…And One On the Ground
Three accidents with oft-forgotten, lone victims who were just minding their own business when their lives collided with an airliner.
WARNING: This article contains gruesome and emotional details of major aviation accidents.
When we purchase a ticket for an airline flight, we are technically submitting to and exposing ourselves to the ridiculously unlikely event of an accident. It’s obvious that the reward outweighs the incredibly minor risk, but at least you’re choosing to put yourself in that situation.
But what if you hadn’t chosen to participate in that flight and still became part of the accident? The odds of a passenger losing their life in a plane crash are about the same as winning the Powerball jackpot… twice. But imagine the odds if you’re just going about your day at home, or driving down the street.
There are three airline accidents that come to mind that involved a single fatality outside the aircraft. We as an industry spend so much time with analysis of the crash sequence, usually with a very flight deck-centric focus, and I feel that sometimes we lose sight of the very people we aim to protect by flying safely.
Instead of casting them off to the statistics column, let’s hear their stories today.
August 2, 1985
“You’re gonna lose it all of a sudden… there it is,” the Captain said to the First Officer, who was flying Delta Air Lines Flight 191.
They were on approach to Dallas-Fort Worth, descending through 1,000 feet at a solid 152 knots when they hit the leading edge of a microburst: a sudden, strong headwind. That headwind makes it feel like you’re gaining speed, causing their airspeed to jump 20 knots in just 12 seconds. To stay on the glide path and keep things stable, the First Officer pulled back the power.
But that headwind doesn’t last. As the plane moves deeper through a microburst, the headwind fades and becomes a downdraft that not only robs the plane of that extra speed, but also pushes it toward the ground.
Though Delta Flight 191 is a well-known accident related to microburst, there’s a lesser-known story about an L-1011 that survived one.
Link: The Disaster That Wasn’t: Saving Eastern Air Lines Flight 902 (NYCAviation.com)
The Captain knew it was coming, which is what he meant when he said they’d “lose it.” On the cockpit voice recorder, you can hear both the Captain and Second Officer urging the First Officer six times to add power. He did, but it wasn’t enough. In less than 20 seconds, the plane lost more than 50 knots of airspeed, and with it, they lost both their altitude and any chance of reaching the runway.
Meanwhile, William Mayberry was heading west on Highway 114 in his black 1971 Toyota Celica. He had just left work at a Toyota dealership where he had recently been hired as a mechanic. A veteran of the US Air Force, a husband, and a father of two, William had only been in North Texas for a week. He moved from Vicksburg hoping to better provide for his family, who were still back home and planning to join him in two weeks.
That day, he was making a short drive to a relative’s house in nearby Grapevine to celebrate a birthday: his own. William had turned 28 years old that very day.
Flight 191 hit the ground at 200 miles per hour and kept sliding forward toward Highway 114. Other drivers later said the rain was so heavy that visibility was no more than 30 feet, so William likely never saw it coming. One of the L-1011’s engines struck William’s car with tremendous force, shearing off its roof and crushing the rest of the vehicle. Mayberry was both ejected from the vehicle, and decapitated.
Photos of the wreckage were published in newspapers across the country. That was how his family found out he died, even before he was officially identified.
His widow said that her kids “...saw the picture of Bill’s car in the paper and asked if their daddy had been squashed.”
Delta Air Lines Flight 191 killed not just the 136 passengers on board, but also William Mayberry while he was on his way to be served his own birthday cake.
February 12, 2009
There was light snow and fog in Buffalo that evening, creating prime conditions for icing. While planning their approach, the Captain of Colgan Flight 3407 made a key mistake: he set the stall warning trigger 20 knots too high.
As they descended, both pilots got distracted by what’s called “non-pertinent conversation.” That means they were chatting about things unrelated to the flight, which isn’t allowed below 10,000 feet. By the time they snapped back to what they were doing, they were at 2,300 feet and hadn’t completed the descent checklist. They were flying a little fast and, in order to drop their speed to where they should have been already, they hurriedly pulled back the throttle and lowered both the flaps and landing gear at once.
As they quickly slowed to 130 knots, the stall warning activated, consisting of a “stick shaker” that vibrates the yoke to get the pilot’s urgent attention. However, because of the Captain's earlier mistake, they weren’t actually near stall speed, yet.
What happened next turned that false alarm into a real emergency. Instead of lowering the nose to increase speed, which is the proper response to a stall warning, the Captain pulled the nose up sharply. That caused the plane to lose even more speed and sent them into an actual stall. The aircraft has an automatic system that tries to recover in these situations by forcing the nose down, known as the “stick pusher.” But the Captain overrode it and continued pulling back on the yoke.
As speed continued to bleed off, and without enough to generate lift, the aircraft turned over and fell from the sky.
On the ground below, Douglas Wielinski was in his living room with his wife, Karen. They were watching a recorded episode of American Idol while their youngest daughter was in her upstairs bedroom.
When the show ended, Karen asked if he wanted to watch a food program next. He joked, “I don’t have time for that,” and decided to head upstairs to bed. He had no idea how little time he actually had, and that it would be the last conversation he ever had with his wife.
Still sitting on the couch, Karen was used to hearing airplanes overhead. But when Colgan 3407 approached, she could tell something sounded different. She had only a moment to wonder if the plane might hit something before the 108-foot-long aircraft slammed into their home.
Chaos followed. Karen managed to crawl out through a hole in the wreckage and quickly found her daughter, who had also survived, hysterical in the driveway. Her husband, however, did not make it out.
There was some debate over whether Mr. Wielinski died instantly or survived the impact and died in the fire. Reports indicate he was thrown from the house and across the driveway, having lost his legs in the crash. His body was found two days later beneath the wreckage of their home.
Unbeknownst to me at the time of starting and titling this article, the wife of Doug Wielinski, Karen, wrote a book titled “One on the Ground: The Story of One Family Before, During, and After Continental Flight 3407 Crashed into their Home.” You can purchase the book on Amazon.com.
December 8, 2005
A big square that’s tightly surrounded by communities on all sides, you can say Chicago’s Midway Airport is “urbanly landlocked.” When compared to other airline-served airports, you could also reasonably call its runways short. But in aviation, every flight is calculated to ensure it can safely take off or land in various weather and runway conditions, assuming all parameters are met and proper procedures are followed.
Southwest Airlines Flight 1248 was inbound from Baltimore, preparing to land at MDW. A storm had already dumped eight inches of snow on the city, and visibility was reported at 4,500 feet. Due to visibility restrictions, the only available runway at the time was 31C. However, that would mean landing with a tailwind.
Most aircraft have a tailwind landing limit of 10 knots. That night, the tailwind was calculated to be 8 knots, which would usually be fine. But because of the snowy runway and reduced traction, the operational limit dropped to 5 knots. That meant they technically should not have tried to land.
I’d like to note that, up until this point, the decision to land “illegally” was not solely the fault of the pilots. The weather and runway conditions that were provided, and how it was provided, were flawed. This has been improved upon since then.
The pilots did a solid job getting the 737-700 onto the runway near the prescribed touchdown zone, but for reasons unknown, they did not deploy the thrust reversers until 16 seconds later, as the aircraft crossed the touchdown zone near the opposite end of the runway.
With little traction and limited braking, the 115,000-pound aircraft overran the runway at 46 miles per hour. The nose dropped after the nose gear collapsed, and the aircraft smashed through an airport blast fence, sliding onto a busy Chicago street before finally coming to a stop.
While the 110-foot 737 was struggling to slow, the Woods family was heading north in their car along South Central Avenue. It was a few weeks before Christmas, and the spirit of the season was in full swing. Mom, Dad, and their three young children, ages one, four, and six, had just left McDonald’s and were on their way to grandma and grandpa’s house.
They were driving through their own winter wonderland, literally singing along to Bruce Springsteen’s version of “Santa Claus is Coming to Town” as they approached West 55th Street. That’s when the Southwest Airlines flight appeared on their right. The aircraft was nearly at a stop, but not before its left side smashed into their vehicle and pinned it underneath.
Mr. Woods managed to escape and help his wife and four-year-old out of the car. His other two children were trapped in the back seat. Rescuers had to cut the vehicle open to get to the infant, who miraculously came out with just a few cuts and bruises. However, six-year-old Joshua Woods was pulled from the wreckage with no signs of life.
The NTSB later concluded that despite the various contributing factors, timely use of reverse thrust would have brought the aircraft to a stop before reaching the family’s car, and possibly sparing Joshua’s life.
Reality-Based Reminder
None of this is intended to villainize any of the pilots involved in these accidents or to cast a spotlight on blame. Fatal commercial aviation accidents are still quite rare, and as the threat of complacency continues to grow, these stories serve as reminders of the far-reaching effects of our industry’s actions, both inside and outside of the aircraft.
This is also meant as a small memorial to those whose stories are often left untold, people who never boarded a plane but were involuntarily placed in the path of flight.
If you have a question about aviation, my career, or a story request, please email me at phildernerjr@gmail.com.
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are solely my own and do not represent the positions of my employer or any affiliated organizations. This content is for informational purposes only and is not intended as professional advice.