www/bejne/omfXdpmYr7uboLs Knowing what you're loading and knowing how to load it can never be underestimated.

[@quasarsavage]

And pls tell the freaking pilots what’s on the plane today… smh no wonder pan am fucking nosedived in the coming decade and a half after this

[@juliemanarin4127]

Exactly

[@bruceabrahamsen221]

I had smoke a few times in my flying career. Diverted to the nearest airport! You can't mess around as you can see with this crash.

[@Monothefox]

The goggles, they do nothing! Yes, PanAm were grossly negligent.

[@Tadesan]

Up and at them!

[@exrobowidow1617]

Years after this accident, I was in line to check my baggage at the ticketing counter. Another family had a small RC car they were trying to check, as they were traveling to some type of event for their hobby. Unfortunately for them, it was gas powered. They weren't allowed to transport the fuel, of course. But they also were not allowed to transport the car, because it had gas in the tank. "But we emptied the gas tank completely!" they said. The airline agent explained that there is always residual fuel, which causes fumes, so they could not take the car on the airline. PERIOD. I felt sorry for the family, as they probably did not have time to arrange ground transportation for their little car. I was also a little, tiny bit surprised that an empty gas tank could be such a huge problem, and couldn't be resolved somehow, but obviously it's good that the airline was putting safety first. You don't want even "a little bit" of unsafe, when you're in the air. I guess the moral of the story is: Do your homework before attempting to transport questionable items by air.

[@galady8632]

Wow! Who would think fossil fuel on an airplane would be a bad idea? Me! Me! Me! Detailed info is included on airline websites, Homeland Security website, NTSB website, etc. Ask questions before planning any trip is always wise. Good old UNcommon sense. Google is an easy source of information - and it's free!

[@patrickbuick5459]

I still remember going on a ferry in Canada that made us dump the Jerry cans and fill them with water. Topped up ours and a few other people's tanks... They were going to make a fuss about the propane tanks, but I believe they were already empty.

[@Rishnai]

@@galady8632 Strange. Nowhere in OP’s comment does it say the story was an era where any of those tools existed. Where’s YOUR UNcommon sense? People can’t check pages that don’t exist, yet you made assumptions to platform a rant. How ironic.

[@russellholm742]

As someone who worked for an airline for 28 years loading aircraft, YES THEY WERE NEGLIGENT !

[@cchris874]

Either it was bad luck, or Pan Am must have been in shambles as this was just the 2nd of 5 fatal Pan Am crashes in a period of 9 months, which must be a world record.

[@PDX53]

You may be interested in United Flight 173 that occurred on Dec. 28. 1978. Flight crashed into a Portland, OR neighbothood b/c they ran out of fuel. A guy had been living in a house he was remodeling & decided to get a burger and when he got back his home was in small slivers.

[@questionablebackyardmeows]

Very similar to the Valujet crash (except then it was oxygen generators in a closed hold that caused/fueled the fire). Amazing no one had learned the "always check cargo" lesson from this

[@francistessier687]

Another example of a cargo fire was UPS Flight 006. Like the ValueJet crash, its cargo, namely lithium-ion batteries, caught fire.

[@moi01887]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/r6uvhWmVibagp5o

[@steinarjonsson_]

Oxygen is not a fuel but it lowers the combustion point of fuels, enabling a fire to burn through the fuel more efficiently.

[@PJHEATERMAN]

Caused a major overhaul in the rules for F.A.A. designated repair stations as it pertains to Aircraft parts, how they are stored and traceability from it's orgins to it's final user.

[@Cris-em9tn]

As people said, multiple cargo fires have been caused by negligence, either criminally or accidentally. But pilots can't just go tear into the cargo to check. For mail, that's simply illegal in the US. For anything else, cargo operators handle writing the manifests and having pilots sign off due to responsibility: if something goes missing, you know it had to be someone who could get into the actual cargo. And it also shows by chain of command who was at fault. Because of how few hands are in the cargo itself, they quickly traced back why ValuJet crashed: who wrote empty instead of expired, who did the pins wrong, etc. It's just sadly sometimes, dangerous materials get by the last safety check. Maybe a person's carry on didn't show a weapon, maybe cargo fires happened. But man... when it's with something that produces oxygen, it's a lost cause.

[@hostrauer]

Unfortunately, the Boeing 707's design made it especially vulnerable to a well known yaw-roll problem called a "Dutch roll," making the yaw damper on the 707 extra vital.

[@MegaSunspark]

Yes, but why is turning off the yaw damper is even allowed when it is safety critical to the control of the aircraft? It reminds me of SwissAir 111 where the opposite happened. When they turned off the electrical power to most of the aircraft due to smoke in the cockpit, the inflight entertainment system called the IFEN continued to operate with power as it had its own circuit breaker which was not part of the fire checklist. And guess where the fire started? ....in one of the IFEN wires ...and this system's circuit breaker didn't trip even though the faulty wire was arching and burning.

[@blablaglag0393]

Ohhhh right the 747-400 in xplane does that, that yaw damper very important

[@davemould4638]

@@MegaSunspark A loose or faulty connection will create a high resistance that will heat up and can cause arcing and fire. But it will also result in a *decrease* in the current through the wire, and so you would not expect a circuit breaker to trip or a fuse to blow.

[@MegaSunspark]

@@davemould4638 That's exactly true. The arc event may cause a momentary high current flow while it's happening, but it might be too brief of time to trip the breaker. Breakers are designed with some tolerance so they don't trip everytime there is a short spike in the current, otherwise they'd be tripping constantly. There are though some breakers that are designed so if they sense repeated spikes within a short span of time they will trip. Then you will have to manually reset it. Hopefully after you corrected the problem.

[@davemould4638]

@@MegaSunspark No, the point is that heating and arcing due to a poor (loose) connection does not cause any current spikes at all. The current through the whole circuit *drops* due to the increased resistance of the poor joint. However, instead of all the power being consumed by the legitimate load (motor, radio, heater or whatever), much of the power is now dissipated as heat in the faulty connection, which should not be taking any power at all. Power is a function of the square of the current multiplied by the resistance (I2R). In a good connection, if the current is 10 amps and the resistance of the connection is 0.0001 ohms, then the power disippated in the connection will be 0.01 watts, so no overheating. There is also no air gap in the connection so no arcing. If the connection comes loose, its resistance might increase to (say) 10 ohms. This will cause the current in the whole circuit to *decrease* (say down to 5 amps, depending on the value of the legitimate load) due to the overall increase in resistance. However the power disippated in the connector itself is now 5 amps squared multiplied by 10 ohms = 250 watts. This will quickly heat a small connector to red hot, setting fire to any nearby flammable substances. All that the circuit breaker "sees" however is a drop in current from 10 amps down to 5 amps. At no time did the current increase above normal.

[@Ananth8193]

Awesome video man as always.. It's always a nightmare for pilots if there is a smoke in the cockpit... Oh boy as you said if they had identified the source of fire they would have survived the crash

[@bruceabrahamsen221]

They needed to put it down at the nearest airfield. Swiss air had a fire on board over nova scotia, they were minutes from an airport and decided to hold and dump fuel. Over 200 people died because of that move.

[@geoh7777]

If I were a pilot and there was significant smoke in the cockpit and the source was not certain, I would be tempted to put it down wherever I could and let them fire me. My reply would be that they need to provide a smokeless aircraft like everyone else gets.

[@mrkiplingreallywasanexceed8311]

Incredible that the pilots didnt know they had ruddy nitric acid on board. Incredible how FAA didnt have the teeth to deal with their own transport of hazardous materials regs. Yes, surely the airline ultimately responsible for compliance and safety?

[@MovieMakingMan]

No member of the FAA should have a history of working for airlines, plane manufacturers or as a lobbyist for that industry. The reason they don’t have enough to teeth is because the system is ultra corrupt. Sadly, imbeciles in the US believe all regulations are bad. Republicans get massive cheers from gullible dunces in their audiences when they say they are going to cut regulations. Those dunces don’t or are not capable of thinking of the consequences of cutting regulations everywhere. Corrupt corporations and corrupt politicians love those republican patsies. They can always count on them to vote against their own best interests. They actually believe unregulated capitalism is ‘freedom’. What idiots!

[@andrewtaylor940]

This was 1973. At the time most truckers didn’t know what they were carrying. What we think of as modern hazardous material handling and transportation rules were only just starting to coalesce into what we think of as the modern system of rules. It wasn’t just air transport. In 1973 Fire Departments typically did not have hazmat gear or training. Certainly no specialized teams. The system of Hazmat placards was not yet in place and generally only dedicated transport vehicles such as a rail cars that only ever carried a single specific load, or for example a gasoline tanker truck would have safety markings warning of what was inside. And even figuring those out was a Byzantine mess. It would just be a 3 or 4 digit code painted in normal lettering on a corner of the vehicle. You needed a reference manual to figure out what you were dealing with.

[@Shardith]

Even with the lack of hazardous materials regulations for trucking at the time, at least in a truck you can pull over and get the heck out if your cargo is on fire. No such luck with the aircrew they are stuck inside that plane until they can land it.

[@errorsofmodernism9715]

@@andrewtaylor940 I agree Andrew, these children all have been educated by the school system with so many false assumptions about history it is astoundng at their stupidiy

[@AlchemistCH]

Whoever had the idiocy to pack the nitric acid like that was the definition of criminal negligence. Laws or no laws - if you are selling such materials, you have to ensure they wouldn't cause an incident. As for the aircraft operator - depends on how much information they were given. There's a huge difference between mishandling something covered in hazard labels and not triple-checking every item on the cargo manifest for lack of those labels (or other things the sender is supposed to be aware of).

[@wilsjane]

You have hit the nail on the head, The responsibility goes right back to the sender unless warning labels are ignored. Tens of thousands worth or medical devices used by surgeons during organ transplant are airfreighted around the world from the US and Germany every day. These items would become worthless, once the sterile packaging was compromised. Checking freight is far from simple.

[@lukjad007]

Reminds me of how that company who made one wheel told their customers to black out the part on the shipping waybill that said it was hazardous material. FedEx banned them.

[@neonheadmutt]

Who is the company? Also what is one wheel lol

[@christianullrich2923]

@@neonheadmutt It is a one-wheel “hoverboard”. The manufacturer, Future Motion, forces customers (globally) to ship the things to them in the US for any repairs. Because shipping lithium batteries by air is expensive, they sent out shipping labels with instructions to hide the fact that these batteries were in there. When FedEx found out, they had kittens and banned the company entirely. Look for Louis Rossmann‘s videos on the OneWheel.

[@Morpheus-pt3wq]

​@@christianullrich2923 And all they had to do was to allow the use of 3rd party batteries. Greed has no limits. I think the same thing happened here. Business people almost always take the approach "what isn´t forbidden, is allowed".

[@Milesco]

@@Morpheus-pt3wq "And even if it _is_ forbidden, we'll do it anyway."

[@Hellsong89]

@@christianullrich2923 Holy shit that company is crooked.. Was this recent thing top of everything else they have pulled?

[@Relkond]

How they stored the cargo reminds me of that time a chemical plant stored one component of a binary rocket fuel in drums made from the other component. That had worked well* until the plant blew up. *that factory had small, easily extinguished fires all the time. Until they weren’t easily extinguished.

[@sharkbait1o1]

Kills me how close they were to the airport…so close yet so far

[@PJHEATERMAN]

You have an on board fire as you overfly a military airbase and press on another 45 miles, and you don't declare an emergency. I don't understand the flight crews logic.

[@flyingphobiahelp]

It takes time and distance to lose 30,000 feet in a transportation category aircraft. You can’t just drop in like for a light aircraft

[@PJHEATERMAN]

@@flyingphobiahelp yes you can. Dump the gear and flaps and do an emergency decent.

[@paulcantrell01451]

Same here… they were 100 nm north of Portland ( 7200 foot runway ) and 140 nm north of Pease ( 11,300 foot runway ). They could have landed at either in 12-15 minutes without requiring a crazy descent speed. I think they were just mentally unprepared to accept the seriousness of their situation.

[@GreenStarTech]

Fire/smoke? Get down fast. I have seen 707's get dumped on the tarmac quickly from altitude when needs be.

[@PJHEATERMAN]

@@GreenStarTech Yep, a inflight fire is something you cant manage other than get your ass on the ground. Dump gear and flaps and close the throttles. No airport no problem when its truly an onboard fire i don't need a runway.

[@aldenconsolver3428]

The company that shipped the nitric acid - certainly Quilty - the term negligent manslaughter comes to mind. Pan Am probably not so much, UNLESS they had charged extra for shipping dangerous materials - then that extra charge would have said that they knew of this situation and should have treated it with the respect it required. I dont know about this case, but the reluctance of the selling company to put on the outside the nature of the chemicals being transported has caused me difficulties in the past. Nitric acid (anything more than 1M) should have been clearly labeled caution, fire hazard, chemical burns, corrosive....

[@savroi]

I have to disagree on one thing, Pan Am is as criminally negligent as the company who sent it. My father would send back any cargo that was not explicitly declared on the manifest of said cargo. As a transporter you have to know what dangers whatever you're transporting entitles and what measures should be taken to handle it. In this case Pan Am should have refused this cargo. The only way Pan Am could get away with it is if the cargo manifest was falsified but for what has transpired here this wasn't the case.

[@BritishRail47]

> Pan Am probably not so much, UNLESS they had charged extra for shipping dangerous materials Given it's the same company who charged a "security surcharge" after receiving bomb threats and didn't even let the security people know so they could be more vigilant, followed shortly after by a bomb going off on one of their flights, I'm almost certain they will have charged extra

[@k.c1126]

Sadly, this was not the last plane to crash because of improper storage of chemicals.

[@davef.2811]

And most likely won't be the last. I retired 10 years ago and lithium batteries were the big, upcoming bugaboo and they were always trying to sneak around the rules then, too.

[@noblenoisii7283]

Its always painful to read airplane crash and onboard fire since in most cases if the Captain had acted quick enough enough to land to a closer airport than the lives of the crew or passenger could have been saved.

[@redrust3]

Thank you. I am old enough to remember flying Pan Am as a child. Enjoyed the experience. On the other hand, I was not in the habit of reading accident reports...

[@kommandantgalileo]

huh, Nitric Acid. I love that stuff, great for rockets when mixed with UDMH

[@John-ij3vi]

Thank you for doing what you do. As always a really great and informative video.

[@MiniAirCrashInvestigation]

I appreciate that!

[@josephweiss1559]

Both the Manufacturer and Pan Am were criminally negligent

[@drbirdie]

Nitric Acid can cause so much havoc. Especially when you store it in a way that can only result in a leak.

[@Jabarri74]

I don't get why it had to be flown either. Surely its cheaper (and safer) to source locally using road/rail or just make your own? Even a ship would be far more suitable

[@davidp2888]

Your content is always high quality. You tell the story without adding a lot of drama or fluff.

[@bikeny]

Oh so true. And he does it without the annoying and distracting background music (what I call noise) that some channels like to use. For those, I find myself muting and just reading the cc. If I want music in my YT videos, I'll watch a shuffle dance video (side note: some of those are quite good).

[@hariman7727]

... I don't get why they wouldn't land under emergency protocols at a nearer airport. Edit: yes, this was massive criminal negligence.

[@pibbles-a-plenty1105]

Which comes first? Criminal negligence or criminal ignorance? Pan Am probably was only starting up the learning curve, IMO, for transporting hazardous materials, and so was everyone else. Progress is made at the expense of lives in a lot of endeavors, especially in aviation.

[@savroi]

Pan Am has been transporting cargo since its beginning back in the twenties. The best you can say is that they were criminally negligent. As a transporter you can't claim ignorance, you have to know. This could have happened on a regular flight specially at that time when 747's were flying half empty. This accident could have been much, much worse. The pilots were also to blame for underestimating what was happening but they paid with highest price whilst Pan Am got away with it almost scot free. Ah! Capitalism and the value of life...

[@rilmar2137]

Damn, they were so close, too!

[@anhedonianepiphany5588]

“Don’t click away just yet” I don’t believe I’ve ever ‘stopped short’ on one of your presentations. I don’t like to miss a thing.

[@Mrs.Tincher]

Just love your channel and the breakdown of each flight you highlight. Informative, educational and well thought out. Every video just gets better and better! Thank you for all the hard work that you do and sharing it with us!

[@rrknl5187]

As for not declaring an emergency, back then you’d get yelled at no matter what. It didn’t matter what it was , it was always the pilots fault and management would make it clear that it hadn’t better happen again.

[@jayschafer1760]

There was a Pan Am copilot around this time who was yelled at and threatened with termination because he asked the captain (as they descended past 600 feet, far later than normal) if the captain would like to lower the landing gear, then couldn't help but laugh when the captain ordered "Gear down!" in a very authoritative voice a few seconds later. Yeah, Pan Am had a ton of crashes for a spell, and many were caused at least in part because of the "Captain is God" complex and lack of CRM.

[@galady8632]

@@jayschafer1760 ... Crew Resource Management, TIM, Situational Awareness, etc - when I initially heard those I was baffled. During training they made sense. On the planes they were invaluable.

[@noneofyourbizness]

Layman's Q: regardless of the nature of the cargo onboard, surely merely 'suspecting' that the fire onboard is electrical in nature is grossly insufficient grounds for refusing the earliest landing opportunity available. no? i mean, wouldn't it be obvious to appreciate that IF your suspicions (no matter how well founded) should turn out to be, for ANY reason, incorrect, the longer time you have chosen to keep the plane in the air AND on fire, MUST CERTAINLY increase the risk of you losing control of the plane and/or death. So, why would a captain/crew choose to take on that seemingly senseless and higher risk alternative? Layman's thoughts: LAND ASAP to minimise crew's exposure to risks associated with existing uncontrolled fire and potential crash AND to deliver to properly equipped and trained fire crews the smallest fire possible in order to minimise the risk of the plane becoming a total loss... which simultaneously preserves more and better physical evidence with which to determine the fire's ACTUAL cause etc (not just personal suspicions arising from incomplete/unavailable knowledge of essential information)

[@RonPiggott]

Thank you for the effort in producing this.

[@mikeyboy3054]

God you're good. Favourite channel.

[@mariovuksanovic5077]

I was in shock when the pilot didn't declare an emergency and land right away at the nearby air force base. In shock!!!!....You don't know for shure where the smoke is coming from or what kind of fire it is...land right away and figure it out on the ground. Land immediately....the cabin was filling up with smoke....you had a chance....you were going to Europe....if this would have happened over the deep Atlantic ocean, you would have had no chance but you were close to an air force base......what were you thinking?

[@gchampi2]

You have to remember, this was 1973. Modern safety practices DIDN'T YET EXIST. At the time, putting out a Mayday call would have consequences to the pilots career, possibly including being demoted or even fired. Also, smoke in the cockpit wasn't that unusual at the time, as it was legal to smoke cigarettes/etc while in flight - even on the flight deck. The crew thought they were dealing with a minor electrical fire. They reacted as they were trained to do. Unfortunately, they didn't know the true issue they were dealing with, and the training they had turned out, in hindsight, to be flawed. This accident is one of the reasons that the modern reaction of "Get the plane on the ground ASAP" exists. Flight safety is an ongoing thing, changing as incidents/accidents occur, and lessons are learned. There is a reason you'll hear the phrase "Tombstone Technology" bandied about, when referring to flight safety systems and practices...

[@AdrianColley]

The crew were invited by ATC to declare emergency, and still said no. And they asked for an approach on the opposite side of the airport. If they'd even just asked for 15R instead of 33L they might have made it.

[@JasonFlorida]

Thanks again for another awesome video!

[@TheAutisticOwl]

Have you done Alaska Airlines flight 261? The one that turned upside down and was the main inspiration for the movie "Flight"?

[@AdrianColley]

Wait, that was based on a real event? I thought it was textbook Hollywood madeuppery

[@TheAutisticOwl]

@@AdrianColley yes. Well, mostly the upside down part but yeah that was one of the inspirations

[@evolancer211]

Great stuff, thanks for the videos!

[@theresacaron4238]

Another case of profits ahead of lives. It's okay to attempt efficient operations but not at the risk of causing harm. I'm sure this still goes on in some capacity remembering that the FAA has a shortage of qualified inspectors that can assess risky operations.

[@ashlogan2049]

so true about profit above all else, the worst thing about this case is it seems like it wouldn't have too expensive or involved a process to pack and position them to ensure they were safe. and it would've cost nothing to let the crew know! if this were to happen now I'd point the finger at lack of training and experience, because I think these days a lot of companies increase profit by employing cheap unqualified labour, I'm not so sure this is how things were done in the 70's - I think back then experience and knowledge was more valued

[@StevenLeoKorell]

Pan-Am certainly tested the boundaries.

[@Morkvonork]

I dont understand why you would even airfreight such a lowvalue bulk chemical.

[@Jabarri74]

Me neither its not lithium batteries or such that you could expect to be flown. Even then you would expect shipping not flight to be the main route in out

[@geminian7846]

Exactly. I remember this incident and asked the same question at the time. What on earth is the point of transporting nitric acid, by air or any other means, from the US to Germany, which had plenty of nitric acid production capacity of its own? Those actively involved in the shipment were obviously legally responsible, but morally the consignee of the shipment should have borne a sizeable share of the guilt.

[@darrellshoub7527]

Great episode !!!!

[@mikoto7693]

This reminds me of UPS Flight 6. It went down due to the improper labelling and storage of lithium batteries that caught fire and spread rapidly. It burned through several of the cables used to control the various flaps and keep the plane in the air and steady. It was too intense for the fire suppression systems to put out. Smoke and heat soon filled the flight deck and prevented the pilots from seeing their instruments. And then the fire damaged the systems responsible for supplying oxygen to the captain. He failed to get to the oxygen mask at the back of the flight deck meant to be used by anyone in the jump seat. Alone now, the first officer really tried to get back to Dubai with his crippled plane. He didn’t make it, but his last act was to gain just enough height to avoid crashing into an apartment building. Such a horrible way to die.

[@gnarthdarkanen7464]

From my training on Hazmat starting in the Navy, to my work since involving Hazmat... HELL YES, Pan Am was criminally negligent. Just a regular driver has to get a special certification to transport Hazmat legally over the road. I mean as simple as in a cargo van that would otherwise be listed under "Private Vehicle" and the ONLY reason for a Commercial License endorsement is because it's a work-exclusive vehicle for shipping small cargo's in limited amounts. You STILL must have the Hazmat training and certification or it's illegal to transport that stuff!!! ANYONE who's ever been involved in any kind of shipping will tell you that it's VITALLY important a driver knows what's in his load. I may not need every gritty detail down to nuts, bolts, and rivets, but don't think for a minute you're going to get by "no big deal" with a case of nitric acid and try to tell me "It's just some glassware for a lab"... The acid WILL be disposed of, and you'll be BANNED FOR LIFE from ever hiring my service again. I can't see how this was even remotely legal for Pan Am, considering the intensity with which the aviation industry embraces the "safety first" mindset... ALL the way to the FAA and NTSB. ;o)

[@sundog486]

It's very easy to judge these historical events by modern standards. Events like this have helped us create and enforce the safety standards we have today.

[@cchris874]

This is also one of 5 fatal Pan Am crashes in a span of just 9 months between July 1973 and April 1974. But then 1974 was a bad year all round. The sad truth is, most of the crashes back then were easily preventable, but commercial pressures, then as now, took priority. The main difference is that it took dead bodies to enforce the necessary changes back then. Now there are fewer systems left that haven't killed people.and, today, the much higher flight volume forces airlines to be safe, or they would be having crashes every few weeks. True, we are also much more knowledgeable now too.

[@Valkyrie_Yukikaze]

Nice video. Damn I'm early today.

[@na195097]

Why would the yaw damper be considered non-essential?! Did the FE make a mistake or was the checklist just wrong to include that step?

[@AdrianColley]

Asking the real questions now

[@BigBlueJake]

Sounds like the checklist was wrong. Surprised they missed that, because the 707 was developed after Boeing came up with the KC-135 design for the Air Force. KC-135s were apparently notorious for Dutch Roll, and that has cost the USAF a few planes and crews.

[@mizzyroro]

They would have been alive had they declared an emergency and landed at KPSM.

[@jayschafer1760]

KPSM would have almost certainly been able to handle them, but I'm guessing that they didn't want to land there because it wasn't an airport that Pan Am flew out of.

[@jamesrudd8705]

You can make that assumption, but you don't know.

[@ianbackman1045]

it was only 60 or so years that we found out that square windows were not the way to go. since then the industry has come a long way in preventing air accidents, to be almost at the top of the learning curve. the British Comet is a tragic story.

[@PauperJ]

Good video, as always, MACI. Any plans yet on the Crater Lake 2 video? Maybe BNA to LNK? Or a very short flight, OMA to LNK.

[@megadavis5377]

I had a chance to speak at length to a 91-year-old retired Pan Am captain about 10 days ago over in Grass Valley, CA. He said that when he joined Pan Am in 1960 he was, of course, considered a "New Guy", as well as he should have been... But after almost twenty years he was still considered a new guy. He was not, and would never be, part of the club. He indicated that that was the way it was at Pan Am until just a few years before they sold out to Delta; he himself went to United Airlines. The "Old Boys' Club" was alive and well at Pan Am for decades, and many indiscretions and problems were covered up by company officials and "in-house" FAA personnel.

[@yamato6114]

I read a few books about Pan Am. People talk about it with great fondness but honestly they sounded like a horrible company to work for. Arrogant, thumped their noses down at other industry players, etc.,

[@couch2558]

Pan Am seems to have a significant number of accidents that can ultimately be chalked up to them being at fault somehow, or even them trying to avoid investigating incidents

[@MissFoxification]

The worst "accidents" are those that are completely avoidable.

[@paulbrouyere1735]

I worked at a chemical plant for several months. I left because of too many incidents which could have lead to disaster. Those were the 90’s. I remember thinking the investors don’t know what’s happening on the workfloor. A disaster for our environment.

[@Shardith]

Shockingly criminally negligent

[@jfergs.3302]

something about the consequences of the convictions would have been a handy addition to this vid!

[@George_M_]

Gaaah why didn't they declare an emergency and land Dx I know the mentality of not wanting to change plans when under pressure but come on.

[@kemwilson2046]

Nice drop!

[@kevinbarry71]

Smoke filling the cockpit and the pilots don't want to declare an emergency? WTF! They mention an Air Force Base; perfect place to put it down

[@PDX53]

United Flight 861 (Aug 12, 1962) lands DC-8 at small (then) FBO in Troutdale, OR. My sister-in-law's Dad was a long time pilot and knew all about it. He said the pilot wasn't fired but had a red face for a few years. In the late '70's I flew in & out of Troudale on private jets. The Lear 25 was a rocket compared to the Citation 1 of that era.

[@ZenkaiAnkoku2]

Pan Am is ultimately responsible for the cargo on their planes. Regardless of who ships/loads it. It is their plane. Their responsibility. Not only was it loaded incredibly dangerously, the pilots were not made aware of the dangerous cargo. Pan Am is lucky their negligence only ended 3 lives that day. As this plane could have come down somewhere much worse.

[@lashamartashvili]

Panam were criminally as well as chemically negligent for sure.

[@cr10001]

I would NOT be happy with a design where the yaw damper could inadvertently be turned off and crash the plane as a result.

[@courtneypuzzo2502]

I believe my late maternal grandfather was a first responder on this accident he was a Boston Police Officer at the time and currently at that time lived on Leyden St though shortly after moved to Saugus so my mom wouldn't be bused to Dorchester/Roxbury when there were several K-6 schools near where they lived including Curtis Guild and Mennesah E Bradley where I later attended Kindergarten

[@TCPUDPATM]

15,000 lbs or 1,600 kgs? That’s some Gimli Glider math! 🤣 Great video. Thanks!

[@CoastalSphinx]

I'm pretty sure it was read as "6800 kgs" but the pronunciation was de-emphasized in the middle like "SIXTy eigHT HUNDRED" which could easily be mistaken for "SIXTEEN HUNDRED".

[@TCPUDPATM]

@@CoastalSphinx I was just being a pain. You’re right of course.

[@oxcart4172]

Always hate hearing about a 707 crash. Such a good looking jet.

[@cchris874]

It had personality. Today they all look and sound alike.

[@jamessimms415]

I’m guessing the reason they went to Boston where there were likely PanAm Maintenance facilities @ Boston instead of having to fly people to Pease AFB

[@Dana_Danarosana]

Damn! Just horrible and totally preventable too... At least it wasn't a PAX flight... Of course, similar DID happen with PAX 23 years later with ValuJet 592.

[@ActionMan1979]

Strange case. By Declaring Emergency it would generate an investigation, and the pilot wanted to land specifically in a far location amid a dangerous situation...

[@joecrammond6221]

it is sad that despite their strong history, Pan Am has a history with negligence, this flight and 103 in particular, no wonder they went bankrupt

[@illyasvielemiya9059]

I think because Pan Am was one of airlines who started airplane travel business. They have no idea what is bad untill it happens I mean, most today rules is created because accident happened and people learned how to prevent that from happening again like that accident which started the checklists before flying who also posted in this channel

[@robertgoodwin5393]

This was a screw up on every level! All we can do is learn from this! Nitric acid, for Christs sake! You ever handled it? It is BAD NEWS! I agree with the chemical engineer's assessment! below mine! I feel for the pilots and the poor passangers who died in this completely avoidable crash! Bob

[@scottbrown6305]

Ok, I have calmed my slightly obsessive nervous system down enough to comment… When I was in the military, one of my ladies was prepared the has a disdecoration forms for my section when I The unit was going on deployment. It really wasn’t a lot,; explosives, ammunition, Flammable liquids, and a little peroxide just for fun. We would go out of our way to make sure that this information was meticulously documented and given to the pilots. As a sideline: we all knew the pilots who would be transporting materials. We were part of the same squadron. These were our friends and we wanted to make sure everything was good to go. I am flabbergasted that someone would attempt to get by these requirements. So yeah, this is criminal negligence.

[@couchetard1984]

Were the IATA rules in play at that time? I took a shipping/receiving course for Du Pont ten years ago and it wasn't all that complicated.

[@savroi]

IATA was founded after WWII but I guess it was up to the companies determining whether they will transport it on items that were not expressly listed. It would be interesting to know if Pan Am was paid "extra" for this cargo even if it only would pile up on evidence of mishandling already proved.

[@Phiyedough]

It is ironic when you think about the rules applied to passengers to stop them from taking hazardous items on planes.

[@mickkidston7344]

just a point of order. you said "regulations around shipping hazardous materials by air ARE extremely convoluted" they are not, at the time(1973) there may have been some "confusion" (deliberate or otherwise), for decades now the transportation of dangerous goods by air has been a science led simplified excercise subject to annual revision

[@jayschafer1760]

The rules for shipment/packaging/acceptable quantities of different classes of dangerous goods by air are hundreds of pages long, at least at present. If that isn't convoluted and a bit hard to understand without a lot of work, I don't know what is.

[@jayschafer1760]

The rules for shipment/packaging/acceptable quantities of different classes of dangerous goods by air are hundreds of pages long, at least at present. If that isn't convoluted and a bit hard to understand without a lot of work, I don't know what is.

[@strafrag1]

Convoluted guidelines regarding Hazmats are not acceptable for air cargo operators. Glad things there have improved but there have been other issues regarding unsafe cargo. The carriage of lythium batteries comes to mind as well.

[@kindnessisking5500]

Great video, keep up the good work!

[@allansbullet]

About the same time as this crash, I had a customer here in New Zealand who ordered some antimony trichloride (butter of antimony) from me (I worked for a chemical importing company at the time). It was only about 4 kilograms - under 10 pounds, and had to come from the USA. My customer wondered why it took so long to get here. It turned out that it is quite corrosive but not NEAR as corrosive as nitric acid! So it couldn't come by airfreight - took over 3 months to arrive by sea. If the regulations about an obscure chemical like that were clearly known, HOW did Pan Am and the logistics company NOT know about nitric acid??? It beggars belief that they shipped the stuff by air!! Criminally negligent for sure!! Probably a good thing that Pan Am don't exist anymore - little wonder - they dropped that many planes down here in the South Pacific that no sane person would fly with them. This Flight 160 saga was yet another in the chequered history of a totally CRAP AIRLINE!!

[@b.t.356]

What really breaks my heart is the fact that the pilots were so close to making it but ran out of time before they could. This should never have occurred.

[@gregreed3484]

I can't even count the number of times that I was appraised of non-compliant shipments of freight on my part121scheduled passenger aircraft AFTER arrival at the destination by the baggage handlers unloading leaking or compromised items!! Plus many of these items where not even legal to be on a passenger flight in the first place!!

[@FutureSystem738]

Yes, they were definitely criminally negligent. Landing at a nearer, unfamiliar airport wouldn’t have changed much at all. They probably needed that many miles just to lose altitude.

[@Caprica-od6oc]

As good as Pan Am was, they seem to had a terrible track record when it came to follow guidelines regarding transport of cargo (flight 160) or passengers (flight 103 that crashed over Lockerbie). They completed ignored, warnings, procedures and rules.

[@billyhw5492]

They should have landed at the air force base.

[@Jabarri74]

I thought so too might take a call from ATC but smoke= get down worry 'bout the rest later

[@beckybradshaw3249]

Pan Am had the opportunity to handle these procedures strictly...esp. after Pan Am 103, but didn't learn a thing. Very sad.

[@F-Man]

MINI!!

[@MiniAirCrashInvestigation]

MEGA

[@Mrs.Tincher]

🤣🤣🤣👍👍👍👍

[@moonprincess500]

Sawdust, SAWDUST????? ARE THEY OUT OF THEIR MIND?????

[@armchairtin-kicker503]

Vectors to Pease Air Force Base would have been the correct call. Never under estimate an onboard fire.

[@scootermom1791]

2:03 "Negative on the emergency"?!? What constituted an emergency, then, for the crew? Obviously, we'll never know. I can't believe they didn't declare this an emergency! Smoke/fire is an emergency, and they need to land immediately. I think the crew was too calm, if that's possible. If they'd realized the emergency for what it was and landed sooner than they did, they may have been alive to tell this story instead.

[@jonathanhall1278]

SAWDUST WAS USED FOR CUSHIONING FOR NITRIC ACID!? Dude, I can’t believe that. That’s insane, I would expect the people in charge of packaging corrosives to at least have basic knowledge of the hazards of the chemicals. Just read the SDS 😟

[@BigBlueJake]

I'm kinda surprised they weren't told to land at Pease AFB if it was that bad. Were they still at too high of an altitude?

[@jmchinch]

They should have put down at Pease AFB..the runway was big enough for B52’s and C5’s

[@pantherplatform]

_"This is the story of how two pilots let their 3 year old kids fly a Boeing 777 into a mountainside."_

[@andrewdillon7837]

Nitric Acid , i know it makes explosives if mixed with an alcohol, (eg , glycerine ) , but does it do similar to wood shavings ??

[@tylerbuckley2092]

I blame the shipping company on this one not the airliner by law every manifest for cargo has to be labeled properly just like in trucking costco sams club has the driver lable their manifest as general delivery the driver not knowing what they are hauling and Sam's Club likes to sneak cargo not on the bill of lading just like this incident with pan am it is important for the drivers to know what they are transporting so they could tell first responders if they landed safely the fire department would know how to handle the fire being chemicle as it was the fire crew would apply proper agents to put out that fire only way to identify a electrical fire the smell of ozone would be in the air

[@aidanchoiniere9779]

Hell yeah, notification gang