Came here due to my interest in crash investigations, and in particular, the loss of Swiss Air 111. Remember the night of that crash, and followed it as closely as possible as it unfolded. IMO, Swiss Air 111 is the most horrifying accident on record (especially after reading the eyewitness accounts -- and I've seen enough death scene descriptions and what remains of humans afterwards, but none pales to this one).

Thanks for continuing to have a forum to discuss this crash after so long (it seems these crashes are but news stories for MSM to fill space, and quickly they're lost to history). TWA 800 seems to have gotten most of the press, but again IMO, there's so much more horror in this event. Perhaps it's graphicness is what keeps people arms distance away (like the Valujet crash), but it's important that folks don't forget; for airline accidents, unfortunately, will continue and the secrets to each fate has an answer from the past.

May the survivors have closure in knowing that their loved ones didn't die in vain. They may well save countless lives, too.

Not if the FAA has their way.

However I'm glad to meet someone else like me. I'm always sort of embarrased by my interest in crash investigations. Whenever I've told people about it they look at me like I'm some kind of ghoul or something. I think it stemmed from my childhood, leading into adulthood fear of flying. I flew a Cessna Skyhawk once and I was fine, but I don't like being "flown" because the root of my fear is giving up control. I feel the same way if i'm driving in a car with a bad driver or any driver going over a tall bridge. I'm interested in all aspects of aviation, not just accidents.

Flight 111 was bad there's no doubt about it, but the worst I've ever heard of is Alaska Airlines 261. I won't go in to details of the cabin environment prior to the crash here because this is a sacred place, but suffice to say it wasn't pretty.

I will talk about the technical aspects of it though because that is relevant to this discussion. Basically Alaska Airlines heavily neglected maintence of their airliners to keep them in the air and making money, much like Valujet did. On the accident aircraft a simple lack of grease on the Jackscrew in the Horizontal Stabilizer cost 88 people their lives. GREASE, that's it something that might have cost them $50 tops. And the sad thing is they'd been reported to the FAA a year before, and all they got was a fine and got watched a little more carefully. Why the FAA didn't ground them...

I wish the media would have grabbed ahold of 261 like they did Flight 800, then something might have gotten done.

Got into all of this because my dad was a forensics chief and worked the crime scenes. Got into his books. :x Then years later my interest moved into forensic anthropology (especially in mass disasters). Now it's over 20 years later. My interest isn't because it's of fear or for ghoulish reasons, it's to help find closure for the survivors (and in some cases, help answer history). There's always something that's over looked, that years later is found [usually in some box on some shelf] to help answer the riddles.

But like you said, this is a sacred place and talking about such things may be disquieting. I'll hang around more to debunk the tinfoil types, though. As they seem to be sicker, preying on survivors and trolling them along, giving false hope and preventing closure (so very important for survivors). Conspiracies don't often bring down planes, corporate greed and government inefficiency often does (the FAA and the airline industry are in bed together. Crap, even the fictional 1970s Quincy, M.E. episodes hinted about it!).

Thanks for a heads up on another NTSB report to read, too. Think I may have glanced through it before, but will recheck it again.

Ya, as I mentioned to Barbara I'm proud of our Canadian TSB for doing such a good job on the investigation of Flight 111. Unfortunatly I've heard that Transport Canada is giving them some guff about implimenting their reccomendations, but I guess that just goes to show there are money grubbers in Canada too.

Murray, Thanks for your help- apparently, you were right. Everything appears to be ok again.

Barbara

That's what ya pay me the big bucks for.

LOL