Aviation safety archive
Explore the causes of aviation accidents and the lessons for safety. Each account traces the events, the investigation findings and the resulting changes to crew training, aircraft design and flight procedures.
Explore the archiveWe distinguish between fatal accidents, serious incidents, hijackings and emergency landings. Our editorial categories do not replace official classifications.
Flight analysis · NTSB DCA09MA026
From the bird strike to touchdown on the water. Select a moment to see how much altitude and time the crew of US Airways Flight 1549 had left.
Based on NTSB DCA09MA026. Key-point times and altitudes come from the investigation. The map uses actual OpenStreetMap geographic data. The flight line is an approximate reconstruction from Figure 1 of the report, not a GPS track; position and altitude between key moments are interpolated.
A shared event database
The filters bring together different outcomes while preserving each event’s official classification.
Found: 100 · Showing: 51–75
Hijackers forced the crew to continue despite insufficient fuel. After the engines stopped, the aircraft ditched off the Comoros coast.
A Boeing 747 and Il-76 collided on opposing courses near Delhi after the Il-76 deviated from its assigned altitude.
A fuel-air mixture ignited in the centre fuel tank. The aircraft broke up shortly after departing New York.
Improperly prepared chemical oxygen generators caught fire in the cargo compartment. Smoke and system damage quickly deprived the crew of control.
An armed group hijacked the A300 in Algiers and demanded a flight to France. At Marseille, GIGN stormed the aircraft and freed the remaining hostages.
Accidental activation of go-around mode led pilots to fight the automation, increasing pitch until the aircraft stalled and crashed near the runway.
A company employee attacked the cargo DC-10 crew and tried to take control. The severely injured pilots resisted and landed the aircraft.
Control-column movement partly disconnected the autopilot’s roll channel. The crew recognised the changed mode late and could not recover control in time.
The cargo Boeing 747’s inner engine separated, striking off the adjacent engine and damaging the wing. The aircraft lost control on approach and struck an apartment building.
The left engine’s thrust reverser deployed unintentionally at altitude. Severe asymmetry caused loss of control and aircraft breakup.
An incorrectly installed cockpit windscreen blew out, partly pulling the captain outside. The first officer landed while the crew held onto the captain.
A tail-engine disc failure disabled all three hydraulic systems. The crew controlled the aircraft solely through differential engine thrust.
A baggage-container explosion destroyed the Boeing 747 above Scotland. The extensive investigation combined technical reconstruction and international forensics.
A US warship mistakenly identified the passenger Airbus as a threat and shot it down with missiles over the Persian Gulf.
In heavy rain, both engines lost thrust and would not sustain a restart. The crew landed the Boeing 737 on a narrow grass levee without structural destruction.
A large section of the ageing Boeing 737’s cabin roof separated. Despite decompression and damage, the crew landed on Maui.
A fire broke out on the combined passenger-and-cargo deck. Smoke and system damage progressed until the aircraft was lost over the ocean.
The MD-82 began takeoff without extended flaps or slats. The configuration warning did not activate, and the aircraft could not climb.
An overheated tyre burst in the landing-gear bay, damaging systems and starting a fire. The aircraft lost control and broke up.
Hijackers diverted the aircraft to Malta and began killing hostages. Explosions and fire during the assault caused heavy casualties.
An incorrectly repaired rear pressure bulkhead failed, damaging the vertical tail and hydraulic systems. The crew fought to control the aircraft for nearly half an hour without normal controls.
The L-1011 encountered a microburst on final approach, rapidly lost airspeed and struck the ground short of the runway.
At cruising altitude, the aircraft lost speed, entered a flat spin and struck the ground. It was the deadliest aviation accident in Soviet history.
A bomb in the baggage compartment destroyed the Boeing 747 over the Atlantic. Investigations identified failures in screening, intelligence sharing and baggage control.
After being hijacked, the aircraft repeatedly flew between Beirut and Algiers. Passengers were held and released in groups; one US serviceman was killed.
How to read an investigation
An investigation report does not look for a hero or someone to blame. It reconstructs the chain of factors to help prevent the same combination from recurring.
Recorder data, communications, weather, physical evidence and operational records.
What happened to the aircraft and which decisions were made, second by second.
Technology, people, the environment and the organisation are considered together, rather than reduced to a single convenient cause.
Recommendations become training, design changes, procedures and new requirements.
Editorial standards
Fatality and survivor figures are checked against investigation materials. Where an official report is not publicly available, we say so explicitly. Eyewitness accounts are not presented as the investigation commission’s conclusions.
The terms “fatal accident”, “accident”, “serious incident” and “act of unlawful interference” are not interchangeable. We therefore display both the editorial category and the official classification.