Air Emergency (2003–…): Season 5, Episode 6 - Southern Storm - full transcript
New Hope, Georgia.
April, 4th, 1977
Hello,
My husband called me,
He said: Honey,
we got some bad weather coming in
Boys, come on in now
Nasty weather is coming.
One of the worst storms in years
is moving across the South
Sadie Hurst rushes her children to safety
We had this tremendous noise
When I got to the top of the basement steps
to close the door
I saw a red reflection like fire in the door
72 people are killed
when a Southern Airways DC-9 falls from the sky
This is a true story
It is based on official reports
and eyewitness accounts.
Air crash Investigation Season 05
Southern Storm
Good afternoon, sir
Can I see your boardingpass, please?
Just on the isle on the right, sir
Boarding pass?
81 passengers board Southern Airways Flight 242
A DC-9, bound for Atlanta, Georgia
Many of them are military personnel
form nearby bases.
Captain Bill McKenzie
and first officer Lyman Keele
have been shuttling passengers
across the American South all day
Who has got the landing?
Not me, says the captain
Pilots regularly exchange tasks
on long days like this one
First officer Lyman Keele will be handling
this leg of the flight
He has been an experienced NAVY pilot
who has been with Southern Airways for 4 years
Before their last take-off,
the crew was handed a weather report
for the airports along their route
The DC-9 was introduced in 1965
to fly frequent short flights
Both of its engines are mounted
to the rear fuselage rather than the wings.
It was designed for take off on shorter runways
We had a 13 landing day
with a lot of small stops
with 20 or 30 minute legs in between
It was the tour of the South
Skies have been smooth all afternoon,
but the weather is worsening,
the flight crew is prepared for turbulence
It was raining in Huntsville
I said: It is going to be bad weather,
don't serve!
So, we did not serve from Huntsvill to Atlanta,
which is a very short route
and we were delighted not to be serving
I was a little surprised that we took off
When we did,
I thought we'd taxi at the end of the runway
and hold for a while,
because the weather looked so bad
But we taxied out and immediately took off
At 3:54 PM the DC-9 takes off
into a hard rain
The short hop to Atlanta
should take just 25 minutes
As Southern Airways 242
flies away from Huntsville
the National weather service tracks weather
that is far worse than the pilots expect
Tornado's are touching down
all across the South
The weather in the South East in the United States
can be very treacherous
High humidities, high temperatures
are a prescription for thunderstorms
With all of that kind of moisture in the air,
and the high convecting heating
you are going to have very large thunderstorms
that are associated with heavy rains. hail...
...icing conditions and extreme winds
And of course tornadoes
that will respond with that kind of action
Huntsville Air Traffic Control has some concerns
about the gathering storm
Southern Airways 242,
I am painting a line of weather
which appears to be moderate to
possibly heavy precipitation
starting about 5 miles ahead
Okay, we are in the rain right now
It doesn't look much heavier
than where we are in right now, does it?
It is not a solid mass,
but it appears to be a little bit heavier
than what you are in right now
In 1977, most airliners are equipped
with a Bendix weather radar
Pilots are trained to avoid regions
that appear bright
Where there is light, there is bad weather
I can't read that,
it looks like rain, Bill
What do you think?
There is a hole
There is a hole right there,
that is all I see
The pilots spot a dark area on their radar
a passage way through the storm
They plan to navigate between
towering thunderheads over 14,000 meter
Coming over, we have pretty good radar
at least right straight ahead, there
The next few miles
is probably the best way we can go
But as they head towards the storm-system
they get an ominous report from Memphis ATC
Attention, all aircraft
SIGMET
SIGMET is short for
SIGnificant METeorological Information
A warning to pilots
that dangerous weather is in the region
Here we go
Hold on, cowboy
The storm suddenly gets much worse
I have never heard such a loud hail
in my life
and the beating on the sides of the airplane
is extremely deafening
Please, keep your seat-belts fastened
You should be out of this, shortly
Hail at the size of baseballs hammers the DC-9
breaking the plane's windshield
The pilots of Southern 242
had to raise their voices audibly
to be heard above the unholy tattoo of this hail
which was butt shutting the airplane
These pilots have never been through
anything like this before in their lives
I don't know how to get through here, Bill
I think we can cross there
McKenzie and Keele desperately
seek an escape route from the storm
but as they do, the emergency escalates
The plane loses all electrical power
Without power, Keele must keep the aircraft level
without an artificial horizon
but surrounded by thick clouds
the horizon is difficult to find
It is almost impossible for Lyman Keele
to get his bearings
Southern 242,
What is your speed?
Atlanta Air Traffic Control tries
to make contact with Southern Airways
They receive no response
Southern 242 Atlanta
What is your speed?
After 36 seconds in the dark...
...power returns
The instruments come alive
and the radio begins working again
Air Traffic Control finally gets through
to McKenzie and Keele
Maintain 15,000
Maintain 15,000, Southern 242
Southern Airways Flight 242 has been instructed
to fly at 4600 meter
But the plane has fallen to almost 4200 meter
We are trying to get it up there
While I was looking
at the front of the left engine,
I could see the hail continued
to put more and more dents
into the cowling around the engine
and in the center of the engine
And the engine was starting to make sounds
like it was quitting
Okay, 242, we just got a windshield busted
You turn up back to 15,000 ft
We are at 14,000 ft
Southern 242,
You say you are at 14,000 ft now?
Left engine won't spool
Our left engine is cut out
You say you lost an engine
and busted a windshield?
Yes, sir
My God
The other engines is gone, too
Both engines are now out
This DC-9 is a glider
and it is falling at 56 ft/sec
They are at 14,000 ft,
they don't have a lot of time
Lyman Keele adjusts his course
to navigate his plane out of the storm
Captain McKenzie must restart the engines
or they will be forced
to make an emergency landing
Without engines, Southern Airways Flight 242
is plummeting from the sky
There is also another dire consequence
of the engine failure
Normally, the engines generate electricity
for the instruments, radios and hydraulics
When the engines quit,
all of these systems fail
APU deployed
The Auxiliary Power Unit
is a backup power generator
It will provide electricity to the plane
but it will take more than 2 minutes for it
to power up
When the 2nd engine quit
I was not aware of what was going on around me
I was so focused on trying to figure out a way
to save myself
I knew that sometimes the tail breaks off
in an accident
and I felt the further back I could get,
the better
After two minutes without systems,
the auxiliary power unit finally kicks in
The pilots may not have engines
but at least they now have power
We lost both engines
How about getting a vector to the nearest place?
Captain McKenzie needs directions
to an airport
The flight can only stay airborne
for another 6 minutes
Dobbins Air Force Base is 32 km away
It has a runway that is long enough for a DC-9
It also has full emergency services
Southern 242, turn right, heading 100
will be vectors for a straight approach to Dobbins
Runway 11
How far is it?
Lyman Keele knows
Dobbins Air Force Base intimately
He trained there and
it is now his home base as a NAVY reserve pilot
He has landed there frequently
Clear an emergency, Bill
Right now, Keele's familiarity with Dobbins
is the only advantage this crew has
Less than 16 km away
lies the town of New Hope, Georgia
Sadie Hurst sees no signs of an advancing storm
It was an absolute beautiful day
The children were playing outside,
riding bicycles up and down the driveway
My husband worked in Atlanta
and he kept his radio on the radio-station
When he called me he said:
Honey, we got some bad weather coming in
He said: you need to get the kids in
Boys, come on in now
Nasty weather is coming
Come in now
Flashlights, and batteries, Steven
For the tornadoes come you got bad weather,
dark clouds, rain and hail
We didn't see any of that
Southern Airways 242 finally breaks
through the storm-clouds into clear skies
The plane descends steadily through 2100 meters
Get those engines started
Once the engines failed,
the workload in the cockpit
increased substantially
In this particular instance,
the first officer was the pilot flying
He was the one
that was manipulating the flight controls
and manoeuvring the airplane
The captain on the other hand was now
running checklists and trying to troubleshoot
Listen, we lost both engines
and I cannot tell you the implications of this
We only got two engines!
How far is Dobbins now?
Southern 242, 19 miles
Do you have one engine running now?
Negative, no engines
I didn't know what was wrong
I bet I can tell something was wrong
I went and opened the cockpit door
simply to tell them we are ready for whatever
Just don't stall this thing out
No, I won't
Bill, what is going on?
Not now, Cathy, sit down
You could tell they were afraid
I understood they were afraid
just for the sound of their voice
So, I understood
there was something very dangerous going on
that I had no idea what
Down to only 1400 meters,
the plane is still 27 km
from Dobbins Air Force Base
Ask them
if there is anything between here and Dobbins
ASK THEM
IF THERE IS ANYTHING BETWEEN HERE AND DOBBINS!
Is there an airport
between our position and Dobbins?
Southern 242, No, sir
Closest airport is Dobbins
First Officer Lyman Keele doesn't think
he can get the DC-9 as far as Dobbins AirForceBase
He has lost too much altitude
I don't think we are going to make it
We are trying everything to get something started
Roger, well, there is Cartersville
You are about 10 miles South of Cartersville,
15 miles West of Dobbins
Keele needs a closer airport,
Cartersville seems like a good choice
We will take a vector to that, yes
We will have to go there
Can you give us a vector to Cartersville?
Alright, turn left heading 360
It will be directly to Cartersville
Air Traffic Controllers in Atlanta
see no other options
They direct flight 242 to Cartersville Airport
As the pilots seek out an airport,
the flight attendance still don't know
what type of landing to prepare for.
They wouldn't talk to me
When I walked in the door,
the whole windshield was cracked
So, what do we do?
I think we have lost both engines
I thought so
Cathy briefed all your passengers
I realized I was in an emergency situation
and I felt I was going to die
but I decided I would do everything I could
to try to help my chances
I had previously collected
some blankets and pillows
and had gotten my leather jacket
off the overhead rack
I arranged those to make
a nest, as much as I could, for myself
With tornadoes in the forecast,
the community of New Hope is braced
for a different type of danger
After a couple of hours of playing outside,
my mother called us to come in
because there was bad weather coming our way
We came into the house
and mother had told us what was going on
And she said that we need to get downstairs
to prepare for the bad weather that was coming
Southern Airways Flight 242
has lost too much altitude
The pilots come to the frightening conclusion
that at the rate they are falling,
they cannot make it to Cartersville
They must prepare to land now
I am picking out a clear field
Bill, you have to find me a highway
Let us get the next clear open field
No, Bill
I see a highway over there, no cars
Right there, is that straight?
No!
We will have to take it
Lyman Keele decides to bring the plane down
onto a rural highway
Georgia State Highway 92
Captain Bill McKenzie radios Atlanta ATC
with the bad news
We are putting it on the highway
The clock runs out on Southern Airways 242
Sweet Jesus
With no engines,
first officer Lyman Keele lines off the aircraft
for an emergency landing on the highway
that runs through New Hope, Georgia
Flaps
Gear down to 50
God, Bill, I hope we could do it
Without training
on how to land a DC-9 with no engines
first officer Lyman Keele's attempt
is entirely improvised
Lyman Keele is a young man who has just come back
from the proving ground of South East Asia
He was a NAVAL aviator
He learned the niceties of landing
on a rolling, pitching, aircraft carrier
in the South China Sea in the middle of the night
What he was confronted with right now
was even a greater test,
the greatest test he had ever confronted
in his life as an airman
There is a car ahead
I got it now, I got it
Brace for impact
The Southern Airways Flight
touches down on State Highway 92
When the aircraft touched down,
the first touch down was very nice
It was smooth, it seemed like it was going to work
and everything was going to turn out okay
and then it immediately bounced back up in the air
and slammed down
The plane smashes into New Hope
Before the plane
completely stopped moving,
there was fire blowing
through the cabin
I felt my face burning,
even though I tried to cover it
with my leather jacket
We heard this tremendous noise
Large section of Southern Airways 242
littered the entire length of New Hope
I got my seat belt loose after a few tries
and turned toward the rear of the airplane
and I saw a spot of light
I got up and ran for that light
I could not believe I was alive
I just could not believe it
Where I found myself after we woke up
was indescribable
I was sitting by the front entry door
We have a co closet that was adjacent to it
and the back wall of the jump-seat strapped to
All three of those walls had collapsed
and rolled in like a little triangle ball area
And there was just enough for me inside
I could see a crack of light
And I thought:
I am going to that crack of light
Stewardess Sandy Purl also escaped safely
She is able to help others
Survivors flee the flaming wreckage
When I got to the top of the basement steps
to close the door
I saw a red reflection like fire in the door
Then I saw what was happening
I saw smoke and fire
and the people that were coming toward me
They were screaming, they were yelling
they were quiet
Everything was on fire
and I could see people running toward a house
I need to use your phone
I wanted to call
The local people are Southern and say
We just landed somewhere and we need help
It just became a blur
they just kept coming
I got back to the kitchen
and I was just circled by people
They knew they were in a house
and I guess they felt safe
and they needed somebody to help them
I was still frantic
I was still trying to move as quickly as possible
and doing as much as I could at the time
I will remember till the day
I die just staring there...
...at the pine trees, burning
pieces of aircraft,
It was so unreal
I have never seen anything like this
and never want to see anything like that again
72 people,
including pilots Lyman Keele and Bill McKenzie
die in the crash of Southern Airways Flight 242
Investigators would soon uncover a tragic
series of misqueues and coincidences
that cause the plane to crash
Southern Flight 242 crashed
after the DC-9 jet lost power in both engines
The plane had flown through a violent hailstorm
on a flight from Huntsville, Alabama to Atlanta
I saw the plane as it came veering down
It hit the tree tops
We thought it was a tornado at first
People were in the storeyard in vehicles,
it actually hit them
A family of seven is killed instantly
when the plane hit there car
They were just leaving the store about the time
that the flight tried to land on the highway
and then it hit the gas-pumps
and they exploded
everything around was on fire
They were in the car and perished
during the explosion in fire
Investigators from the NTSB arrived
within hours of the accident
This is the 2nd major blow
to Southern Airways safety record
In 1970, flight 932,
carrying the Marshal University football team
crashed in West Virginia
Everyone on board was killed.
There are always many questions
that investigators have to find the answers to
The two primary questions that needed
to be answered by the NTSB were:
'What were the weather conditions'
and 'What caused both engines on
a 2 engine-airplane to flame-out...
...that resulted in the pilots having to make an
emergency landing on a highway in a small town'
The storm that flight 242 flew into was a monster.
Why had a crew, so familiar with weather
in the South, flown head first into it?
Investigators listen to the CVR
for any clues about the decisions,
made by the crew as they were
entering the thunderstorm
They learn that the pilots relied heavily
on their weather radar as they approach the storm
but it appears to have deceived them
One of the limitations of the radar that the crew
of Flight 242 was using is signal attenuation:
That is that the beam that is projected from the
radar unit out to look at the weather and return
is diffused, so that the picture that is depicted
in the cockpit that the crew is looking at
may not be accurate
Weather radar sends out radio waves
those waves bounce off storm-clouds ahead
and return to the aircraft
but if precipitation is extremely intense,
the radio-waves cannot be deflected away
The radar unit might then interpret
the lack of returning waves as a clear path ahead
Those inaccuracies are hard to decipher
and if the crew is depending
solely or very intently on the radar
to guide them through the precipitation,
they may be making decisions
that aren't based on accurate information
The storm that entangled Southern Airways 242
is one of the worst to hit U.S. in 3 years
The crew didn't encounter a tornado, but
it was battered by torrential rain and heavy hail
I don't know how we get though here, Bill
What Keele and McKenzie read as a clear area ahead
was in fact the heaviest part of the storm
They flew straight for it
The other engine is gone, too
Southern 242, say again
standby...
...we lost both engines
Once inside the storm, the DC-9's engines failed
But a turbo-fan engine is designed to ingest
huge amounts of rain and even hail
Precipitation alone should not have shot them down
Investigators study what is left
of the DC-9's engines for clues
They need to know if some mechanical failure
caused both engines to fail inside the storm
Initially, I was puzzled as to how the engines
could be involved in the cause of this accident
but it was very anxious to get there
to see the engines to find out if there was
any sort of visible failure in the engines
Pratt and Whitney, the manufacturer of the engines
assigns Al Weaver to advice
the NTSB investigation
The engines are moved to Atlanta Airport
for a closer inspection
And when they lifted the engines up,
in the vertical direction
in the hangar
I could hear the tinkling and pieces fell out
through the front of the engine on the floor
I reached over and picked up those pieces
and I recognized immediately
this parts of the high compressor blading,
deep with inside the engine.
Al Weaver discovers
that the pieces that fell from the engine
were broken blades from the compressor
Jet engines need pressurized air for combustion
Two separate compressors inside the engine
are made up of dozens of steel blades
The rapidly spinning blades
force air to the back of the engine
The pressurized air is ignited
in the combustion chamber, creating thrust
Weaver notices that the compressor-blades
are badly bent or fatigued
The way they are bent
tells him they were damaged in the air,
not when the plane hit the ground
And we know that that fatiguing and the type
of fatigue that we could observe with our eye
is caused by the repetitive surging
of the engine over and over.
A surge occurs when the airflow through an engine
gets interrupted
Pressure builds up between the compressors
in stead of behind them
Without the back pressure,
air from the combustion chamber moves to the front
The engine briefly looses power
Next, investigators need to find out
if the repetitive surging was caused by
the engines, inhaling massive amounts of rain
When an engine ingests rain,
it has to convert it into a gas
before it can pump it out as exhaust
That process uses energy
and slows down the engines
Investigators conclude
that with so much rain to convert,
the engines could not maintain enough power
to run the generators
That is what caused the first power outage
But it doesn't explain
why the engines failed completely
Al Weaver wants to know if the sheer volume
of rain, the engines were forced to ingest,
could have caused their failure
The same engine model that powered SA242
is run with up to 14% water/air
Engines up 3/4 throttle
Let us begin
Investigators ultimately throw
monsoon-level-rains against the engine
They run it from idle up to full throttle
The rain was not enough to cause the kind of surge
that tore the engines on flight 242 to pieces
The engines operated normally,
no abnormalities
So, our judgement was:
we could not conceive of a rainstorm
that would put more water in
We knew we were going in the wrong direction
with more water
The water-ingestion-test
points investigators to another suspect
Hail
People who survived the crash described
seeing hail the size of baseballs
It was powerful enough
to break the plane's 3.5 cm thick windshield
Al Weaver discovers significant hail-damage
on both of the plane's engine cowlings
Starting at the front of the engine,
we noted that the inlet cowl and the center body
that streamlined the airflow
going in to the engine
which are parts of the air part structure,
and made out of aluminium
were all dented from both engines
And that let us to suspect
that the existence of the hail
might have been a significant contributor
Weaver knows that it would take a powerful force
to damage the hard metal compressor blades
We knew
from the mechanically examination of the engines
that the hail itself
did not cause any damage to the engine
and only dented
the outside of the covering over the engine
Heavy precipitation and a damaged cowling
could have interrupted the engine's airflow
and caused a surge
But one surge shouldn't tear an engine apart
Weaver suspects that massive pieces of hail
may have clogged the vital outlet in the engines
The bleed valves
When pressure builds between the two compressors
bleed valves should open automatically
to release that pressure, and clear the surge
If the bleed valves were blocked,
the engines would have continued
to surge over and over again
Once the engine begins to surge
the action that the pilot should have taken
was to pull the throttles back to clear the surge
Al Weaver turns to the CVR
and discovers that the circumstances
may have caused the crew to do the exact opposite
Maintain 15,000 ft, Southern 242
We are trying to get it up there
Weaver learns that the crew was asked to climb,
while in the heart of the storm
In order to climb,
the captain had to increase thrust to his engines
which would have made matters worse
But if the surge was not cleared,
and allowed to continue
then the engine
would simply break itself internally
Advancing the throttles
would only worsen the situation
With its bleed cavities blocked by hail,
pressure build up inside the engines,
bending the compressor blades until they shattered
And once the blades broke in the compressor
then, the engine has no hope of ever working again
Investigators now understand
how the pilots mis-read the storm
and how their engines failed as a result of it
But they don't know why the pilots were not warned
that there was such a severe storm in their path
As the pilots prepare to depart Huntsville
they did have a weather report from Southern Air
But the information was already hours old
Southern Airways dispatch did not have
updated information
They did not subscribe to
the National Weather Services update system
They did have a subscription to a service
that required them to dial up
and receive the information
When the dispatcher called the phone number,
to get the updated information
it was busy, and never pursued it
It was not able to provide
any kind of updated information to the crew of 242
Southern Airways 242,
I am painting a line of weather which appears
to be moderate to possibly heavy precipitation
starting about 5 miles ahead
Could Huntsville have provided
better weather information?
Absolutely
but in the course of doing their job,
they provided localized weather information
about an intense thunderstorm
or rain-shower that was moving over the airport
They were only responsible really
for about 40 nautical miles
What the crew of Flight 242 was looking at
was well beyond 40 miles
With little information on the storm
and having mis-read their weather radar
Bill McKenzie and Lyman Keele
flew blindly into massive thunderheads
The heavy rain and hail crippled their engines
The crew decided that
their only option
was an emergency landing
When investigators analyze the flightpath
of Southern Airways 242
they discover one more deadly oversight
From the time the crew realized
that they had no engine power
until the time of touchdown was about 9 minutes,
in looking at the
critical decision making
they had about 7 minutes of
solid critical decision making
before they were committed
to that emergency landing on the highway
Give us a vector to a clear area, Atlanta
After the engines failed,
the pilots made a 180° turn towards the West
looking for an escape from the storm
That takes them directly away
from Dobbins Air Force Base
The turn takes the pilots out of the hailstorm
but leaves them further away from a runway
They also loose
minutes of valuable time flying time
Only once the pilots escaped the hailstorm,
then they turned again towards Dobbins
Is there an airport
between our position and Dobbins?
Southern 242, No Sir,
closest airport is Dobbins
Had they maintained their course to Dobbins
rather than make the turn
to try and find another airport
they probably would have had a better success-rate
and definitively a better survival-rate
By the time McKenzie received the instructions
Southern Airways 242 had been flying away
from Dobbins for too long
The plane was simply too far
and flying too low to make it there
But there was one last missed opportunity
to save Flight 242
Investigators learn that just as McKenzie and
Keele were directed towards Dobbins Air-force Base
they were right above another runway
Cornelius Moore Airport
I thought we would land at Cornelius Moore Airport
because I was familiar with that airport
I had flown many times in our airplane
back and forth between Decatur and Atlanta
Investigators learn that Cornelius Moore
was just out of range of radar
at Atlanta approach Control
They did not know it existed
They could not direct Southern Airways 242 there
because they could not see it on their screens
When I learned that the controllers in Atlanta
did not know about the Cornelius Moore Airport
in Cartersville, I was upset
Because we went
within 3 or 4 miles at that airport
It had a 4,000 ft runway
and even though some of the
controllers thought it was too short
it sure would have better than that highway
we had landed on
I was very, very angry
it was just a foetal reaction
It was such a waste of life
I was sad
The NTSB investigation concludes that
the catastrophic failure of the turbo fan engines
and the failure to convey sufficient information
on the storm to the pilots
are the causes of the crash
of Southern Airways 242
The NTSB acts immediately
It issues a recommendation
that weather radar systems
aboard planes and in ATC centres
be upgraded to better portrait the weather
In today’s commercial aircraft
pilots have available to them:
colour weather radar
It is radar that depict in various colour-bands
the intensity of the precipitation
The crash of Southern Airways 242
also leads to a better understanding of how
engines should be managed in heavy precipitation
We once again reaffirm to the pilots
the importance not to allow the engine to
continue operation in continual surging
If there is a surge condition for any reason
you should clear the surge
because if you didn't clear the surge,
and allowed it to operate
it would break eventually
In every air-crash, investigators try to determine
whether or not the accident was survivable
When you look at the survivability
in an aircraft accident
you can definitively say
that the design of the seat contributed
to the survival factor aspects
But the statistics that bear out whether
sitting in the front of the airplane is safer
or the back of the airplane is safer...
...don't exist
In this particular incident a surviving passenger
Don Foster, was quick thinking
He put a leather
jacket over his head
and used the pillow as a buffer between
the seat in front of him and his face
That probably saved his life
from the standpoint that it minimized
any injuries he would have suffered
In fact, the NTSB believed
that if flight attendants had distributed
blankets and pillows to the passengers
there would have been fewer injuries
as a result of the crash
We learn from every airplane-crash
We learn from this one
We learn that the communication broke down
within the FAA
within Southern Airways
even within the cockpit of that DC-9
What we didn't alternately learn though
is the most important lesson
And that is:
Awesome respect for mother nature
and what mother nature can do
30 years have passed
since Southern Airways 242 crashed through
the small community of New Hope, Georgia
Every 10 years since the crash
survivors of the tragedy gather
at a church in New Hope
They remember those that were lost
and help one another cope with the tragedy
It is one of the longest running survivors-group
of its kind
I want to welcome you to this service today
in remembering April, 4th 1977
when the Southern Airways Flight 242 crashed
here in the New Hope community
Earl D Johnson
Lyman Keele Jr
William McKenzie
Earl C Griffin Jr
After the crash I had a hard time understanding
how I manage to survive
After a couple of months I quit worrying about it
I felt like I had a second shot at it
I felt that...
...family was more important...
...having fun was more important
It took a pretty big toll on our family,
my mother, my father especially
I lost two of their children
and all of their grandchildren, all at one time
I can still to this day...
...I can smell the things
and I can hear the sounds
and I can see those people
So many things will bring back
the smallest memories
and every time it is triggered,
the emotions come back
You don't want them to, you don't ask for them
but you cannot stop them
You didn't have a great life because of this
in a way, that makes no sense
but it has changed me for the better
I think I had a better life
because of how I grew from that
May this service do honour
to these dear loved ones
and may it bring comfort and piece
to who remain
Narrator
Jonathan Aris
Subtitles
Rein Croonen
April, 4th, 1977
Hello,
My husband called me,
He said: Honey,
we got some bad weather coming in
Boys, come on in now
Nasty weather is coming.
One of the worst storms in years
is moving across the South
Sadie Hurst rushes her children to safety
We had this tremendous noise
When I got to the top of the basement steps
to close the door
I saw a red reflection like fire in the door
72 people are killed
when a Southern Airways DC-9 falls from the sky
This is a true story
It is based on official reports
and eyewitness accounts.
Air crash Investigation Season 05
Southern Storm
Good afternoon, sir
Can I see your boardingpass, please?
Just on the isle on the right, sir
Boarding pass?
81 passengers board Southern Airways Flight 242
A DC-9, bound for Atlanta, Georgia
Many of them are military personnel
form nearby bases.
Captain Bill McKenzie
and first officer Lyman Keele
have been shuttling passengers
across the American South all day
Who has got the landing?
Not me, says the captain
Pilots regularly exchange tasks
on long days like this one
First officer Lyman Keele will be handling
this leg of the flight
He has been an experienced NAVY pilot
who has been with Southern Airways for 4 years
Before their last take-off,
the crew was handed a weather report
for the airports along their route
The DC-9 was introduced in 1965
to fly frequent short flights
Both of its engines are mounted
to the rear fuselage rather than the wings.
It was designed for take off on shorter runways
We had a 13 landing day
with a lot of small stops
with 20 or 30 minute legs in between
It was the tour of the South
Skies have been smooth all afternoon,
but the weather is worsening,
the flight crew is prepared for turbulence
It was raining in Huntsville
I said: It is going to be bad weather,
don't serve!
So, we did not serve from Huntsvill to Atlanta,
which is a very short route
and we were delighted not to be serving
I was a little surprised that we took off
When we did,
I thought we'd taxi at the end of the runway
and hold for a while,
because the weather looked so bad
But we taxied out and immediately took off
At 3:54 PM the DC-9 takes off
into a hard rain
The short hop to Atlanta
should take just 25 minutes
As Southern Airways 242
flies away from Huntsville
the National weather service tracks weather
that is far worse than the pilots expect
Tornado's are touching down
all across the South
The weather in the South East in the United States
can be very treacherous
High humidities, high temperatures
are a prescription for thunderstorms
With all of that kind of moisture in the air,
and the high convecting heating
you are going to have very large thunderstorms
that are associated with heavy rains. hail...
...icing conditions and extreme winds
And of course tornadoes
that will respond with that kind of action
Huntsville Air Traffic Control has some concerns
about the gathering storm
Southern Airways 242,
I am painting a line of weather
which appears to be moderate to
possibly heavy precipitation
starting about 5 miles ahead
Okay, we are in the rain right now
It doesn't look much heavier
than where we are in right now, does it?
It is not a solid mass,
but it appears to be a little bit heavier
than what you are in right now
In 1977, most airliners are equipped
with a Bendix weather radar
Pilots are trained to avoid regions
that appear bright
Where there is light, there is bad weather
I can't read that,
it looks like rain, Bill
What do you think?
There is a hole
There is a hole right there,
that is all I see
The pilots spot a dark area on their radar
a passage way through the storm
They plan to navigate between
towering thunderheads over 14,000 meter
Coming over, we have pretty good radar
at least right straight ahead, there
The next few miles
is probably the best way we can go
But as they head towards the storm-system
they get an ominous report from Memphis ATC
Attention, all aircraft
SIGMET
SIGMET is short for
SIGnificant METeorological Information
A warning to pilots
that dangerous weather is in the region
Here we go
Hold on, cowboy
The storm suddenly gets much worse
I have never heard such a loud hail
in my life
and the beating on the sides of the airplane
is extremely deafening
Please, keep your seat-belts fastened
You should be out of this, shortly
Hail at the size of baseballs hammers the DC-9
breaking the plane's windshield
The pilots of Southern 242
had to raise their voices audibly
to be heard above the unholy tattoo of this hail
which was butt shutting the airplane
These pilots have never been through
anything like this before in their lives
I don't know how to get through here, Bill
I think we can cross there
McKenzie and Keele desperately
seek an escape route from the storm
but as they do, the emergency escalates
The plane loses all electrical power
Without power, Keele must keep the aircraft level
without an artificial horizon
but surrounded by thick clouds
the horizon is difficult to find
It is almost impossible for Lyman Keele
to get his bearings
Southern 242,
What is your speed?
Atlanta Air Traffic Control tries
to make contact with Southern Airways
They receive no response
Southern 242 Atlanta
What is your speed?
After 36 seconds in the dark...
...power returns
The instruments come alive
and the radio begins working again
Air Traffic Control finally gets through
to McKenzie and Keele
Maintain 15,000
Maintain 15,000, Southern 242
Southern Airways Flight 242 has been instructed
to fly at 4600 meter
But the plane has fallen to almost 4200 meter
We are trying to get it up there
While I was looking
at the front of the left engine,
I could see the hail continued
to put more and more dents
into the cowling around the engine
and in the center of the engine
And the engine was starting to make sounds
like it was quitting
Okay, 242, we just got a windshield busted
You turn up back to 15,000 ft
We are at 14,000 ft
Southern 242,
You say you are at 14,000 ft now?
Left engine won't spool
Our left engine is cut out
You say you lost an engine
and busted a windshield?
Yes, sir
My God
The other engines is gone, too
Both engines are now out
This DC-9 is a glider
and it is falling at 56 ft/sec
They are at 14,000 ft,
they don't have a lot of time
Lyman Keele adjusts his course
to navigate his plane out of the storm
Captain McKenzie must restart the engines
or they will be forced
to make an emergency landing
Without engines, Southern Airways Flight 242
is plummeting from the sky
There is also another dire consequence
of the engine failure
Normally, the engines generate electricity
for the instruments, radios and hydraulics
When the engines quit,
all of these systems fail
APU deployed
The Auxiliary Power Unit
is a backup power generator
It will provide electricity to the plane
but it will take more than 2 minutes for it
to power up
When the 2nd engine quit
I was not aware of what was going on around me
I was so focused on trying to figure out a way
to save myself
I knew that sometimes the tail breaks off
in an accident
and I felt the further back I could get,
the better
After two minutes without systems,
the auxiliary power unit finally kicks in
The pilots may not have engines
but at least they now have power
We lost both engines
How about getting a vector to the nearest place?
Captain McKenzie needs directions
to an airport
The flight can only stay airborne
for another 6 minutes
Dobbins Air Force Base is 32 km away
It has a runway that is long enough for a DC-9
It also has full emergency services
Southern 242, turn right, heading 100
will be vectors for a straight approach to Dobbins
Runway 11
How far is it?
Lyman Keele knows
Dobbins Air Force Base intimately
He trained there and
it is now his home base as a NAVY reserve pilot
He has landed there frequently
Clear an emergency, Bill
Right now, Keele's familiarity with Dobbins
is the only advantage this crew has
Less than 16 km away
lies the town of New Hope, Georgia
Sadie Hurst sees no signs of an advancing storm
It was an absolute beautiful day
The children were playing outside,
riding bicycles up and down the driveway
My husband worked in Atlanta
and he kept his radio on the radio-station
When he called me he said:
Honey, we got some bad weather coming in
He said: you need to get the kids in
Boys, come on in now
Nasty weather is coming
Come in now
Flashlights, and batteries, Steven
For the tornadoes come you got bad weather,
dark clouds, rain and hail
We didn't see any of that
Southern Airways 242 finally breaks
through the storm-clouds into clear skies
The plane descends steadily through 2100 meters
Get those engines started
Once the engines failed,
the workload in the cockpit
increased substantially
In this particular instance,
the first officer was the pilot flying
He was the one
that was manipulating the flight controls
and manoeuvring the airplane
The captain on the other hand was now
running checklists and trying to troubleshoot
Listen, we lost both engines
and I cannot tell you the implications of this
We only got two engines!
How far is Dobbins now?
Southern 242, 19 miles
Do you have one engine running now?
Negative, no engines
I didn't know what was wrong
I bet I can tell something was wrong
I went and opened the cockpit door
simply to tell them we are ready for whatever
Just don't stall this thing out
No, I won't
Bill, what is going on?
Not now, Cathy, sit down
You could tell they were afraid
I understood they were afraid
just for the sound of their voice
So, I understood
there was something very dangerous going on
that I had no idea what
Down to only 1400 meters,
the plane is still 27 km
from Dobbins Air Force Base
Ask them
if there is anything between here and Dobbins
ASK THEM
IF THERE IS ANYTHING BETWEEN HERE AND DOBBINS!
Is there an airport
between our position and Dobbins?
Southern 242, No, sir
Closest airport is Dobbins
First Officer Lyman Keele doesn't think
he can get the DC-9 as far as Dobbins AirForceBase
He has lost too much altitude
I don't think we are going to make it
We are trying everything to get something started
Roger, well, there is Cartersville
You are about 10 miles South of Cartersville,
15 miles West of Dobbins
Keele needs a closer airport,
Cartersville seems like a good choice
We will take a vector to that, yes
We will have to go there
Can you give us a vector to Cartersville?
Alright, turn left heading 360
It will be directly to Cartersville
Air Traffic Controllers in Atlanta
see no other options
They direct flight 242 to Cartersville Airport
As the pilots seek out an airport,
the flight attendance still don't know
what type of landing to prepare for.
They wouldn't talk to me
When I walked in the door,
the whole windshield was cracked
So, what do we do?
I think we have lost both engines
I thought so
Cathy briefed all your passengers
I realized I was in an emergency situation
and I felt I was going to die
but I decided I would do everything I could
to try to help my chances
I had previously collected
some blankets and pillows
and had gotten my leather jacket
off the overhead rack
I arranged those to make
a nest, as much as I could, for myself
With tornadoes in the forecast,
the community of New Hope is braced
for a different type of danger
After a couple of hours of playing outside,
my mother called us to come in
because there was bad weather coming our way
We came into the house
and mother had told us what was going on
And she said that we need to get downstairs
to prepare for the bad weather that was coming
Southern Airways Flight 242
has lost too much altitude
The pilots come to the frightening conclusion
that at the rate they are falling,
they cannot make it to Cartersville
They must prepare to land now
I am picking out a clear field
Bill, you have to find me a highway
Let us get the next clear open field
No, Bill
I see a highway over there, no cars
Right there, is that straight?
No!
We will have to take it
Lyman Keele decides to bring the plane down
onto a rural highway
Georgia State Highway 92
Captain Bill McKenzie radios Atlanta ATC
with the bad news
We are putting it on the highway
The clock runs out on Southern Airways 242
Sweet Jesus
With no engines,
first officer Lyman Keele lines off the aircraft
for an emergency landing on the highway
that runs through New Hope, Georgia
Flaps
Gear down to 50
God, Bill, I hope we could do it
Without training
on how to land a DC-9 with no engines
first officer Lyman Keele's attempt
is entirely improvised
Lyman Keele is a young man who has just come back
from the proving ground of South East Asia
He was a NAVAL aviator
He learned the niceties of landing
on a rolling, pitching, aircraft carrier
in the South China Sea in the middle of the night
What he was confronted with right now
was even a greater test,
the greatest test he had ever confronted
in his life as an airman
There is a car ahead
I got it now, I got it
Brace for impact
The Southern Airways Flight
touches down on State Highway 92
When the aircraft touched down,
the first touch down was very nice
It was smooth, it seemed like it was going to work
and everything was going to turn out okay
and then it immediately bounced back up in the air
and slammed down
The plane smashes into New Hope
Before the plane
completely stopped moving,
there was fire blowing
through the cabin
I felt my face burning,
even though I tried to cover it
with my leather jacket
We heard this tremendous noise
Large section of Southern Airways 242
littered the entire length of New Hope
I got my seat belt loose after a few tries
and turned toward the rear of the airplane
and I saw a spot of light
I got up and ran for that light
I could not believe I was alive
I just could not believe it
Where I found myself after we woke up
was indescribable
I was sitting by the front entry door
We have a co closet that was adjacent to it
and the back wall of the jump-seat strapped to
All three of those walls had collapsed
and rolled in like a little triangle ball area
And there was just enough for me inside
I could see a crack of light
And I thought:
I am going to that crack of light
Stewardess Sandy Purl also escaped safely
She is able to help others
Survivors flee the flaming wreckage
When I got to the top of the basement steps
to close the door
I saw a red reflection like fire in the door
Then I saw what was happening
I saw smoke and fire
and the people that were coming toward me
They were screaming, they were yelling
they were quiet
Everything was on fire
and I could see people running toward a house
I need to use your phone
I wanted to call
The local people are Southern and say
We just landed somewhere and we need help
It just became a blur
they just kept coming
I got back to the kitchen
and I was just circled by people
They knew they were in a house
and I guess they felt safe
and they needed somebody to help them
I was still frantic
I was still trying to move as quickly as possible
and doing as much as I could at the time
I will remember till the day
I die just staring there...
...at the pine trees, burning
pieces of aircraft,
It was so unreal
I have never seen anything like this
and never want to see anything like that again
72 people,
including pilots Lyman Keele and Bill McKenzie
die in the crash of Southern Airways Flight 242
Investigators would soon uncover a tragic
series of misqueues and coincidences
that cause the plane to crash
Southern Flight 242 crashed
after the DC-9 jet lost power in both engines
The plane had flown through a violent hailstorm
on a flight from Huntsville, Alabama to Atlanta
I saw the plane as it came veering down
It hit the tree tops
We thought it was a tornado at first
People were in the storeyard in vehicles,
it actually hit them
A family of seven is killed instantly
when the plane hit there car
They were just leaving the store about the time
that the flight tried to land on the highway
and then it hit the gas-pumps
and they exploded
everything around was on fire
They were in the car and perished
during the explosion in fire
Investigators from the NTSB arrived
within hours of the accident
This is the 2nd major blow
to Southern Airways safety record
In 1970, flight 932,
carrying the Marshal University football team
crashed in West Virginia
Everyone on board was killed.
There are always many questions
that investigators have to find the answers to
The two primary questions that needed
to be answered by the NTSB were:
'What were the weather conditions'
and 'What caused both engines on
a 2 engine-airplane to flame-out...
...that resulted in the pilots having to make an
emergency landing on a highway in a small town'
The storm that flight 242 flew into was a monster.
Why had a crew, so familiar with weather
in the South, flown head first into it?
Investigators listen to the CVR
for any clues about the decisions,
made by the crew as they were
entering the thunderstorm
They learn that the pilots relied heavily
on their weather radar as they approach the storm
but it appears to have deceived them
One of the limitations of the radar that the crew
of Flight 242 was using is signal attenuation:
That is that the beam that is projected from the
radar unit out to look at the weather and return
is diffused, so that the picture that is depicted
in the cockpit that the crew is looking at
may not be accurate
Weather radar sends out radio waves
those waves bounce off storm-clouds ahead
and return to the aircraft
but if precipitation is extremely intense,
the radio-waves cannot be deflected away
The radar unit might then interpret
the lack of returning waves as a clear path ahead
Those inaccuracies are hard to decipher
and if the crew is depending
solely or very intently on the radar
to guide them through the precipitation,
they may be making decisions
that aren't based on accurate information
The storm that entangled Southern Airways 242
is one of the worst to hit U.S. in 3 years
The crew didn't encounter a tornado, but
it was battered by torrential rain and heavy hail
I don't know how we get though here, Bill
What Keele and McKenzie read as a clear area ahead
was in fact the heaviest part of the storm
They flew straight for it
The other engine is gone, too
Southern 242, say again
standby...
...we lost both engines
Once inside the storm, the DC-9's engines failed
But a turbo-fan engine is designed to ingest
huge amounts of rain and even hail
Precipitation alone should not have shot them down
Investigators study what is left
of the DC-9's engines for clues
They need to know if some mechanical failure
caused both engines to fail inside the storm
Initially, I was puzzled as to how the engines
could be involved in the cause of this accident
but it was very anxious to get there
to see the engines to find out if there was
any sort of visible failure in the engines
Pratt and Whitney, the manufacturer of the engines
assigns Al Weaver to advice
the NTSB investigation
The engines are moved to Atlanta Airport
for a closer inspection
And when they lifted the engines up,
in the vertical direction
in the hangar
I could hear the tinkling and pieces fell out
through the front of the engine on the floor
I reached over and picked up those pieces
and I recognized immediately
this parts of the high compressor blading,
deep with inside the engine.
Al Weaver discovers
that the pieces that fell from the engine
were broken blades from the compressor
Jet engines need pressurized air for combustion
Two separate compressors inside the engine
are made up of dozens of steel blades
The rapidly spinning blades
force air to the back of the engine
The pressurized air is ignited
in the combustion chamber, creating thrust
Weaver notices that the compressor-blades
are badly bent or fatigued
The way they are bent
tells him they were damaged in the air,
not when the plane hit the ground
And we know that that fatiguing and the type
of fatigue that we could observe with our eye
is caused by the repetitive surging
of the engine over and over.
A surge occurs when the airflow through an engine
gets interrupted
Pressure builds up between the compressors
in stead of behind them
Without the back pressure,
air from the combustion chamber moves to the front
The engine briefly looses power
Next, investigators need to find out
if the repetitive surging was caused by
the engines, inhaling massive amounts of rain
When an engine ingests rain,
it has to convert it into a gas
before it can pump it out as exhaust
That process uses energy
and slows down the engines
Investigators conclude
that with so much rain to convert,
the engines could not maintain enough power
to run the generators
That is what caused the first power outage
But it doesn't explain
why the engines failed completely
Al Weaver wants to know if the sheer volume
of rain, the engines were forced to ingest,
could have caused their failure
The same engine model that powered SA242
is run with up to 14% water/air
Engines up 3/4 throttle
Let us begin
Investigators ultimately throw
monsoon-level-rains against the engine
They run it from idle up to full throttle
The rain was not enough to cause the kind of surge
that tore the engines on flight 242 to pieces
The engines operated normally,
no abnormalities
So, our judgement was:
we could not conceive of a rainstorm
that would put more water in
We knew we were going in the wrong direction
with more water
The water-ingestion-test
points investigators to another suspect
Hail
People who survived the crash described
seeing hail the size of baseballs
It was powerful enough
to break the plane's 3.5 cm thick windshield
Al Weaver discovers significant hail-damage
on both of the plane's engine cowlings
Starting at the front of the engine,
we noted that the inlet cowl and the center body
that streamlined the airflow
going in to the engine
which are parts of the air part structure,
and made out of aluminium
were all dented from both engines
And that let us to suspect
that the existence of the hail
might have been a significant contributor
Weaver knows that it would take a powerful force
to damage the hard metal compressor blades
We knew
from the mechanically examination of the engines
that the hail itself
did not cause any damage to the engine
and only dented
the outside of the covering over the engine
Heavy precipitation and a damaged cowling
could have interrupted the engine's airflow
and caused a surge
But one surge shouldn't tear an engine apart
Weaver suspects that massive pieces of hail
may have clogged the vital outlet in the engines
The bleed valves
When pressure builds between the two compressors
bleed valves should open automatically
to release that pressure, and clear the surge
If the bleed valves were blocked,
the engines would have continued
to surge over and over again
Once the engine begins to surge
the action that the pilot should have taken
was to pull the throttles back to clear the surge
Al Weaver turns to the CVR
and discovers that the circumstances
may have caused the crew to do the exact opposite
Maintain 15,000 ft, Southern 242
We are trying to get it up there
Weaver learns that the crew was asked to climb,
while in the heart of the storm
In order to climb,
the captain had to increase thrust to his engines
which would have made matters worse
But if the surge was not cleared,
and allowed to continue
then the engine
would simply break itself internally
Advancing the throttles
would only worsen the situation
With its bleed cavities blocked by hail,
pressure build up inside the engines,
bending the compressor blades until they shattered
And once the blades broke in the compressor
then, the engine has no hope of ever working again
Investigators now understand
how the pilots mis-read the storm
and how their engines failed as a result of it
But they don't know why the pilots were not warned
that there was such a severe storm in their path
As the pilots prepare to depart Huntsville
they did have a weather report from Southern Air
But the information was already hours old
Southern Airways dispatch did not have
updated information
They did not subscribe to
the National Weather Services update system
They did have a subscription to a service
that required them to dial up
and receive the information
When the dispatcher called the phone number,
to get the updated information
it was busy, and never pursued it
It was not able to provide
any kind of updated information to the crew of 242
Southern Airways 242,
I am painting a line of weather which appears
to be moderate to possibly heavy precipitation
starting about 5 miles ahead
Could Huntsville have provided
better weather information?
Absolutely
but in the course of doing their job,
they provided localized weather information
about an intense thunderstorm
or rain-shower that was moving over the airport
They were only responsible really
for about 40 nautical miles
What the crew of Flight 242 was looking at
was well beyond 40 miles
With little information on the storm
and having mis-read their weather radar
Bill McKenzie and Lyman Keele
flew blindly into massive thunderheads
The heavy rain and hail crippled their engines
The crew decided that
their only option
was an emergency landing
When investigators analyze the flightpath
of Southern Airways 242
they discover one more deadly oversight
From the time the crew realized
that they had no engine power
until the time of touchdown was about 9 minutes,
in looking at the
critical decision making
they had about 7 minutes of
solid critical decision making
before they were committed
to that emergency landing on the highway
Give us a vector to a clear area, Atlanta
After the engines failed,
the pilots made a 180° turn towards the West
looking for an escape from the storm
That takes them directly away
from Dobbins Air Force Base
The turn takes the pilots out of the hailstorm
but leaves them further away from a runway
They also loose
minutes of valuable time flying time
Only once the pilots escaped the hailstorm,
then they turned again towards Dobbins
Is there an airport
between our position and Dobbins?
Southern 242, No Sir,
closest airport is Dobbins
Had they maintained their course to Dobbins
rather than make the turn
to try and find another airport
they probably would have had a better success-rate
and definitively a better survival-rate
By the time McKenzie received the instructions
Southern Airways 242 had been flying away
from Dobbins for too long
The plane was simply too far
and flying too low to make it there
But there was one last missed opportunity
to save Flight 242
Investigators learn that just as McKenzie and
Keele were directed towards Dobbins Air-force Base
they were right above another runway
Cornelius Moore Airport
I thought we would land at Cornelius Moore Airport
because I was familiar with that airport
I had flown many times in our airplane
back and forth between Decatur and Atlanta
Investigators learn that Cornelius Moore
was just out of range of radar
at Atlanta approach Control
They did not know it existed
They could not direct Southern Airways 242 there
because they could not see it on their screens
When I learned that the controllers in Atlanta
did not know about the Cornelius Moore Airport
in Cartersville, I was upset
Because we went
within 3 or 4 miles at that airport
It had a 4,000 ft runway
and even though some of the
controllers thought it was too short
it sure would have better than that highway
we had landed on
I was very, very angry
it was just a foetal reaction
It was such a waste of life
I was sad
The NTSB investigation concludes that
the catastrophic failure of the turbo fan engines
and the failure to convey sufficient information
on the storm to the pilots
are the causes of the crash
of Southern Airways 242
The NTSB acts immediately
It issues a recommendation
that weather radar systems
aboard planes and in ATC centres
be upgraded to better portrait the weather
In today’s commercial aircraft
pilots have available to them:
colour weather radar
It is radar that depict in various colour-bands
the intensity of the precipitation
The crash of Southern Airways 242
also leads to a better understanding of how
engines should be managed in heavy precipitation
We once again reaffirm to the pilots
the importance not to allow the engine to
continue operation in continual surging
If there is a surge condition for any reason
you should clear the surge
because if you didn't clear the surge,
and allowed it to operate
it would break eventually
In every air-crash, investigators try to determine
whether or not the accident was survivable
When you look at the survivability
in an aircraft accident
you can definitively say
that the design of the seat contributed
to the survival factor aspects
But the statistics that bear out whether
sitting in the front of the airplane is safer
or the back of the airplane is safer...
...don't exist
In this particular incident a surviving passenger
Don Foster, was quick thinking
He put a leather
jacket over his head
and used the pillow as a buffer between
the seat in front of him and his face
That probably saved his life
from the standpoint that it minimized
any injuries he would have suffered
In fact, the NTSB believed
that if flight attendants had distributed
blankets and pillows to the passengers
there would have been fewer injuries
as a result of the crash
We learn from every airplane-crash
We learn from this one
We learn that the communication broke down
within the FAA
within Southern Airways
even within the cockpit of that DC-9
What we didn't alternately learn though
is the most important lesson
And that is:
Awesome respect for mother nature
and what mother nature can do
30 years have passed
since Southern Airways 242 crashed through
the small community of New Hope, Georgia
Every 10 years since the crash
survivors of the tragedy gather
at a church in New Hope
They remember those that were lost
and help one another cope with the tragedy
It is one of the longest running survivors-group
of its kind
I want to welcome you to this service today
in remembering April, 4th 1977
when the Southern Airways Flight 242 crashed
here in the New Hope community
Earl D Johnson
Lyman Keele Jr
William McKenzie
Earl C Griffin Jr
After the crash I had a hard time understanding
how I manage to survive
After a couple of months I quit worrying about it
I felt like I had a second shot at it
I felt that...
...family was more important...
...having fun was more important
It took a pretty big toll on our family,
my mother, my father especially
I lost two of their children
and all of their grandchildren, all at one time
I can still to this day...
...I can smell the things
and I can hear the sounds
and I can see those people
So many things will bring back
the smallest memories
and every time it is triggered,
the emotions come back
You don't want them to, you don't ask for them
but you cannot stop them
You didn't have a great life because of this
in a way, that makes no sense
but it has changed me for the better
I think I had a better life
because of how I grew from that
May this service do honour
to these dear loved ones
and may it bring comfort and piece
to who remain
Narrator
Jonathan Aris
Subtitles
Rein Croonen