Sudanese Airliner Crashes, Killing 116

[DemoTex]

A Sudanese airliner crashed just outside a Red Sea coast airport minutes after takeoff Tuesday, killing 116 people, officials said. The only survivor was a 2-year-old boy.

The Boeing 737 had left Port Sudan for the capital, Khartoum when it fell into an uninhabited area outside the airport, about 410 miles northeast of Khartoum.

The child was rushed to hospital in good condition, state airline officials said.

They said the dead were 11 crew members and 105 passengers - 54 Sudanese men, 27 women and 16 children as well as eight foreigners, including a citizen of the United Arab Emirates. (More ...)

http://customwire.ap.org/dynamic/stories/S/SUDAN_PLANE_CRASH?SITE=FLTAM&SECTION=HOME

[Skittles]

1. I'm reminded of that plane

that crashed - I believe it was in Detroit - a Northwest flight. Do you remember? A tiny little girl was the lone survivor.

[DemoTex]

2. The Northwest MD-80 (Detroit to Phoenix)

No-flap takeoff. I'd forgotten that there was a survivor.

[Skittles]

3. yes

that's the one. I believe it was in '87.

Here's a true story. Back in '79, I visited my grandmother in England. I was in the military and didn't have a lot of money so while I was there I kept trying to talk her into coming to the states. I told her, that way you can see all of us (my mum and my brothers). She had never been on a plane and was very afraid of them. I was telling her, but grandma, they're safer than cars, etc. I kid you not, at that very moment, the BBC news came on. They'd show a picture of Big Ben - it would 'bong' and they'd read a headline; it would bong again and they'd read another headline as a prelude to the news.

Here's how it went:

(BONG) MAJOR AIRLINE DISASTER IN AMERICA

(BONG) ENGINE FALLS OFF AIRPLANE TAKING OFF FROM OHARE AIRPORT IN CHICAGO.

(BONG) ALL (###) PASSENGERS KILLED.

My family lives in the suburbs of Chicago so O'Hare would have been where grandma would fly. Argh. Many years later, though, she actually did fly to the states.

Question for you Demo - I never understood that air crash. Shouldn't that plane still been able to fly with one engine? Was it the literal loss of the engine that caused the crash? I saw a picture and the plane was completely vertical in the air. Did the engine loss alone do that?

[DemoTex]

4. That was the American Airlines Flight 191 DC-10 at ORD (5/25/79)

The moment the pylon bolt snapped and the port engine came off the wing, the pilots became test pilots (but they did not know it). They were relatively low and relatively slow at V2+10 (I'm guessing there), although "on profile." They probably never knew that the engine had actually separated from the wing. The key to "flying out" of that particular situation may have been speed. After all, "speed is life" in the swept wing world. The engine-out target climb speed that they tried to achieve was too slow to control the damaged DC-10. Thus the crash. It is much more complicated than that actually, but that's the super-condensed version.

http://vtvt.essortment.com/americanairline_reuj.htm

BTW: Do you remember what else happened earlier in the day of the AA DC-10 crash at ORD? On the morning of May 25, 1979, John Spenkelink became the first inmate to be executed in Florida following the resumption of capital punishment.