All language subtitles for Air.Disasters.S03E10.Split.Decision.1080p.PMTP.WEB-DL.DDP2.0.H.264-maldini_track3_[eng]

Military families
in Kentucky

prepare to welcome home
loved ones from overseas.

The plan was to have
a reception for them

and then those soldiers
would be reunited

with their families and friends.

At the same time,
at a small Canadian airport...

There was wreckage
all over the place.

There was massive destruction.

Nobody could have
survived this.

256 people are dead.

It's one of the worst
aviation accidents of all time.

Any time a crash of
this sort would occur,

immediate suspicions
would be raised.

Answers will be
hard to come by.

It does not advance safety

to get the wrong cause
of an accident.

...as two radically
different scenarios

for the crash emerge.

Ladies and gentlemen,

we are starting our approach.

We lost both engines!

Put the mask over your nose.

Emergency descent.

Mayday, mayday.

Brace for impact!

I think I lost one.

Investigation starting...

He's gonna crash!

Arrow Air flight 1285
is nearing the end

of a 6,000-mile journey from
Egypt to the United States.

The dc-8 is on its way to
fort Campbell, Kentucky,

via Germany and Newfoundland.

On board are eight crewmembers
and 248 passengers.

Most of them are U.S. Soldiers

with the famed 101st airborne
division, the screaming eagles.

That division
fought through World War II,

through d-day and
the battle of Normandy,

dropped in behind
the German lines.

It's really marked
its place in history.

I think everybody
who serves in that division

has a special loyalty
and a special feeling

about the division
and being part of it.

They had been in the Sinai
for five and a half months,

so I'm sure they were
anxious to get back

to friends and family
and to enjoy the holidays.

To bring the soldiers home,

the military has hired
the charter carrier Arrow Air.

It was not unusual to do that
back in the '70s and '80s,

where the government
would contract

with the civilian airlines

to transport troops
in and out of the country.

At 5:30
in the morning,

the Douglas dc-8 lands at
gander international airport

on the eastern edge of
Newfoundland, Canada.

They had to
refuel in gander

before they could
complete the flight

into Fort Campbell, Kentucky.

Okay, guys,
I'd like to be refueled,

checked, and wheels up
in 90 minutes.

Roger that.

Captain John Griffin
has been an Arrow Air pilot

for four years.

He's also a flight instructor
for the airline.

First officer John Connelly
will be at the controls

when flight 1285 leaves gander.

Mike fowler,
the flight engineer,

monitors the aircraft's
mechanical systems.

Okay, you want to
give her the once-over?

While the pilots run through

a series of
pre-flight checklists,

the flight engineer steps out to
inspect the plane's exterior.

He'll look for any damage
to the fuselage or engines,

and check for buildups of ice
on the plane.

The soldiers wait
inside the airport.

Some shop for souvenirs
at the gift shop.

Anything?

Okay, roger that.

All right, 15,538 gallons,

or 101,000 pounds.

Passengers and cargo unchanged.

Weight's confirmed.

Okay.

We're good to go.

That puts us here.

Rotation is 144 knots.

Yeah, that looks good.

On the airspeed
indicator is a marker, or bug.

It reminds the crew of
the exact speed they must hit

in order to get the plane
off the ground.

Bugs set on the right.

Copy that.

With the refueling
and pre-flight checks complete,

the 248 soldiers
get back on board.

I think it was
probably a very joyous mood,

because when
they landed in Gander,

I know some of them went in
and used the telephones

to call Fort Campbell
and call their families

and say they were in Gander, and
they'd be home in a few hours.

Gander tower, big a 950,

we've completed refueling
and pre-flight checks.

Requesting taxi
to runway 31.

Big a 950,
wind's at 290 at four knots.

Takeoff now runway 22.

A last minute change
puts Arrow Air

on a different runway
than originally planned.

9,900 feet, takeoff to the
south, we're good.

Copy that, Gander. Runway 22.

Big a 950,
you are cleared for takeoff.

Merry Christmas.

Roger that,
Gander tower.

Merry Christmas to you, too.

The dc-8 accelerates
to takeoff speed.

80 knots.

Check.

V-1.

Rotate.

Arrow Air 1285
lifts off from Gander airport

at 6:46 a.m.

But just seconds later...

Ah, she's flying like a pig.

Positive rate?

Negative.

I'm sure for
the last few seconds

those soldiers knew that there
was a serious problem in hand.

Watch your altitude!
Pull up.

Come on, airspeed!

Airspeed!

Watch the trees!

Yes, arrow 1285
is down, just off runway 22,

estimate 2,000 to 4,000 feet.

At the small airport
in Gander, Newfoundland,

emergency crews race
to the crash site.

It's a field of wreckage,
bodies and personal effects.

Thousands of gallons of jet fuel
are feeding a massive blaze.

It didn't look like aircraft.

It was just probably
a 30-foot-high burning mass

of metal and fuel
and everything.

Hey, any survivors?

Canadian air force
captain Tom Badcock

is one of the first
on the scene.

As an Air Force
officer, of course,

I had been to numerous crashes,

but this was nothing like I had
ever seen in my life before.

And to see the devastation

and to see my,
basically, comrades

lying on the ground
in pieces was...

Words couldn't,
can't describe it.

Many of them had bought t-shirts

saying "I survived
Gander, Newfoundland".

We found that
particularly emotional.

After hours of searching

through the charred wreckage,

everyone's worst fears
are realized.

The crash has claimed the lives
of all 256 people on board.

The search for the cause of the
disaster is already under way,

but it will lead to controversy
and ultimately to the demise

of the Canadian aviation
safety board.

For the U.S. Military,

the crash of flight 1285
in Gander, Newfoundland,

is a historic loss.

If you take a look
at the history

of the 101st airborne division
air assault,

even in World War II,

that division never
lost so many people

in such a short period of time

as they did on December the 12th
in 1985 in Gander.

The Canadian military
sets up a security perimeter

around the crash site.

We controlled all
access to and from the site.

The RCMP asked me if
I would identify an object

which they thought
to be strange.

I've never seen a casing
like this before.

And he said,
"does this have any

kind of a chemical or
nuclear connotation?".

And I said, "no, I have no idea
what it is".

The find
raises suspicions

about what was on the flight.

It certainly is possible

that Arrow Air could have been
carrying things

either that it shouldn't
have been carrying

or that weren't on any kind
of cargo manifest.

David Mcnair
is an investigator

with the Canadian aviation
safety board.

There were
aircraft parts everywhere,

and you immediately became aware
that it was gonna be hard

to find things that
you needed to find.

Mcnair is joined
by colleague Peter Boag.

They arrive hours
after the crash

to a scene of
complete devastation.

The sights and smells,
it's always unpleasant,

but you just have to.

You have to do it.
It's part of your job.

The terrible scale
of the crash

quickly makes headlines
around the world.

It will have a tremendous impact
on this division.

This is not only a
sad day for the 101st airborne,

but a sad day for the nation.

Most of the young
men and women we mourn

were returning to spend the
holidays with their families.

You do not grieve alone.

We grieve as a nation together

as together we say goodbye
to those who died

in the service of their country.

There is just no way
that I can express to you

how tragic that was
with the loss of so many people

in that one plane crash.

The Americans
were really suffering

in terms of military losses

just two years prior to the
crash of the Arrow Air flight.

The United States had lost
a large number of soldiers

in a suicide truck bombing
in Beirut.

So the losses, in a sense,
were mounting,

and although
the numbers these days

might not strike us
as extraordinary,

they certainly were
extraordinary at the time.

It wasn't just some
assortment of soldiers...

A large number of them

from one of the leading
American military units

in the American army.

You know, all of this raised,
if you like, the symbolic stakes

quite apart from
the casualty toll

of the loss of life
that occurred.

Investigators
immediately interview

the Gander ground crew

and get some intriguing
information.

Morning.

Did you see the flight engineer
inspect the aircraft?

But they did not deice
the wings before taking off?

Yeah, we picked up
a little bit of ice coming in.

We're good to go.

Okay. Thank you.

Well, we were concerned
about icing,

because the refueler witness
indicated

that they had picked up some ice
on the approach.

They turn to
meteorological reports

for the early hours
of December 12th.

In early morning
it was very, very icy,

and it had been
severe freezing rain.

They flew in during the time
that the forecast was for icing.

Mcnair and Boag wonder

if the crew of flight 1285

may have made a serious error
by not deicing.

They check to see what other
planes flying out of Gander

did that morning.

There were two other
takeoffs this morning.

One deiced, one didn't.

And we noted that
one Boeing 737 that departed

that picked up quite a bit
of ice on his departure,

and that was an indicator to us

that the probability of
ice accretion or ice gathering

on the aircraft
was quite high.

But the other aircraft,

a British aerospace VC10,

had been on the ground for
50 minutes and did not deice.

It got off the ground safely.

And they took off within two
hours of each other.

Ice cannot have been
the only factor in this crash.

Big a 950,
wind's 290 at four knots.

Takeoff now runway 22.

In search of
other factors,

they consider the last minute
runway change.

Copy that, Gander.
Runway 22.

Not the runway
they were expecting.

But they quickly conclude

that the alternate runway
could not have had any bearing

on this crash.

Runway 22 is the
longest runway at Gander,

so, in fact, it gave them
the best margin for performance.

Investigators examine
and document the crash site,

trying to determine
the trajectory of the plane

as it went down.

This was a very
heavily wooded area,

and as it got closer
to the ground,

it started clipping the trees.

And we're gonna need pictures of
the treetops as well,

and we're gonna need
aerial shots.

But what they need most of all

is the information from
the plane's two black boxes.

They could hold the key

to understanding
what doomed flight 1285.

But as soon as
they're recovered,

Mcnair sees a potential problem.

We were disappointed to
see it was such an old recorder,

an old foil recorder,

as they really just don't
give enough information

to the investigators.

Well, send them off to Ottawa,
and we'll see what we've got.

The older design
of the FDR engraves data

on a slow-moving roll
of stainless steel foil.

Though the foil is
fire resistant,

it can record only
four flight parameters,

such as airspeed and altitude.

The newer digital
flight recorders

can record hundreds
of parameters.

All they can do is
send the black boxes to

the national research council's
flight recorder playback center

and hope for the best.

Then, with the investigation
only hours old,

it takes a drastic turn.

An overseas U.S. Consulate
receives word

from someone claiming
responsibility for the crash.

The caller says it was the work
of Islamic Jihad,

a branch of Hezbollah.

If you had to think about
any one terrorist group

operating in the middle east
at this time

which had an intent
as well as a capacity

to target American military
personnel, that was Hezbollah.

The call opens
the possibility

that a terrorist bomb
brought down flight 1285.

Tensions were really
high in the world at that time.

When an aircraft fully loaded
with American soldiers

crashes...

There's always questions
that come up.

Mcnair sends
portions of the wreckage

to a royal Canadian mounted
police forensics lab

to be tested for bomb residue.

The team searches for evidence
that flight 1285 exploded

before it hit the ground.

They look for any fallen debris

between the runway
and the point of impact.

If the aircraft exploded before
it hit the trees,

one would expect something
would come off the aircraft,

and we would have found it.

We didn't find anything,
nothing at all.

So we knew with confidence that
the aircraft hit the trees,

the first impact,
intact.

It's a similar story

when the test results
from the RCMP come back .

They find no trace
of bomb residue.

And both U.S. And Canadian
officials suggest

Islamic Jihad's claim of
responsibility could be false.

One of the things that
obviously benefits

terrorist organizations
is to spread the claim

for operational responsibility
very, very broadly

to kind of boost the reputation
of their organization,

again, to instill greater fear.

So it's difficult to separate
fact from fiction.

With terrorism
looking less likely,

investigators continue
to focus on

the performance of the aircraft.

35 feet, six inches.

Four and a half
degree declination.

The airplane had
struck some trees

about half a mile from
the end of the runway,

and we could see a distinct
pattern in the trees.

Using photographs
from the crash site,

investigators plot
the height of 378 trees

to determine the dc-8's
exact position as it went down.

The airplane
was right wing low

with a nose high attitude
relative to the trees.

Through photogrammetry,
we determined that, in fact,

the aircraft was way above
the stall angle of the aircraft,

so the aircraft was
clearly stalled

in a high rate of descent.

The plane's radical
nose-up position prevented it

from getting the lift needed
to keep it in the air.

Investigators can't explain
why the plane was flying

at such an extreme angle.

One clue about what
the pilots were doing

comes from a piece of
cockpit wreckage,

the airspeed indicator.

Look here.

It shows that the
crew set a takeoff speed

of 144 knots

and that the plane reached an
airspeed of at least 165 knots.

Bugs set on the right.

Copy that.

Investigators hope that

a much more detailed picture
of the pilots' last moments

will emerge from
the cockpit voice recorder.

But they're in for
a disappointment.

It doesn't sound like
it recorded anything

from the cockpit.

The cockpit recorder
wasn't functioning properly.

It didn't record any of
the crew's conversations.

With the absence of
cockpit voice recorder,

we don't know exactly
what the crew was doing

or what they were facing.

Their hopes now rest
with the flight data recorder.

Even this rudimentary
recorder would have caught

some indication to show
what speeds they rotated at.

What warning lights, if any,
were they seeing?

What was their reaction?

All these things are
extremely valuable.

But it turns out to
be only marginally more useful

than the cockpit voice recorder.

The recorder for
the Arrow Air accident

was extremely limited.

We were able to determine,
first of all, speed,

a little bit of altitude
and heading of the aircraft.

There was no indication on there
of engine power, bank angle,

pitch angle.

The flight data
recorder tells investigators

that Arrow Air 1285
began its takeoff roll

and increased to
a speed of 167 knots.

Liftoff occurred 51 seconds
from the start of the roll.

Two seconds later,
the speed began to decrease.

Come on, airspeed!

Airspeed!

The speed dropped off
very quickly,

and so we knew that the aircraft
was below normal flying speed.

We got that much
from the recorder.

It tells us almost nothing.

But a closer look
at the flight data

does reveal a potentially
valuable clue.

The distance needed
to get to takeoff speed

was longer than the pilots
had planned for.

We looked at
the acceleration distances,

and it took a little bit longer
than we...than expected.

4,300 feet, 100 knots.

6,300 feet, 144 knots.

They should be
lifting off now.

Investigators
discover that liftoff occurred

some four seconds later,

or more than 1,000 feet further
than it should have.

8,000 feet, 167 knots.

An extra 1,000 feet
to get off the ground.

Why'd it take them so long?

V-1.

Rotate.

They used the full power,

and we would expect them to
rotate a little earlier,

take off a little earlier.

The longer than normal takeoff

supports the original theory

that ice on the wings
played a role in the crash.

But investigators know
that can't be the whole story.

Icing itself
is not necessarily

the only thing that happened.

Accidents don't just
usually have one item.

They have several items.

Determined to find
out what else,

besides ice on the wings,
contributed to the crash,

the CASB turns its attention
to the plane's flaps.

For the dc-8, the optimal
flap setting for takeoff

is 18 degrees.

Looks like
the flaps were extended.

With detailed work, we could say
with some reasonable certainty

of where the flaps were,

which we believe were in
the normal takeoff position.

They wonder if ice,

combined with
malfunctioning engines,

caused the plane to stall.

The engines are sent to the CASB
in Ottawa for a full inspection.

Each engine was
recovered on site,

and immediately you could tell

that there was rotational damage
on all the engines.

Wood debris
is found deep inside

all four of the turbines.

A lot of tree debris

means the engine was running
when it hit the trees.

Evidence shows the dc-8

was properly configured
for takeoff

and that there was nothing wrong
with the engines.

So why was flight 1285 slow
to get off the ground?

Investigators focus in on
the weight of the aircraft.

It's 101,000 pounds for fuel,

passengers and cargo unchanged.

They had predicted that
each passenger and baggage

would weigh 170 pounds.

That average weight,
170 pounds,

matches the estimated weight
for male passengers

set out in
the Arrow Air guidelines.

As a pilot, having flown many
military people around,

this didn't seem to ring true,

so we immediately looked at that
aspect of the investigation.

Good morning.

I have a rec form
for some personnel files.

Following his hunch,

Mcnair soon makes
a crucial discovery.

Regular commercial
flights has a mixture of folks.

It has men, women, children,

so then the average
doesn't work out as much.

But this was no
ordinary commercial flight.

All 256 passengers were adults,
almost all of them large men.

We actually looked at
the medical records

of the passengers, in terms of
getting their actual weight

during their last medical.

In my own case,
I normally weigh 175,

but when I've got
all my gear on,

or I'm bringing it
on board an aircraft,

I'm bringing on board
200 pounds or more.

We estimated that
the more realistic weight

would have been 220 pounds
per passenger.

That includes the passenger,
everything they were carrying,

and the equipment they had.

With the new estimates,

he calculates the weight
of the passengers

at more than 54,000 pounds.

That's 12,000 pounds heavier

than the weight recorded
on the load sheet.

It's not even close.

But this plane had
been flying with that weight

all night,

taking off from Cairo, then from
Cologne without any problems.

The ice picked up in Gander
may have made the difference.

You can take off at
a heavier than normal weight,

and if there are no other
factors at play,

you can get away with it.

If you have something else,
like ice,

you have a serious problem.

Investigators now
strongly suspect

that it was a combination
of ice and extra weight

that prevented the dc-8
from staying in the air.

Okay. This has to be it.

Ice and weight.

We had a lot of scientific basis

to say that the aircraft
should have flown but did not.

Why didn't it fly?
And we had two powerful reasons.

One was weight.

The other was even
probably more powerful,

is a small amount of ice
contamination on the aircraft.

But they can
only theorize.

No one in Gander
saw ice on the wings.

It's impossible to know
how much there was.

That's one problem.

Mcnair and Boag must now
confront another.

Some of their own colleagues
on the CASB

are raising doubts
about the findings.

One of those with questions

is board member and
aviation expert Les Filotas.

Well, as soon as
I started looking

at the draft report,
I skimmed some of it

and went to the part that was
my technical specialty,

the flight data recorder part,

and as soon as I looked at it,

I said, "there's something
really wrong here".

Filotas immediately wonders

how the aircraft
could lose thrust

and crash so quickly
after takeoff.

I did rough
calculations,

and it just showed that to get
that kind of deceleration,

you'd have to lose not one, two,
or three engines, but all four,

and that was just a startling
thing to see right away.

Watch your altitude.
Pull up.

Come on, airspeed!

Airspeed!

They said
the aircraft was,

I believe the exact phrase was
"destroyed by a fuel-fed fire".

The early reports, everybody
who was around there

mentioned the massive explosion
and the mushroom cloud.

See this thing

coming, come across the front

of the truck, and it was like

a flame on the bottom, eh.

Two truckers
on the highway

were almost under
the flight path

when the Arrow Air aircraft
passed over,

and they both said they saw fire
on the right-hand side.

U.S. Army officials deny

there was any unreported
or classified cargo

on board Arrow Air 1285.

But Filotas has reason
to doubt that claim.

When the troops'
equipment was loaded on board,

there were some of
these big boxes.

What could have been on there?
And we couldn't get any answer.

There was no cargo manifest,

and it was another contentious
question that was never settled.

Not much attention clearly was
paid to security procedures.

And, you know, this was
a different time, admittedly,

but still, I think,
the lack of security

at Cairo, at the airport

as the soldiers came on board
the Arrow Air flight

for their return journey,

I think anybody would have to
regard it as shocking,

even for their time.

And it's the kind of thing that

would never be allowed
to happen today.

Filotas joins
those speculating

that Arrow Air flight 1285 was
the victim of a terrorist plot.

Was it Hezbollah?

Did it have any kind of
European connections?

And the big question
always in the back

of American governmental and
security authorities' minds is

is there a...is there
a cold war dimension to this?

Are the soviets involved?

The testimony you're
about to give will be the truth,

the whole truth, and nothing but
the truth, so help you god?

I do.

Please be seated.

Some now wonder
if Arrow Air 1285

was at the center of the biggest
global scandal of the time...

The U.S. Plot to illicitly
provide Iran with arms

in exchange for
American hostages.

Arrow Air was indeed
one of the airlines

that assisted a covert operation

that was being mounted
at the time

out of the Reagan White House
by a famous individual

by the name of
colonel Ollie North,

and the Iran contra business
was very tangled

and a very peculiar
covert operation.

It was not a thin, tiny layer of
ice on the wings.

Filotas points to
photographic evidence

to prove his case.

My colleague made
a trip out to Gander

and went to
the RCMP photo lab there,

where they had
literally thousands

that they took
on the crash site.

Many photos that
seemed to indicate

that there was some kind of
an explosion on board.

It's just like if you took
a piece of aluminum foil

and poked your finger in it.

It would curl out from
the inside to the outside

and would be obvious
from which side

you put your finger through.

Filotas becomes
even more suspicious

when he learns that
an independent investigator

hired by Arrow Air

had explored the possibility
of an onboard explosion.

He carefully
looked at everything

and found that on
the number three engine,

that's the inboard engine
on the right-hand side,

some of the inlet guide veins,
three of them, consecutive ones,

had sort of a dent
in the leading edge,

and one of them had
some red paint on it.

That investigator
concluded that

there could have been
a midair explosion...

...and that the damage and the
paint markings inside the engine

could have been caused by
debris exploding outward

from the main fuselage.

Another key piece of information
for Filotas

comes from
the postmortem examination

of some of the 256 victims.

Autopsies indicate that there
were extremely high levels

of carbon monoxide
in their blood.

So if they have
combustion products

in their lungs,

natural inference is that
they must have breathed in

some combustion products
before the crash.

From all this evidence,

Filotas and his colleagues paint
their own picture of the crash.

What the hell was that?

Smoke.

Smoke in the cockpit.
Smoke.

But the lead
investigators, Mcnair and Boag,

maintain that
the sabotage theories

are nothing more than
a sensationalist distraction.

We had no indication
that terrorism was a player,

but we did have
a lot of indication

that there was an aircraft
performance problem

and there were icing problems.

Mcnair and Boag
decide

the only way to end
all the speculation

is to scientifically
prove their theory

that ice combined
with extra weight

is what brought down
flight 1285.

Okay, you want to
give her the once-over?

Before the mid 1980s,

little was known about
the aerodynamic impact

of very thin ice accumulation.

The flight engineer
who inspected the aircraft

was likely only looking for
large buildups of ice

that would make the plane
significantly heavier,

not thin coatings
on top of the wings.

As part of the investigation,

we did a lot of research on
the effects of ice on aircraft.

Aerodynamic tests
carried out in a wind tunnel

reveal that even a small amount
of ice contamination

can significantly
reduce wing lift.

Just a small amount,
say the size of some sandpaper,

if that's the type of
surface you have,

it can seriously degrade
a large aircraft.

That was a surprise to me.

The team carries out
further tests

in a flight simulator.

We basically had to
reprogram the simulator

to degrade the performance
to simulate ice.

V-1.

Rotate.

Every attempt
to fly the simulator

with the exact same parameters
as flight 1285

ends the same way,
with a stall and a crash.

Okay, let's run it again with
10,000 less pounds.

From the simulator trials,
we realized with icing on board,

what degraded the lift
characteristics of the aircraft,

it was difficult to fly
a normal profile,

and you could easily
lose control of the aircraft.

Ah, she's flying like a pig.

Positive rate?

Negative.

Full power.

The pilots would have
been able to see

that their plane wasn't
climbing fast enough.

Watch your altitude.
Pull up.

Come on, airspeed!

Airspeed!

Watch the trees!

First officer
Connelly pulled the nose back,

trying to get the plane
in the air.

What he didn't realize was
he was sealing their fate.

The dc-8 was already on
the verge of a stall.

Pulling the nose up
only made things worse.

The aircraft's weight
had been underestimated...

Its lift compromised
by ice on the wings.

A fatal combination.

If you take
one of the factors out,

if you take the ice out
and have the same weight,

maybe you don't have
the accident.

If you take out the heavy weight
and still have the icing,

maybe you won't have
the accident,

but if you have them combined
together, you have the accident.

As for the suspicious
paint markings

found inside the engine,

Mcnair determines they came from
a front-end loader

used to clear debris
at the crash site.

As well, the extreme intensity
of the fire

could have caused the abnormally
high level of carbon monoxide

in the victims' blood.

Even the truckers' accounts
of pre-impact flames

can be explained.

If you have an airplane
flying at high angle of attack

where it's in a stalled regime,
typically, or often,

you will have flame
coming from the engine

because of compressor stall.

As for
the terrorists' capability

to pull off such
a complex, brazen attack,

there is significant doubt.

Could they have done it
in terms of intent?

Yes.

In terms of actually
pulling that operation off

in the circumstances?

You know, that seems to be
low probability,

but just at the edges of
the margins of the possible.

There was
a lot of controversy

which we just basically
had to deal with,

in terms of keeping on
with our job,

because investigation is
not an emotional issue,

it's a scientific issue.

So we basically had to
stick with science.

We didn't see any evidence of
any other kind of explosion.

We only saw the evidence of
an explosion caused by impact

and the aircraft breaking up.

Mcnair believes
his conclusion

carries an urgent warning for
the entire airline industry.

A lot of people
have a hard time believing

that a little, tiny bit of ice
on a large wing

will have a big effect,
but it does.

After nearly three years

of painstaking research
and investigation,

the Canadian aviation
safety board

is ready to release its report.

But what is supposed
to provide answers

instead ignites a storm
of controversy.

The ice theory
is flat-out wrong.

CASB investigators believe

they have a convincing report

that explains the complex cause
of the crash of flight 1285.

I was hoping that,
as all investigators do,

when the final report came out,

that in fact the safety message
would be out there

and would be accepted.

But four of the nine
members of the board

disagree with
the report's conclusion.

This investigation appears
to involve a cover-up.

It's impossible that
ice would have been a factor.

Crash investigators
are, you know,

they're always under pressure
to come up with an answer

sooner than they would like,

and sometimes depending on
the intensity of that pressure

can perhaps create
crash investigations

which are less than
satisfactory.

The dissenters take
the unprecedented step

of releasing their own
minority report,

citing an onboard explosion
as the cause.

We had extremely difficult time

in putting out
our dissenting report.

We were given
a very restricted time,

and then there was an attempt to
suppress it.

I was asked the question
outright,

"well, what do you want to do?

Do you want to try
to save your job,

or do you want to get the truth
about this accident?".

My answer was,
"well, I want to save my job

by getting at the truth".

It was quite unusual
to have a dissenting report

written with photographs.

I don't see merit in it.

I totally don't understand
why it was issued

in the first place.

Why would you come up with this?

What's the scientific basis
for it?

There is no science.

Okay, look.

Paint transfer means nothing.

The crew blood samples
means nothing.

The petalling is meaningless.

Therefore, you have no evidence
of terrorism.

This proves nothing.

In this particular case,
of course,

what we had was
an extraordinary outcome,

where you have a majority
and a minority report

which are deeply divergent

and which raise very different
kinds of pictures

about what the outcome
of this crash would be.

I think it's very
tough for families and friends

not to have final closure
on something.

There was really
no definitive answer

to what caused that crash.

If I was a family member,
I'd have questions, too.

But on march 10, 1989,

while the controversy
continues to swirl,

there's tragic evidence that
Mcnair and Boag's message

has not been heard.

In Dryden, Ontario,
in wintry conditions,

the crew of a Fokker F-28
elects not to deice.

Just seconds after takeoff,

the plane cannot achieve
sufficient lift

to stay airborne.

The accident was almost
identical to Arrow Air 1285.

The airplane hit
the tree canopy intact,

and after that, it exploded

because of the fact
it hit the ground

with a lot of fuel on board.

The crash kills 24
of the 69 people on board.

It was pretty clear
from Dryden

that icing or snow may have been
a factor in this as well.

If only
the 'investigators' warning

had been heard,

the tragedy in Dryden
may never have happened.

The fact that there was
a lot of controversy

around this investigation
was very unfortunate,

because basically, it took away
from the safety message.

Aircraft like the dc-8
are very vulnerable

to icing contamination.

That message was lost
because of the controversy

and the bomb theory.

But those who held
firm to the bomb theory

stand by their actions.

It does not advance safety

to get the wrong cause
of an accident.

The real safety message is that
you have to get at the truth,

and the truth, truth and
the facts of this accident

were never finally established.

The controversy
over this investigation

spelled the end of the Canadian
aviation safety board.

It was scrapped
and later replaced

with a new,
better-regulated agency.

We learned a lesson.

It cost a lot of people
their lives,

and that lesson didn't get
passed on to other people,

and other people
lost their lives.

That's the sad part, for me.

I know,
in my own case,

if I really didn't know
all the answers,

and I had lost someone
in that terrible crash,

I wouldn't be satisfied.

It's tough when you don't know,

and you've lost someone
that's near and dear to you.

I think we all want to know.