American Airlines Flight 191: The Deadliest Non-Terrorist-Related Plane Crash In U.S. History
Fair UseAmerican Airlines Flight 191, seen at an odd angle, shortly before it crashed on May 25, 1979.
Shortly after American Airlines Flight 191 took off from O’Hare International Airport in Chicago en route to Los Angeles International Airport, the plane’s cockpit voice recorder recorded a loud “thunk” and the voice of one of the pilots exclaiming, “Damn!” Then, the plane plummeted from the sky.
It crashed into the nearby, defunct Ravenswood Airport, erupting into a fireball so hot that firefighters could not even approach it for almost an hour. With 273 fatalities, including two people who were on the ground, the crash of American Airlines Flight 191 stands as the worst non-terrorist-related plane crash in U.S. history. And it was tragically preventable.
Tribune Content Agency LLC/Alamy Stock PhotoWhen the plane exploded, it caused a fire so intense that firefighters could not approach it for nearly an hour.
As investigators later found, the plane had quickly lost its 9,000-pound left-wing engine and pylon during take-off. As the aircraft shot into the air, the plane was dragged down to the left, causing it to nosedive. Within just two minutes, it had crashed, killing all 271 people onboard, as well as two unsuspecting bystanders on the ground.
Dan Cirignani, a police officer patrolling nearby, responded to the scene. Not only had everyone died in the crash, but the heat of the explosion had made the crash victims completely unrecognizable.
“They looked like black coal,” he told the Chicago Tribune. “The carnage, it was just one of the most horrible things you’ve ever seen.”
Though there was initial speculation that the plane itself, a McDonnell Douglas DC-10, was somehow faulty, investigators found that the blame lay with the American Airlines maintenance crew. In order to save time and money, they had not followed the correct procedures while removing the plane’s engine and pylon during repairs and maintenance.
