Avianca Flight 52: Deadly Delay

Synopsis

On 25th January, 1990, Avianca Flgiht 52, a Boeing 707- 321B, was flying from Bogota to New York JFK Airport via Medellin. The plane crashed into the village - Cove Neck, which was 24 km away from the airport after the flight had been flying in a holding pattern for over one hour above the aerospace of New York. The crew could not do anything due to the plane was running out of fuel and even the reserve fuel incase for emergency. One of the engine flamed out with the main source of the electricity generator causing the aircraft had limited power supply through the battery and thus, the aircraft lost thrust causing it crashed into the village killed 73 out of 158 people on board.

The main reasons of the flight crashed into the village was because
1) The pilots did not confirm with the ATC that they were in an emergency of fuel until the last few minutes, which, they were not following the guideline from IATA, therefore, the ATC couldn’t prioritize the aircraft status causing the aircraft ended up crashing into the village.
2) There was a language barrier between the pilots and the Air Traffic Controller causing the confirmation of priority status.
3) If the flight crews would have used the “airline operational control dispatch system” during their international flight in poor weathers as the US federal Aviation Regulation part 121 required, the accident would have be different.

Aviation Crash Video

Part 1 of 5

(Video embedded from Youtube on 10 September, 2009- see cineflix, undated- a1)

Part 2 of 5

(Video embedded from Youtube on 10 September, 2009- see cineflix, undated- b2)

Part 3 of 5

(Video embedded from Youtube on 10 September, 2009- see cineflix, undated- c3)

Part 4 of 5

(Video embedded from Youtube on 10 September, 2009- see cineflix, undated- d4)

Part 5 of 5

(Video embedded from Youtube on 10 September, 2009- see cineflix, undated- e5)

References

1. CINEFLIX (undated- a). Out of sight. Air crash investigation. retrieved from Youtubeon 10 Sept, 2009

2. CINEFLIX (undated- b) Out of sight. Air crash investigation. retrieved from Youtubeon 10 Sept, 2009

3. CINEFLIX (undated- c) Out of sight. Air crash investigation. retrieved from Youtubeon 10 Sept, 2009

4. CINEFLIX (undated- d) Out of sight. Air crash investigation. retrieved from Youtubeon 10 Sept, 2009

5. CINEFLIX (undated- e)Out of sight. Air crash investigation. retrieved from Youtubeon 10 Sept, 2009

Want to know more?

http://www.aopa.org/asf/publications/sa19.pdf

it contains information on how pilots should do in different situations.

http://libraryonline.erau.edu/online-full-text/ntsb/aircraft-accident-reports/AAR91-04.pdf

for more information, a full NTSB report on this accident

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avianca_Flight_52

more details of the accident provided in Wikipedia- Avianca Flgiht 52

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