Original subtitles

NARRATOR: A passenger plane is torn apart in midair.

Lives hang in the balance.

There's not enough oxygen to survive up here.

A freezing wind of hurricane force is roaring to the cabin.

The flight crew calls mayday, but nobody hears.

And the airplane is headed for a mountain.

It sounds like a nightmare.

For everyone aboard Aloha airlines flight 243,

this is no nightmare.

It's reality.

Aloha 243 still up.

NARRATOR: When crash detectives discover what happened,

their verdict shakes the airline business.

This accident changed aviation history.

WOMAN: Ladies and gentlemen we are starting our approach--

MAN: We lost both engines.

WOMAN: emergency ..

MAN: Mayday, mayday.

WOMAN: Brace for impact.

MAN: I think I lost one.

MAN: Investigation started from--

MAN: He's going to crash.

NARRATOR: At 1:00 PM, Aloha Airlines flight

243 is preparing to depart.

A Boeing 737 is on the tarmac at Hilo Airport

on Hawaii's big island, the southernmost

of the Hawaiian chain.

Flight 243 will be just a 35-minute hop to Honolulu,

on the island of O'ahu.

Serving

The islands means that Aloha works its airplanes hard.

They make short flights, but plenty of them.

This airplane has been shuttling between the islands

since early morning.

It'll be its ninth flight today.

For the flight crew, it's a routine they've

followed for many years.

Aloha 243, roger.

Anticipating startups--

NARRATOR: Captain Bob Schornstheimer

has been flying for 11 years with Aloha Airlines.

Roger.

NARRATOR: His first officer, Mimi Tompkins,

is hoping for a promotion to Captain

after nine years with Aloha.

Did you hear any more about--

NARRATOR: Each of the flight attendants

has a long service record too, but none

so long as Clarabelle Lansing, known to everyone as just CB.

Well, Mr. Kino, welcome.

Always good to see you, CB.

You fixed some good weather for us.

Smooth all the way.

You bet.

NARRATOR: She's been flying for 37 years since

before the days of the first jet airliner.

- Let me help you with this. - Yeah.

This is a heavy one.

NARRATOR: CB is the boss in the cabin, first flight attendant.

Michelle Honda, a 14-year veteran is number two.

Jane Sato-Tomita has served 19 years.

This is one of the most experienced crews you'll

find in an airplane that's been crisscrossing Hawaii's

island safely for 19 years.

Circuit breakers.

NARRATOR: It's made more than 89,000 flights.

On this day, only one other 737 in the entire world

beats that that record.

Flight recorder.

Checked.

NARRATOR: Passengers have no reason

to doubt they're in safe hands, until one

passenger, Gayle Yamamoto, sees something

that makes her pause.

But what is she concerned about?

And how worried should she be?

Do I say something?

NARRATOR: Patricia Aubrey lives in Hilo

but has an appointment today in Honolulu.

At first, she opts for the very front

of the airplane in row one.

But somehow she feels uneasy and decides

to move further back.

She chooses a free seat in row 17.

At 1:25, flight 243 is ready for takeoff.

This airplane often rattles and shakes on takeoff and landing,

but it's something the crew and regular passengers

have grown used to.

What's there to worry about?

BOB SCHORNSTHEIMER (ON RADIO): Hilo departure.

This is Aloha 243, climbing through 3,000.

Roger, climbing to flight--

NARRATOR: Though he's the captain,

Bob Schornstheimer has chosen to take charge of radio links

with air traffic control.

It's Mimi Tompkins who will fly the plane to Honolulu.

Most of the flight time has taken up in climbing

to their cruising altitude.

It'll take 20 minutes to climb to 24,000 feet.

For many passengers, soaring high over the Pacific

is all part of the daily routine--

people like salesman Howard Kitaoka in row five.

He makes this trip often.

When you've seen the view 100 times,

35 minutes is precious time to catch up on paperwork.

The flight's so short that attendants serve drinks

while they're still climbing.

They can move around.

But the passengers are still strapped in.

It's 1:45, 20 minutes into the flight,

the aircraft is at cruising height.

Honolulu Center, Aloha 243, leveling off at 240.

NARRATOR: The crew relaxes.

See, where's that national--

NARRATOR: In perfect flying weather,

everything is following the familiar pattern.

What was that?

We have to get down.

We've lost pressure.

I saw a brilliant flash of light and boom.

Everything was gone, was being sucked out of the plane.

NARRATOR: Here's what's happened.

An explosive decompression has torn away

375 square feet of a fuselage.

HOWARD KITAOKA: We were in a tremendous blast of wind.

The wind blast is unbelievable.

A mass of things just woosh out the plane.

Hair was up here.

Everybody was in their seat, except the stewardesses.

I saw the stewardess get smashed

down in the-- in the aisle.

I could see her hair blowing and I could see blood,

but that's all I could see of her.

NARRATOR: Jane Sato-Tomita has been

struck by debris at row two.

Michelle Honda has been thrown to the floor at row 15.

There's no sign at all of CB Lansing.

I will take control column.

I can't hear you.

NARRATOR: Only seconds have passed since the explosion,

the wind noise makes it impossible for the flight crew

to communicate.

What did we lose back there?

- I can't hear you. - We lost the pressure.

NARRATOR: Now, for the first time,

they gain a sense of what's happened.

Visible over a mound of tangled debris,

there's blue sky, where the airplane roof used to be.

The first five rows are now completely exposed to the sky

on both sides of the plane.

The initial threat of being sucked out

has passed since the airplane is now

completely depressurized, but passengers

are still in danger.

HOWARD KITAOKA: My seatmate was flopping out

outside the aircraft because at that point,

it was just the floor and no walls are receding.

And so I grabbed him.

NARRATOR: The cold and oxygen deprivation

are both potentially deadly.

GREG FEITH: Just imagine the scene up there--

the top of the airplane broken off,

the passengers don't have any ability

to get supplemental oxygen because the critical tubing

that feeds that oxygen is now gone.

And at 24,000 feet with very little to breathe up there,

the passengers become incapacitated.

That's called hypoxia.

If you stay up at that altitude for any prolonged

period of time, you become more and more physically disabled.

With the top of the airplane gone,

you now have 300 mile an hour winds blowing into that cabin.

That's three times hurricane force winds.

Those people were dressed for Hawaii in the springtime, not

minus 50 degree temperatures.

Any period of time, at 24,000 feet, and those people

will die.

NARRATOR: High above the Pacific

Ocean, an extraordinary drama is unfolding.

An explosion at 24,000 feet aboard a Boeing 737,

bound for the Hawaiian island of O'ahu,

tears 370 square feet of fuselage from the airplane,

exposing passengers to the sky.

The cabin is depressurized with no emergency oxygen supply.

Unless they rapidly reach a lower

altitude, where they can breathe again,

the passengers will die.

Captain Bob Schornstheimer takes

over command of the aircraft from first officer

Mimi Tompkins.

He begins an emergency descent, dropping

nearly 4,000 feet per minute.

It speed now increasing to more than 300 miles an hour.

As the aircraft hurtles down, passengers face a new terror,

wreckage blocks their view of the cockpit.

And when the airplane split apart,

the nose dropped down by nearly three feet.

The plane is held together by just the narrow floor beams.

PATRICIA AUBREY: The floor was buckling up.

And you could tell the plane was bending in the middle.

NARRATOR: Michelle Honda can't go

forward far enough to see whether the pilots are

alive or dead.

Hello, flight deck.

NARRATOR: She tries to make contact via the intercom.

Can anyone hear me?

NARRATOR: The wires are severed.

As she struggles forward to try to reach the cockpit,

she gets asked the one question she can't answer.

Do we have a pilot?

I don't know.

Do we have a pilot?

I do not know.

Can you fly a plane?

NARRATOR: The terror of those on board

can only be imagined as she asks

the one question no airplane passenger wants to hear.

Can you fly a plane?

PATRICIA AUBREY: Michelle Honda was coming up

and cupping her hands and yelling in everyone's

ear, individually.

Can you fly a plane?

It's like what?

You know, get out of here.

Is the-- is the pilot gone too?

You know, because you couldn't tell

if there was anybody up there.

NARRATOR: First officer Mimi Tompkins tries to alert air

traffic control at Honolulu.

Do you read me?

NARRATOR: Recordings from the cockpit voice recorder,

the black box, analyzed later by accident investigators,

provide a dramatic record of exactly what took place.

Aloha 243, we're going down.

NARRATOR: The nearest place where they can try to land

is the island of Maui.

Kahului Airport lies between two volcanic mountains.

Between them and safety lies a 10,000-foot summit.

To fly from the location of the explosion

to the safety of Kahului airport,

the pilot needs to carefully maneuver,

avoiding this high ground.

Can the fragile aircraft survive

the stresses of turning or if they ever

reach the airport of landing?

And how can those on board survive?

Jane Sato-Tomita is barely conscious.

Howard Kitaoka clutches her hand.

The only faint sign of life is once when Jane squeezes back.

HOWARD KITAOKA: I'm not exactly sure she was conscious,

but I did manage to squeeze her hand.

And she responded by squeezing my hand.

And we just held hands.

That simple squeeze of the hand, at a time like that,

is very, very emotional.

Aloha 243, do you read me?

NARRATOR: Mimi Tompkins is not getting

through to Honolulu air traffic control,

so she switches to the frequency for the tower

at Maui's Kahului Airport.

Maui tower, Aloha 243.

Maui tower, Aloha 243.

Aircraft calling tower.

Say again.

MIMI TOMPKINS (ON RADIO): Aloha 243 for inbound landing.

NARRATOR: At 1:48, three minutes

after the explosion, the crew makes their first voice

contact with the ground.

We are unpressurized, declaring an emergency.

Aloha 243, say your position.

MIMI TOMPKINS (ON RADIO): We're just going to the East

of point.

Descending out of 11,000.

Request clearance into Maui for landing.

Request the emergency equipment.

Airport fire station.

We have an Aloha 737 five minutes out.

Approximately 20 miles.

Clear to runway 02, decompression problems.

Pilot is declaring an emergency.

We have a 737, five minutes out,

20 miles, runway 2, on board,

people board is .

It has a decompression problem at this time.

Runway 2, Runway 2.

Aloha 243.

OK, the equipment is on the field.

It's on the way.

NARRATOR: At 9,800 feet, flying West of the mountain,

the pilot slows the aircraft.

And as gently as possible, begins the right hand

turn towards Kahului.

Passengers sense that someone must

be in control of the aircraft.

HOWARD KITAOKA: I've had some training as pilot.

And we were wings level.

It wasn't a dive or roll.

It was wings level.

At that moment, I thought, we have a chance.

NARRATOR: Meanwhile, those in the ground

are unsure about what kind of crisis they're facing.

It's a small airport.

An airliner in trouble will test

the fire crews experience.

For the air controller, it's hard to hear

the airplane at all.

Just to verify again, you're breaking up.

Your call sign is 243.

Is that correct?

Or 244?

Aloha 243.

Aloha 243.

MAN (ON RADIO): Aloha 243.

Plan straight ahead for runway 02.

I'll keep you advised of any wind change.

NARRATOR: Four minutes after the explosion--

Do you want me to offer anything else?

No.

NARRATOR: At this lower altitude,

they're able to remove their oxygen masks.

Aloha 243, looks like we've lost a door.

We have a hole in the left side of the aircraft.

NARRATOR: But the tower can't hear this new information.

They've lost contact with the aircraft.

Aloha 243.

The transmissions aren't being picked up.

Aloha 243, you still up?

NARRATOR: Hearing nothing from the aircraft,

the controller fears the worst.

Aloha 243, if you still hear, please, ident.

Affirmative.

Aloha 243, roger.

I got your idents.

Straight away.

Cleared to land.

Wind, 040 at 20 knots.

NARRATOR: Communication is restored,

but the crew's ordeal is far from over.

Cabin, do you hear?

NARRATOR: Now, Mimi Tompkins tries

to contact the cabin by intercom,

but there's no response.

GREG FEITH: Well, the crew doesn't really know

what's going on behind them.

The airplane is still flying, the captain now

has to maintain his focus on flying that airplane,

but he doesn't know what real damage exists behind him.

Tell them we'll need assistance to evacuate.

Right.

Maui tower, Aloha 243, can you hear me on tower frequency?

Aloha 243, I hear you loud and clear.

Go ahead.

MIMI TOMPKINS (ON RADIO): We're going to need assistance.

I can't communicate with the flight attendants.

We'll need assistance with the passengers when we land.

NARRATOR: During the descent, passengers experience

moments of pure terror.

PATRICIA AUBREY: The plane kept vibrating and shaking.

And the luggage racks were falling in

and there was electrical wires flying around zapping.

And you know, pretty much pandemonium,

but it looked like the plane was ripping in half.

NARRATOR: And suddenly, there's a new problem

for the flight crew to handle.

It feels like annual reversion.

What?

The flight control feel like manual reversion.

NARRATOR: It feels to the pilot as

though hydraulic systems, like power

steering in an automobile, have now failed.

The airframe is under great stress.

They need to land as soon as possible.

Can we maintain altitude OK?

There are so many thoughts that go through your head.

Like one of my thoughts was man,

don't put this thing in the water.

NARRATOR: The crew fears that critical wiring and control

cables may have been severed.

Have any of the airplane's vital parts been damaged?

Let's try flying with the gear down.

All right.

You've got it.

NARRATOR: There are lights to indicate

whether or not the landing gear has safely deployed.

The main undercarriage has extended as normal.

But the light showing that the nose wheel has extended,

doesn't come on.

GREG FEITH: The last thing the pilot wanted

to see, especially with his airplane,

in the condition it was in, was that he

didn't have a nose gear.

Because when the nose touched down on the runway,

it would have broken the airplane apart.

Therefore, breaking probably the fuel tanks apart,

which could lead to a very dramatic fire and explosion.

NARRATOR: A second attempt to extend the landing gear.

The nose gear light is still out.

But the radio link is so bad, the tower is still trying

to assimilate the crisis.

MAN (ON RADIO): Aloha 243, just to verify, you do need

an ambulance, is that correct?

I still don't understand.

Affirmative. MAN (ON RADIO): Roger.

How many do you think are injured?

We have no idea.

We can't communicate with the flight attendants.

OK, we'll have the ambulance on the way.

There's a possibility that we won't have a nose gear.

NARRATOR: Now, Bob Schornstheimer has

to make a critical decision.

Should he wait for confirmation that the undercarriage is down

or land anyway?

The textbook in this case would tell the pilots

to overfly the airfield so that the air traffic controllers

can look at the landing gear and give them a report

whether it's up or down.

The pilots would then have to maneuver the airplane all

the way around the airfield, come in for an approach,

and land.

NARRATOR: But with an airplane, which

might break apart at any moment,

that's out of the question.

Tell him we've got problems, but we're going to land anyway

even without a nose gear.

But they should be aware that we don't have

a nose gear indication down.

MAN (ON RADIO): Aloha 243, wind now, 050.

The emergency equipment is in place.

MIMI TOMPKINS (ON RADIO): OK.

Be advised we have no nose gear.

We are landing with no nose gear.

NARRATOR: Maui is not an ideal place to head

for with a damaged airplane.

The island's exposed north shore

lies directly in the path of the trade winds.

HOWARD KITAOKA: I've done that landing a lot of times.

And that particular approach corridor

is very windy because of the mountain on one side

and mountain to the other.

So it's a very bumpy approach.

But that's basically all we had.

FLIGHT ATTENDANT: Get in the right position.

Brace yourself.

Brace yourself.

Get down.

GREG FEITH: Any kind of in-flight turbulence, that

would have put great stresses on the front end

of the airplane.

And there's a high probability that the cockpit

would have separated from the rest of the fuselage.

Catastrophic loss of the airplane and a loss of life.

NARRATOR: With the airfield now in sight,

Bob Schornstheimer has a critical decision ahead.

He begins to slow the aircraft for landing.

Let's try flaps 15.

NARRATOR: An airplane's flaps are sliding panels

at the back of the wings.

They increase lift at low speeds.

They need to be extended during takeoff and landing.

MIMI TOMPKINS: Is it easier to control with the flaps up?

Yeah.

Put them back to five.

Can you give me a B speed for a flaps five landing?

NARRATOR: No two aircraft landings are the same.

Pilots have to factor in many things.

The wind speed and direction, passenger and fuel load,

and the length of the runway before them.

Do you want the flaps right down as we land?

What?

Do you want the flaps right down as we land?

Yeah.

But after we touch down.

OK.

NARRATOR: A complicated formula provides the vref, indicating

the safe landing speed.

Even in a crisis like this, pilots

have to reach for the manual.

Extending the flaps fully will help act as a brake

once they touch down.

But to do it earlier could stress the airframe

to the breaking point.

GREG FEITH: What you have to remember

is that the pilots weren't trained to handle

a situation like this.

With the top of their airplane missing,

they became test pilots.

The aerodynamic effects of the airplane

were drastically different than they were used to.

They really had to fly by the seat of their pants.

Aloha 243, wind now, 050 at 20.

Vref 40 plus 30 flap 1 through flaps 15.

120.

NARRATOR: Using her flight manual,

the first officer makes the complicated calculation

that will give their correct landing speed.

552.

Right.

NARRATOR: The safe speed for landing, taking into account

the length of Kahului's runway two is calculated to be 152

knots or 175 miles an hour.

Get down.

NARRATOR: As the airplane slows,

it becomes much harder to control.

And so the pilot has to make another crucial call.

Don't let go.

Get down.

NARRATOR: Speeding up to keep control

means he'll hit the runway faster than he should.

He gambles that the higher speed landing

is still the best option.

HOWARD KITAOKA: Our approach speed, I felt, was hot.

I mean, we were coming in hot.

I don't know.

Don't ask me how many miles an hour

it was because I don't know.

But from other landings, we were coming in fairly hot.

Crash

NARRATOR: Rescue team is prepare themselves

for a worst case scenario.

At high speed, and without the nose gear,

a crash landing followed by a catastrophic fuel

fire now seems inevitable.

GREG FEITH: Under these conditions,

the lack of a nose gear could have

been a death sentence for everybody

aboard this aircraft.

NARRATOR: In the 12 horrifying minutes since the explosion,

some passengers are convinced they're

not going to make it alive.

PATRICIA AUBREY: I thought it was going to go in the water.

And I was eaten by sharks.

And then we saw the mountain.

And I didn't think we were going to make it over it.

I just knew we were going to crash into that mountain.

And then what we could tell, we could see the airport.

And then you know, then I burned

to death because the plane blew up when

we-- when we hit the runway.

NARRATOR: Suddenly, the news that pilots

have been praying for--

The gear is down.

Hit a phone call with command.

The gear is down.

MAN (ON RADIO): Gear is down.

Do you want me to go to flaps 40?

Help you?

No.

On the ground.

NARRATOR: The crew has had to make life or death decisions.

In the next few seconds, they'll

find out whether they're the right ones.

Michelle Honda cradles her injured colleague

as the critical moment approaches.

Passengers comfort one another in what

may be their last moments alive.

PATRICIA AUBREY: The woman that was sitting

next to me and her husband, he was

on the other side in the next row up, she was next to me.

And they were reaching their hands out

and they were trying to touch fingers to say goodbye.

I was-- that was a really touching moment.

For me, it was when I really knew

I was going to die because they were

saying goodbye to each other.

NARRATOR: Though the forward undercarriage has extended,

the crew still can't be certain whether it's locked in place

or whether it'll collapse on landing.

If it doesn't hold firm, the aircraft,

traveling at close to 200 miles an hour,

will smash nose down onto the tarmac.

One reverse.

OK.

Thrust reverser.

Aloha 243, just shut it down where you are.

OK.

Everything's fine.

The gear did it.

OK. Shut it down.

Good enough?

Yeah.

NARRATOR: In this extraordinary video captured moments

after landing, the amount of damage the airplane suffered

is difficult to comprehend.

An emergency evacuation of passengers who escaped injury

has just been completed.

Some injured passengers have still

to be helped from the plane.

How it flew for those 13 terrifying minutes

seems astonishing.

Captain Bob Schornstheimer is thanked by passengers,

who, just minutes before, had expected to die.

The tension is released.

HOWARD KITAOKA: Oh, I just said, yes, baby.

That's all I said.

The pilot did a tremendous job.

NARRATOR: Patricia Aubrey hugs her heroine, Michelle Honda.

PATRICIA AUBREY: I was crying.

Of course, everybody was traumatized,

looking at the plane and looking

at the people bleeding.

And just-- I kept touching myself going, I'm here.

I can't believe I'm still alive.

NARRATOR: A final desperate head count by Michelle Honda

confirms the crew's worst fears.

CB Lansing, the veteran of 37 years flying for this airline,

is missing.

A sea search begins in the area of ocean,

where the explosion took place.

Neither body nor wreckage are found.

Jane Sato-Tomita has started to recover.

Seven passengers are seriously hurt.

The worst injury, a skull fracture.

But how have the rest survived?

At the moment of decompression, it's

just their belts, which make the difference

between life and death.

It went poof, loud noise, and it just the-- the whole

thing come apart.

And I, personally, thought we were all gone.

And we were fastened there, all had our seatbelts fastened.

Well, most of us, evidently, would have lost a lot more.

NARRATOR: But there is something else.

At the most critical moment, Maui's notorious high winds

died away.

I was amazed to see the front of the fuselage missing.

What's so funny about the whole thing is that when it came in,

had no wind.

I believe if you did had that wind,

the aircraft wouldn't have made it.

It would have split into two pieces.

And it's a miracle.

It's very much a miracle.

GREG FEITH: This is one of the most remarkable

flying events in history.

No airplane has ever landed with this amount of damage.

The only thing that was holding the forward section

cockpit to the rest of the fuselage were the floor beams.

Basically, they were hanging by a thread.

NARRATOR: From a close study of a fuselage crash

investigators try to determine how the airplane structure

remained in one piece.

The critical factor proves to be the precise location

of the explosion.

The thing that saved them was that because the damage was

across the top of the airplane, as the nose tried to bend

down, these members through here are in tension

and it kept them in line, it kept them straight.

So even though it was almost ready to break off,

the structure was still strong enough here

to keep it together.

If this damage had been along the bottom

and the nose is trying to bend down this way,

the structure would have been-- this similar structure would

have been in compression and it would have buckled,

and the nose would have certainly come off.

So it was fortunate that the damage was across the top.

NARRATOR: How does the roof of a jet airliner

simply blow away?

The US National Transportation Safety

Board, NTSB, is tasked with discovering what happened.

Investigators pulled the airplane's records, something

like an automobile service history,

and suspicion falls right away on the airplane itself.

Since its launch in 1967, the Boeing 737

has become the best selling commercial aircraft

in aviation history.

Over 10,000 737s have been sold.

The accident airplane was number 152 off the production

line, delivered in May 1969.

The airplane was designed for a 20-year service

life and 75,000 flights.

This one had exceeded that number, though,

many were of short duration.

Its fuselage was under constant stress

because of pressurization.

The fuselage of the airplane is actually breathing.

It expands and contracts, depending on altitude.

When it's on the ground, it's in a contracted status.

When it's at altitude 24,000 feet, the fuselage expands.

So the airplane is constantly cycling.

That's pressurization.

That will weaken the structure over a long period of time.

And given the history of this airplane,

being a very high cycle airplane, that,

probably, had something to do with weakening

the structure of the fuselage.

NARRATOR: With thousands of 737s

taking to the skies every day, investigators

need to be certain what made this one burst apart.

In Washington DC, Jim Wildey is one of the NTSB team

who worked the case.

His expertise as a metallurgist proves crucial.

I got a call about 2:00 in the morning,

in the middle of the night, from my boss

and there had been an accident in Hawaii.

They were putting the team together.

And I hopped on a plane and went to Hawaii.

NARRATOR: He takes samples from the remaining fuselage,

and back in the lab, discovers something barely

visible to the naked eye.

Hairline cracks like this between the holes

where rivets had been.

Figuring out how those cracks came to be there

means going back to basics, to the way the Boeing

737 was put together.

Airplanes are built from many separate panels.

Where they overlap, they're bonded

together by a powerful adhesive known as epoxy.

Rivets hold the panels tight together,

while the epoxy sets hard.

On the Aloha airplane, there's telltale discoloration

inside the overlapping joints.

Here is the vital clue.

You can see now where the dark material is the epoxy

that was used to bond the two layers of the lap

joint together.

The white material you see here is corrosion damage

of the aluminum fuselage skin.

So the original intent was to the stress that's

trying to pull one skin away from the other skin piece,

the stresses would go through the bonding and not

through the rivets.

Of course, as this thing becomes disbonded,

now the rivets, themselves, are loaded.

And especially this top row of rivets.

And this is the row of rivets we think that had the fatigue

cracking in it that led to the eventual opening of the roof

structure on the Aloha 737 airplane.

NARRATOR: The files reveal that Boeing

warned airlines, including Aloha, a problems

with some early 737s.

If the epoxy isn't applied at exactly the right temperature,

if the panels have moisture or dirt on them,

the bonding can fail.

In warnings and service bulletins,

some issued over 15 years earlier,

Boeing spells out the danger.

The Hawaii climate, with humid and salt-laden air,

helps corrosion to occur.

But instead of grounding airplanes for a nose

to tail examination, Aloha has inspectors

make occasional checks, often at night when those on duty

are least alert.

Working under artificial light, those tiny cracks

escaped detection.

GREG FEITH: These cracks go unrepaired

and now you have an airplane that is a ticking time bomb.

NARRATOR: There are other problems.

Boeing's service bulletins, and what

are called airworthiness directives issued

by the Federal Aviation Administration,

are often difficult to understand.

GREG FEITH: Airworthiness directives

are very complex and read like a legal document.

Aloha needed to have someone who could read that document

and interpret it into plain English for the mechanics,

the wrench turners.

That never happened.

NARRATOR: An airplane that's been worked so hard serviced

by mechanics who don't fully understand the briefings is

a recipe for disaster.

Investigators now believe they know

why the airplane burst open, but they don't yet know how.

JIM WILDEY: I was flying back from Hawaii to Los Angeles.

And while I was in the air, I got a message that--

that we needed to interview this passenger who

had apparently seen a crack as she was getting

on the accident flight.

You saw something, as you got on this airplane, which you

pointed out to your roommate--

Cynthia Johnson.

Yeah, Cynthia.

Talk me through it.

What did you see?

What I saw was to the right of the door

where the paint was white, well, it was a crack.

It was like not a hole exactly, but the metal on top

had come away from the metal below.

I was going to tell the flight attendant,

you know, but they were busy and we had to take our seats.

Oh, yeah.

You figured they know what they're doing.

It's their airplane.

I didn't want to make a fuss or anything.

No, no, no, no, absolutely.

The witness saw cracking in this area.

And we found fatigue cracking back in here.

So this is the line where the cracking joined up.

One piece came down this way and folded off,

and the other piece went across the top

and came off to the right side.

NARRATOR: But something still doesn't make sense.

Boeing designed the 737 and other of its aircraft

so that this should never happen.

Every 10 inches along the airplane

are what are called tear straps inside the fuselage

to strengthen it.

If a tear begins, it should only

reach the next strap before shooting

off at a 90 degree angle.

Though there's a hole in the aircraft,

it acts like a safety valve.

GREG FEITH: The purpose of the tear strip

is to confine any kind of rip or tear

in the fuselage skin to a 10-inch square, basically.

If you allow it to propagate beyond this 10-inch square,

you could then compromise larger

sections of the fuselage and cause a blowout.

The 10-inch square allows a controlled decompression

and confines any structural damage to a very small area.

NARRATOR: So why has the safety valve failed here?

The NTSB believes there were so many cracks in the fuselage

that they simply joined together, running

right through the tear straps.

JIM WILDEY: The Aloha airplane was kind

of unique in a couple of ways.

The way it was operated was with very short flights.

So you had large numbers of these pressurization cycles

and stress was going on and off on these rivet locations.

And secondly, with the disbonding,

all this stress is now going through the rivets.

And that led to the linking up of these cracks,

and then the roof coming off the airplane.

NARRATOR: But is that the final answer on what

happened to flight 243?

A new theory claims to shed fresh light

on those dramatic events.

Matt Austin is an engineer who lives in Honolulu.

The story of flight 243 both appalls and fascinates him.

MATT AUSTIN: I flew very regularly on Aloha airlines

and I've been on that plane about a week before it

actually lost the roof.

You could tell that something was loose in the airplane.

It's just like when you're in an old car and you hit a bump,

you can hear the rattles in it that you

won't hear in a new aircraft.

In this case, when the aircraft landed

there would be noises and rattles

you wouldn't hear on the newer aircraft.

NARRATOR: He begins his own investigation,

scrutinizing the 4,000 pages of evidence

and photographs gathered during the official inquiry.

MATT AUSTIN: I am an expert in explosion dynamics

and how pressure vessels explode,

what causes them to explode, which way the cracks

run as they're coming apart.

In the case of the Aloha accident,

the main focus from the aeronautical industry

was they were looking at as an airplane structural failure,

whereas I analyzed it from the point of view

of a pressure vessel failure.

NARRATOR: As he reviews the evidence,

one question keeps recurring.

Why is CB Lansing sucked out of the aircraft

and not her colleague Jane Sato-Tomita?

Jane was further forward than CB at the crucial moment.

Jane was at row two, CB was at row five.

The NTSB believes the roof separation

began near row three.

Passenger testimony gathered shortly after the incident

suggests that CB Lansing was sucked upwards into the left,

but not forward.

I was on the aisle on the right.

So I look up from my magazine, I see a pair of legs

go up and out on the left.

Just back a first class from where I was if the nose was

12, this is at 11.

Yeah.

NARRATOR: Forensic evidence suggests

another possible scenario.

Michael Sweet, an ex-cop, is now a specialist

in blood spatter analysis.

He examines official photographs

of the 737 fuselage.

This is a-- a large photograph of the left

side of the airplane.

The front would be in this location.

There's a-- what we suspect to be

a bloodstain pattern on the--

right beside the window right here.

NARRATOR: Could this bloodstain be

where CB Lansing's head impacted with the outside

of the fuselage?

The analysts believe so.

MICHAEL SWEET: Well, the fact that there are blood stains

on the side of this airplane suggest to me

that the blood source in this case

was momentarily trapped when it came into contact

with the side of the airplane.

If the flight attendant, in this case,

was ejected outside of a gaping hole,

I would expect her to disappear almost immediately

and not leave any bloodstains on the side of the airplane.

NARRATOR: This analysis suggests

only that she was trapped, but without explaining how or why.

Matt Austin believes he has the answer.

What if a safety hole is opened up as it was designed to do,

but directly above the flight attendant?

Matt Austin thinks CB Lansing is sucked into the safety

hole, momentarily blocking it.

MATT AUSTIN: All of the air that's trying to escape

has no place to go.

So it builds up a huge pressure spike

and that's what blew the roof off the top of the airplane.

NARRATOR: What he's describing is known as a fluid hammer.

In scientific terms, air is fluid as is water.

Here's a simple demonstration in a bathtub.

The water is in fact escaping through the drain.

As we move the drain plug back down toward the hole,

it will immediately slam shut and create

a force which is a simple example of fluid hammer.

NARRATOR: He believes, this phenomenon, on a giant scale,

caused the accident.

MATT AUSTIN: It's very tragic.

But if we don't look at the forensic evidence that's left,

then we won't understand exactly what caused

the explosive decompression and possibly

prevent a future occurrence.

NARRATOR: The NTSB says the fluid hammer theory

is valid, scientifically.

But for them, the evidence still

points to something simpler--

a virtually simultaneous failure in the airplane's

many weak spots.

The safety board's investigations

are never really closed.

And we always would take into account any new information

that comes out.

I believe in the case of the Aloha accident, we have--

we have not changed our probable cause

and we still are sticking with the probable cause

as we determined back in 1988.

NARRATOR: Since the crucial physical evidence was never

found, what happened on board at the precise moment

of explosion will probably never be known.

Aloha Airlines management took most of the blame

for their poor maintenance regime.

The NTSB demanded that the Federal Aviation

Administration do a much better job enforcing

maintenance standards.

Boeing had already improved their manufacturing process

to prevent the adhesive from becoming

so easily contaminated.

What happened on flight 243 made flying safer.

Soon after, Congress passed the Aviation Safety Research Act.

This accident had a very profound effect

on the aviation industry.

And the way we look at aging airplanes, old aircraft,

we changed the way we monitor how they age,

the way we inspect them.

And of course, now, how we manufacture them,

we use different processes.

This was a very critical accident for aviation history.

NARRATOR: Those 13 terrifying minutes

also left their impact on the survivors of flight 243.

I had to go through a healing process.

I took fear of flying classes.

And the old saying of you fall off a horse

and you get back on it is very accurate,

but it's a lot tougher to actually do it.

NARRATOR: Patricia Aubrey also had to find a way

of dealing with the memories.

Her way was to revisit the same piece of airspace

where the terror unfolded.

PATRICIA AUBREY: I'll co-flying with my psychologist.

You go through what they call desensitization, where you

confront your fear and you just do it so many times

that you can do it without having a bad reaction.

Before that happened, if something bad happened to me,

I'd go, I hate life.

But I don't hate life.

I can deal with it.

Bring it on.

I'll-- I'll take care of it.

I'd much rather be alive.

NARRATOR: There's one further legacy of that fateful day.

The ocean never did surrender the body of CB Lansing.

Instead, a memorial garden honoring the veteran flight

attendant was planted at Honolulu Airport,

beneath the big Hawaiian sky where she spent

the better part of her life, and where

it was so suddenly ended.