All language subtitles for M.2003-S22E01-Pacific.Plunge.Alaska.Airlines.Flight.261.WEBDL-1080pEAC3.5.1h264-PiTBULL_track4_[eng]

AUTOMATION: Stabilizer Motion.

- Help me back.
- Okay.

NARRATOR: The pilots of
Alaska Airlines Flight 261

wrestle with an MD-83 nosediving
towards the Pacific Ocean.

THOMPSON (over radio):
We've got it under control here.

- No, we don't.
- The airplane pitched down and rolled.

- Mayday!
- It actually gets inverted, upside down.

NARRATOR: Amazingly, the pilots manage
to keep the aircraft flying.

This is like an airshow maneuver.

Speed brakes!

NARRATOR: Just seconds from impact,
the pilots right their aircraft.

They had one shot to save the plane,

- or all would be lost.
- Here we go!

PILOT (over radio): Mayday, mayday.

(theme music)

AUTOMATION: Pull up.

(indistinct radio transmissions)

NARRATOR:
Alaska Airlines Flight 261 takes flight,

climbing into sunny skies over
Puerto Vallarta, Mexico.

Gear up.

Gear's up.

NARRATOR: Captain Ted Thompson
is an Air Force veteran.

He's flown with Alaska Airlines
for 17 years.

Thank you, sir.

NARRATOR: First Officer Bill Tansky
has been flying for almost four decades.

He's the one flying today.

The pilots on 261 were highly regarded
by their fellow pilots.

These were really top-notch aviators.

- Flaps up.
- Flaps.

NARRATOR: The MD-83 is flying north
to San Francisco for a stop-over.

From there, it's a short hop to its final
destination, Seattle, Washington.

Three flight attendants tend
to the 83 passengers on board.

- (soft suspenseful music)
- Fifteen minutes after takeoff.

- (beep)
- That's strange.

NARRATOR: The pilots become
aware of a problem.

The plane's out of trim.

NARRATOR: Trim refers to small
adjustments to the horizontal stabilizer

that maintains the pitch of the aircraft.

When that light goes on,
it tells the crew,

"You're gonna have a problem
adjusting the nose up or down,"

which is of course crucial for flight.

NARRATOR: The warning light indicates
the horizontal stabilizer is jammed,

pushing the nose down slightly.

Let's check this out.

- Autopilot off.
- Good idea.

- Whoa!
- What's it doing?

- It's pushing down.
- NARRATOR: First Officer Tansky

uses all his physical strength
to keep the plane's nose up.

JOHN: The first officer is
hand-flying the airplane,

so he's manually got
his hands on the control yoke,

and increasingly, there's more and more
pressure that he's having to hold.

He's using a lot of arm muscle.
So this is something that they wanna fix.

Well, we're still climbing, that's good.
Let's get to 3-1-0 and figure this out.

NARRATOR: By pulling back
on the control column,

the pilots can deflect the
plane's elevators enough

to enable the aircraft
to continue climbing.

21 minutes after takeoff,
flight 261 levels off at 31,000 feet.

The manual says try the pickle switch.

Pickle switches are literally
just a little toggle switch

on the control column, and it moves
the horizontal stabilizer, such that

it will push the nose up or down.

NARRATOR: Controls in the cockpit
activate a two-foot jackscrew in the tail.

As the jackscrew turns,
it moves the stabilizer up or down.

They were having to go through the
manuals. And they were asking each other,

"What do you know?
What can we do? What can we try?"

Nothing. Why don't you try?

NARRATOR: Captain Thompson tries to
activate the horizontal stabilizer

using what pilots call the
suitcase handles.

- No dice.
- MARY: It's like trying to start your car.

They were trying everything they could
think of to get their plane to respond.

Let's try it on autopilot.

NARRATOR: They hope the autopilot
can keep the plane level.

The plane is steady.

All right, I'm thinking we
get this plane on the ground

- sooner rather than later.
- Yup, maybe LAX?

Call dispatch.

If you have a control problem,
you have to get that plane on the ground.

Dispatch, 261, requesting a
diversion to LAX.

Our longitudinal trim system
is inoperative.

NARRATOR: Captain Thompson
contacts Alaska Airlines'

- flight dispatcher in Seattle.
- SEATTLE DISPATCHER: Dispatch, 261,

copy that. If you want to land
in LA, for safety reasons,

we'll be looking at over an hour delay
because of a flow problem right now.

(scoffs) I didn't really want
to hear about the flow.

I'm concerned about suitable airports.
Do you have a wind at LAX?

SEATTLE DISPATCHER: It's 2-6-0 at 9.

NARRATOR:
The pilots compare the wind conditions

at Los Angeles and San Francisco airports.

The pilots on this flight took such care
considering all their options on runways.

NARRATOR: There's a headwind at LAX.
But at San Francisco there's a crosswind.

2-6 at 9 versus a direct crosswind.
For safety reasons, I think something

that lowers groundspeed makes sense.

NARRATOR: The headwind at LAX will
help make it a safer landing.

MARY: Once you're lined up for the LAX
runway, you've got perfect winds coming

right at your nose. It blows off
the Pacific Ocean, it's predictable,

it's constant,
and it slows down your plane.

Are you the guys
with the horizontal situation?

NARRATOR: 10 minutes after re-routing,
a mechanic at Alaska Airlines'

maintenance facility
in Los Angeles contacts the crew.

Affirmative.

JOHN: The maintenance facility can talk
directly to the pilots

to provide them the expertise
on the problem that they're dealing with.

Did you try the suitcase
and pickle switches?

Yeah, we tried just about everything.

If you've got any hidden circuit breakers,
we'd love to know about them.

Yeah, I'll look into the
circuit breaker guide as a double check.

- And the alternate's inoperative too, huh?
- Yup, our horizontal stabilizer appears

- to be jammed, the whole thing.
- Okay, thank you, sir.

I'll see you when you get to LAX.

The response
from Alaska Airlines maintenance

was basically no response at all.
They provided them no help.

Really, the most they ever said to them,

"Did you try the pickle switches
and the suitcase handles?"

Which was one of the
first things that they did.

All right, let's try the
pickle switches again.

You got it?

The captain is warning
the first officer as a reminder,

"When we click the autopilot off, be ready
because it's gonna require a lot of effort

- from you right then."
- This'll click the autopilot off.

AUTOMATION: Stabilizer motion.
Stabilizer motion.

NARRATOR: The nose of the plane drops,
far more than the pilots anticipated.

Holy crap!

JOHN: The airplane is
pitched down significantly,

and the airframe is shaking violently.

They know something is very
desperately wrong with the airplane.

NARRATOR: The problem is suddenly
much worse. Flight 261 begins to nosedive.

- What are you doing?
- It got worse.

They have to get the nose back up,

or they'll have an unarrested descent
all the way to the ocean.

- Help me back. Help me back.
- Okay.

NARRATOR: The crew
of Alaska Airlines Flight 261

struggles to regain control
of their MD-83.

They pulled back on the
control yoke, holding a lot of force.

Center, Alaska 261. We are in a dive here.
I've lost control of vertical pitch.

- Alaska 261, say again, sir.
- We are in a vertical dive at 26,000.

NARRATOR: They are now
three minutes from impact.

Speed brakes.

NARRATOR:
The pilots deploy the speed brakes,

control surfaces on the wings
of their plane that increase drag.

MARY: And he wanted to slow the plane
down, and it would also give them

more of a chance physically
to pull the plane out of the dive.

NARRATOR: The speed brakes
arrest the dive.

Using all their strength,
the pilots bring the aircraft

back under control at 24,000 feet.

Okay, once we get the speed slowed,
maybe we'll be okay.

NARRATOR: In 80 seconds,
the plane has dropped 8000 feet.

MARY: The pilots pulled
out of the dive with pure brute force.

THOMPSON:
We've got it back under control here.

- No, we don't.
- NARRATOR: Even though they've managed

to pull out of the dive,
it requires extreme effort

- to keep the nose of the plane level.
- Okay, it really wants to pitch down.

They're really having to work physically
at holding the nose up on this jet.

They're in a fight for control
of the airplane.

- It's a lot worse than it was.
- Yeah, we are in much worse shape now.

This is a very experienced crew.
These aviators have had problems

in flights before, but nothing like this.

Maintenance, 261. Are you on?

NARRATOR: 22 miles from Los Angeles,

Captain Thompson updates
Alaska Airlines Maintenance,

- hoping for advice on how to land safely.
- Yeah, 261, this is maintenance.

Yeah, we've tried both the
pickle switch and the suitcase handles,

- and it ran away full nose trim down.
- Oh, it ran away full trim.

And now, we're worse than we were.

He's explaining that
when he commanded nose up trim,

the trim system moved nose down,
moved in the opposite direction

of the way he commanded it,
and it did so very quickly.

And it did so with a lot of force.

And you're getting full nose trim down
and no nose trim up, correct?

THOMPSON: That's affirmative.
We went full nose down, and now I'm afraid

to try it again to see if we can
get it to go back in the other direction.

JOHN: He is reluctant to try to
move it again for the concern

that if it gets worse yet that they could
lose control of the airplane entirely.

If you want to try it that's okay with me.
If not, that's fine. See you at the gate.

After the maintenance base at LAX said,
"Oh, we'll see you at the gate,"

the pilots knew they were on their own.
All they had left was they had themselves,

their physical strength, and their wits.

NARRATOR: To land the plane,
the pilots need to figure out

how to control their descent,
without using the plane's trim system.

You wanna try the
trim switch again, or not?

- Uh, no, I don't know.
- It's up to you, man.

JOHN: They're literally test pilots,
and they're having to utilize

decades of experience to try
to work their way through to a solution.

- We better talk to the people back there.
- Yeah, I know.

NARRATOR: Captain Thompson
tries to reassure the passengers.

Folks, we've had a flight control problem.
We're intending to go to Los Angeles.

We're working on it,
and I don't anticipate any problems

once we get a couple
systems back on the line.

NARRATOR: With Los Angeles in sight, the
pilots prepare for an emergency landing.

- Try flaps? 15? 11?
- Let's go to 11.

NARRATOR: The pilots test the
plane in a landing configuration.

Okay, we're pretty stable here,
but we gotta get down to 180 knots.

JOHN: The jet is very badly damaged,

and they need to understand,
and find a way to control

the pitch of the jet all the way
through the landing.

If it's controllable,
we oughta just try and land it.

NARRATOR: First Officer Tansky
suggests a risky high-speed landing.

Okay, let's head for LA.

Their predicament was dire.

They would not be able to pull the
plane up and do a go around.

The only chance they had was one shot

to get it on the ground,
or all would be lost.

NARRATOR: But as soon
as they come up with a plan--

- You feel that?
- Yeah.

NARRATOR: The pilots hear thumps at the
back of the plane. Then, disaster strikes.

JOHN:
The airplane pitched down and rolled.

They know that they are
in a life-threatening situation.

This is pilots nightmare.
You're running out of time.

If they do not control the jet very
quickly, they'll lose the airplane.

Mayday!
(grunts)

(suspenseful music)

Ugh, push and roll! Push and roll!

NARRATOR: 18,000 feet
above the Pacific Ocean,

Flight 261 rolls left
and goes into a dive.

AUTOMATION: Too low, terrain.

MARY:
And this is like an airshow maneuver.

The Blue Angels do this.
The Thunderbirds do this.

NARRATOR: Dropping at 160 feet per second,
time is running out.

Okay, we are inverted.
Now we gotta get it up.

JOHN: When the airplane was inverted,
this is a very difficult situation

because they've got to try to determine

if they can maintain control of it and
get the airplane back right side up.

NARRATOR: The plane starts responding.

JOHN:
They're pushing on the control column

to prevent the possibility of the stall

and then they roll the airplane
toward wings level

- in an attempt to maintain control of it.
- Push, push, push. Push the blue side up.

JOHN: The topside of an attitude
indicator is blue like the sky.

And so they need to get the blue side
of the attitude indicator back on the top.

NARRATOR: On the ground, LAX controllers
have lost contact with Flight 261.

SkyWest 51-54, traffic at your
one o'clock is an Alaska MD-80.

Do you see him up there?

NARRATOR: They look for
help from other pilots.

SKYWEST PILOT: Yes, sir.
Definitely in a nose down position,

descending quite rapidly. He's inverted.

Okay, keep your eye on him.
Alaska 261, are you with us yet, sir?

(warning alarm beeps)

NARRATOR: 13,000 over the ocean,
the pilots' efforts seem to pay off.

The plane's nose starts to rise
but it's still inverted.

Okay, let's kick rudder.
Left rudder, left rudder.

MARY: The pilots are kind of
hanging upside down like bats,

and it was very difficult to
reach the rudder pedal.

- Left rudder!
- I can't reach it!

- Okay, right rudder, right rudder.
- Their one hope is if they could

kick that rudder,
they could flip the plane back over.

- Okay, we've gotta get it over again.
- At least upside down we're flying.

(suspenseful music)

NARRATOR: As the pilots fight to get the
plane the right way up,

- the engines on Flight 261 fail.
- (passengers scream)

JOHN: There was a disruption
in the airflow into the engines,

and it caused a loss of thrust.

- Speed brakes.
- Got it.

Their demeanor was determined, collected.
They were giving everything they had.

JOHN: The windscreen's full of the ocean.
They're not gonna solve this.

Ah, here we go!

SKYWEST PILOT:
He's hit the water. He's down.

- (scoffs)
- (soft music)

NARRATOR: Search and rescue helicopters
are immediately dispatched from

from Coast Guard stations.

Search teams find debris
floating 2.7 miles

north of Anacapa Island
off the coast of California.

REPORTER: In addition to pieces of the
plane, searchers are finding

personal effects, a shoe,
a passport, a postcard.

NARRATOR: Aviation Safety
Advocate Mary Schiavo

represents the families of
six passengers from Flight 261.

I remember this person's possessions.

All the pictures were still in
the wallet in the pants pocket...

(clears throat)

except for the picture of his wife.
And so we knew by that

and by how they found things
that he had been clutching...

That was really important to her.

NARRATOR: Rescuers search for survivors
throughout the night. None are found.

All 88 passengers and crew
on board Flight 261 are dead.

It's a terrible tragic thing, of course.
But, you know,

we have a real well-established procedure
here for how these tragedies are handled.

NARRATOR: Investigators from the NTSB,
the National Transportation Safety Board,

are assigned to find an
explanation for the crash.

LAX Maintenance is saying the pilots
reported a jammed stabilizer.

NARRATOR: NTSB Systems Investigator
Jeff Guzzetti joins the investigation.

JEFF: We knew quite a lot
just from the transmissions

- between the flight crew and Los Angeles.
- Maybe they had a mechanical problem.

It looks like they tried
both switches, no luck.

The plane pitched full nose trim down.

JEFF: We immediately began to research

the horizontal stabilizer trim system
to see how it was designed,

how it functioned,
and how the crew operated it normally.

NARRATOR: The leading edge
of the horizontal stabilizer

is raised or lowered by a jackscrew.
When activated, it moves up or down

through an acme nut, changing
the angle of the horizontal stabilizer.

We need to see the jackscrew assembly.
Let's hope it's all in one piece.

NARRATOR: Investigators wonder how the
horizontal trim system could have failed.

I'll get this to the Navy.

NARRATOR:
Recovering parts of the stabilizer system

could give investigators important clues.

But the wreckage field lies
on the bottom of the ocean

at a depth of 700 feet,
well beyond the reach of scuba divers.

We were able to tell the
Navy what to look for,

what the high priority targets were.

NARRATOR:
US Navy crews use side scan sonar

to pinpoint the location of the wreckage.

Remotely operated vehicles
equipped with robotic arms

are used to recover pieces of Flight 261.

The black boxes are retrieved
two days after the crash.

Nine days into the investigation,

essential parts of the
horizontal stabilizer are also recovered.

We got the jackscrew.

And with the brainpower we had,
we had a fighting chance

to find out exactly what went
wrong during this flight.

(soft music)

What's this stuff?

NARRATOR:
Investigators wonder if recovered parts

from the horizontal stabilizer of Flight
261 can provide clues about why it failed.

- It's some kind of metal.
- NARRATOR: What they see is puzzling.

We saw this little thin piece of metal
that we thought looked like a Slinky.

That really struck us
as something very odd.

Why isn't the nut attached
to the jackscrew?

(camera shutter clicks)

NARRATOR: Normally, the lower end of the
jackscrew is threaded through an acme nut.

When we looked at that and saw that
the jackscrew wasn't part of the acme nut,

we asked ourselves,
"How can that happen?"

That really just blew our mind.

The jackscrew and the acme nut
were found a few feet apart.

They must have separated mid-flight.

NARRATOR: Threads one-eights
of an inch thick inside the nut

should hold it securely to the jackscrew.

INVESTIGATOR: Look at this.

NARRATOR:
There's something unusual about the nut.

- Incredible.
- It's completely stripped.

JEFF: When we finally
looked inside the acme nut,

it revealed that there were
no threads inside of it.

Let's talk to metallurgy.

It was shocking and stunning to us
to see something like this.

No one thought that you could get
those thick threads to rip out.

- JOE: Interesting.
- NARRATOR: Metallurgist Joe Epperson

examines the stripped nut
and the jackscrew.

JOE: It became immediately apparent that
what we were looking at was actually

the remainder of the threads
that were inside the nut.

It looks like the jackscrew
stripped the threads of the acme nut.

And the next step in the process was to

figure out how the threads were
reduced to such an extreme degree

and then stripped out of the nut.

There's some grease here on the bottom.

NARRATOR: The team studies residue
observable on the jackscrew.

JOE: The way to prevent wear is
by lubrication with grease.

And in the case of an extreme wear event,
you want to look at:

is there grease where it's supposed to be?

And there's some here at the top.

NARRATOR: In flight,
the jackscrew rotates inside the nut.

To prevent wear,
it needs to be lubricated regularly.

There should be
more grease here in the middle.

That's the working area
where it rotates the most.

When we first looked at the jackscrew,

there was very minimal signs
that there was any grease on it at all.

It was in the ocean for a week.
Did the water wash the grease away?

Nah, I don't think so.
Grease doesn't wash off that easily.

There's still some remnants here,
but none in the middle.

We did find a little bit
of a remnant of grease

at the very upper end
and at the very lower end.

It was very easy to conclude that
being in the ocean

had not washed away the grease
from the working area of the jackscrew.

JEFF: How could it be that there's
so little grease on this jackscrew?

Grease goes through here
during the lubrication process.

NARRATOR:
During maintenance, grease is applied

to the interior of the nut through
a small valve called a Zerk fitting.

So the Zerk fitting
is this fitting right here.

And what mechanics have to do
is put a grease gun hose in here,

and then squirt grease
into this little grease fitting

that goes inside this passage.

So that Zerk fitting should have preserved

and kept the remnants
of whatever grease it saw last.

What's that?

It's packed with dried grease.

JOE: I've been around grease long enough
to know that if you don't replenish it,

and if you just leave it,
eventually it dries up and gets hard.

And it basically says that
it had not been replenished.

- How long has it been clogged like this?
- At least a year, maybe more.

Finding this blockage suggested
a long-term abuse of the grease.

- I'd say we have a maintenance issue here.
- Time to talk to the airline.

We were very suspicious about
how well this component was lubricated,

or whether it was lubricated at all. And
so we had our doubts as to whether or not

this component was being properly
maintained by the airline.

NARRATOR: NTSB investigators travel

to Alaska Airlines operations facility
in San Francisco.

You worked on the plane in
in September 1999, that true?

Yes, I did.

NARRATOR: They track down the mechanic who
was responsible for the last lubrication

of the jackscrew assembly,
four months before the accident.

Could you walk us through
how you lubricate the jackscrew assembly?

I'll tell you this,
it's not my favorite job.

NARRATOR: The team learns that jackscrew
lubrications are done most often

on the night shift, outside the hangar,
sometimes in the rain.

GOGLIA: You're working off high lift
trucks, which will sometimes move

with a gust of wind.
The airplane moves with a gust of wind.

You're up and 30 feet off the ground.
Some mechanics don't like that job.

They're not stable up there.

MECHANIC: To reach the jackscrew assembly
you remove a panel first.

- How do you apply the grease?
- I use a paint brush.

Sometimes I put a big glob on my hand
to make sure it's on there.

JOHN: Aircraft, especially large
aircraft, need grease.

They need to have lubricants,
and it's messy.

GOGLIA: The most effective way
is to fill your hand with grease

and actually move it
up and down on the jackscrew,

filling all the screw grooves,
filling them with grease.

What about greasing the acme nut?

NARRATOR: Investigators focus on how
the mechanic greased

the acme nut on the jackscrew.

MECHANIC: We use a grease gun
through the Zerk fitting.

GOGLIA: You pump grease in
until you see fresh grease coming out.

INVESTIGATOR: Well how do you know whether
the lubrication is being done properly

- and when to stop pumping the grease gun?
- I don't.

Would you be able to see the
grease coming out from the top of the

- acme nut during lubrication?
- No, I can't remember looking to

- see if there was.
GOGLIA: One of the first things

that that tells me is that
he couldn't have known that

that Zerk fitting has taken grease.
You have no idea that it's clogged.

So we found a variety of ways in
which mechanics lubricated this component

and that gave us some pause
because it's a very critical component

and if you don't lubricate it properly,

you could end up with an accident
like the one that just happened.

NARRATOR: The team discovers
that the methods Air Alaska mechanics

use to lubricate the jackscrew assembly
don't follow maintenance standards.

The last time the jackscrew was lubricated
was about four months before the accident.

NARRATOR: But it's not just the way
the jackscrew assembly is being lubricated

that bothers investigators.
It's also the frequency.

- And before that?
- January 1999.

They're doing it every... 2500 hours.

NARRATOR: They can see there's
a long period between lubrications.

- Is that even within regulations?
- I'll find out.

JEFF: We knew we had kind of
a research project on our hands.

Some of the documents that we requested
from the manufacturer, from the FAA,

from the airline, came in the form
of internal memorandums from

from engineering departments, or requests
from maintenance to extend an interval.

It really began to paint a picture of how
the lubrication intervals were extended.

Check it out.
The airline made multiple requests

to extend the intervals
on the lubrications.

In 1987,

the interval between lubrications
was 500 hours.

NARRATOR:
The intervals between lubrications

are measured by the number of
hours the plane is in the air.

In 1991, it goes up to 1200 hours.

By 1996, it increases all the way up...

...to 2500 hours.

They just continued
to extend, extend, extend.

- Approved by the FAA?
- Yeah, every one of them was approved.

NARRATOR: Investigators conclude
that the lubrication of jackscrews

was not only conducted poorly, it was also
performed less and less frequently.

GOGLIA: If you're gonna
extend these lubrication functions,

then you better be doing something to make
sure that what you're doing is correct.

But even if the lubrication wasn't
being done properly,

regular inspections should have
caught the wear on that acme nut.

True, they should have
inspected it regularly.

NARRATOR: Was the
jackscrew assembly on Flight 261

inspected when and
how it should have been?

We looked at the maintenance records
for information about the last check.

I've got something.

NARRATOR: Investigators
dig deeper into the records

of Flight 261 to find out how
the jackscrew assembly was inspected.

INVESTIGATOR: Yeah, this
doesn't look right to me.

NARRATOR: The team finds paperwork which
reveals that during a routine inspection,

a mechanic at
the airline's Oakland facility

observed that the acme nut was badly worn.

Are you sure the reading is 0.040?

GOGLIA: A mechanic who did that
wear check reported

that he found it to be at the limit.

This nut was wearing fast,
and something needed to be done.

The lead mechanic ordered
the nut to be replaced.

This was evidence that
someone had caught the fact

that this acme nut was worn out.

GOGLIA: Most airlines, the decision would
be we will get the piece to the airplane

- as soon as possible and replace it.
- But the entry is crossed out.

- I don't get it.
- Well, when we saw thay

they had crossed out the first entry,
it was very suspicious.

- Something was up. It was fishy to us.
- We have to find out what went on here.

Do you remember inspecting an MD-83
on September 27th, 1997?

- I remember it well.
- NARRATOR: Investigators contact

John Liotine, the lead mechanic who
reported the worn acme nut on Flight 261.

I wrote up the evaluation.
The nut is worn down. Replace it.

LIOTINE: It was an alarming discovery.

In order for that aircraft to
be safe to fly,

that nut assembly at the
very least must be replaced.

- There was no doubt in my mind.
- It was the end of my shift.

When I came back the next workday,
the plane was closed up.

The plane returned to service
with the worn nut.

If the nut had been replaced,

the plane would still be flying,
and 88 people would still be alive.

How could a maintenance facility

allow the airplane to be put back
into revenue service

with the wear
that it found on the acme nut?

NARRATOR: When investigators probe
further, they learn that the amount

of wear on the acme nut
was re-checked by other mechanics.

They determined that it was
just within minimum limits.

Alaska Airlines Maintenance
misses a warning sign.

The wear on the nut should at least
have been monitored, but it wasn't.

The next time that jackscrew was
looked at was in the NTSB laboratory.

NARRATOR: The plane flew with the worn
nut for two more years before it took off

from Puerto Vallarta,
on the day of the accident.

Gear up.

NARRATOR: First Officer
Tansky and Captain Thompson

had no idea that their stabilizer
was on the verge of failure.

THOMPSON: That's strange.
The plane's out of trim.

NARRATOR: The team turns
to the voice recorder

to find out how the devastating chain of
events unfolded onboard Flight 261.

(beep)

- Let's check this out. Autopilot off?
- Good idea.

- (hissing sound)
- Whoa!

NARRATOR: 13 minutes
after takeoff from Puerto Vallarta,

the worn threads in the
acme nut cause the jackscrew to jam,

preventing movement
of the horizontal stabilizer.

I'll try it again.

The Captain's trying to rectify
the jammed stabilizer.

NARRATOR: While cruising at 31,000 feet,

the CVR picks up the sound of
a click followed by a thump.

JEFF: We think that the pilot was
moving his thumb switch on his yoke

in an attempt to move
the jackscrew through the nut.

- (airplane engine whirs)
- NARRATOR: The threads finally give way

and the jammed jackscrew
pulls up through the nut,

causing the stabilizer to move upwards.
A stopper is all that prevents it

- from separating completely.
- (airplane engine whirs)

- Ugh, it got worse.
- NARRATOR: With the horizontal stabilizer

pushing the nose further down,
the plane goes into a dive.

Through sheer brute force,
the pilots hold the jackscrew in place

- and recover the plane.
- (airplane engine whirs)

Okay, it really wants to pitch down.

(thumping)

- TANSKY (panting): You feel that?
- Stop, let's hear that again.

NARRATOR: But eight minutes later,
there's another series of thumps.

- (thumping)
- TANSKY (panting): You feel that?

NARRATOR: The stopper holding
the jackscrew in place finally gives out.

(airplane engine whirs)

- Ugh, push and roll!
- NARRATOR: The damage to the stabilizer

makes Flight 261 uncontrollable. The plane
rolls over and dives towards the ocean.

- Push, push, push. Push the blue side up.
- NARRATOR: Flying upside down,

the crew makes a last-ditch attempt
to right their plane.

- Speed brakes!
- Got it.

NARRATOR: The pilots of Flight 261 give
everything they have to save the plane.

MARY: It was just total professional
fighting for that plane till the very end,

and they expressed the realization
that the fight was over.

(airplane engine whirs)

THOMPSON (yelling): Ah, here we go!

I was sickened by what
I listened on the CVR.

This accident could have been prevented.

They grease that jackscrew,
this doesn't happen.

MARY: The amount of money that
would have saved these lives,

it's a cup of coffee.
It's literally a few dollars of grease.

I still get angry about it.

NARRATOR: In the wake of the accident,

the intervals between
jackscrew lubrications at Alaska Airlines

- is reduced from 2500 hours to 650 hours.
- We lost 88 people

because of a lack of lubrication. This is
a maintenance accident pure and simple.

It is truly a tragedy.

It was just one of those cases that you
work on that's never gonna leave you.

Not ever. It was tough.