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18 August 2015 Magazine

August 1985: The worst month for airdisastersBy Jon Kelly

BBC News Magazine

August 1985 witnessed more passenger

and crew deaths on commercial airlines

than any other month. What made it so

deadly and what changed as a result?

There are many grim landmarks in the

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August 1985: The worst month for air disasters - BBC News http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-33931693

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history of aviation. One in particular stands

out.

Three decades ago, 720 travellers and crew

lost their lives on board commercial aircraft

in a single month - more than in any other

before or since.

The deaths occurred in four separate

accidents in August 1985. Each disaster

had quite different causes. The aircraft involved ranged from a 747

with hundreds on board to a tiny twin engine turboprop carrying just

eight people.

There was Japan Air Lines flight 123, the worst single-aircraft

accident in history, in which 520 of 524 on board were killed. A further

137 died when Delta flight 191 flew into heavy winds as it

approached Dallas-Fort Worth International. A fire on board British

Airtours flight 28M at Manchester Airport led to 55 deaths. And all

those on board the smallest aircraft, Bar Harbor Airlines flight 1808,

lost their lives as it flew into a small airport in Maine, USA.

Each, in their own way, had a lasting legacy, whether in the memories

of those left bereaved or in changes in technology and procedure

introduced as a direct result.

The worst death toll was on Japan Air Lines Flight 123, a Boeing 747,

which was en route from Tokyo to Osaka on 12 August 1985 when

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the airtight bulkhead between its cabin and tail tore open.

The change in pressure blew off the vertical stabiliser, or tail fin. It

also destroyed the hydraulic systems. The plane lurched up and

down.

"The crew heroically fought for over half an hour," says Graham

Braithwaite, professor of safety and accident investigation at

Cranfield University. But by the time the aircraft plunged to 13,500ft

they reported that they had lost control.

The 747 began its final descent. "They were over some pretty

mountainous terrain," says Braithwaite. Altitude dropped rapidly. A

wing then clipped a ridge before the aircraft hit a second ridge,

flipped over and came to rest on its back.

It had been 32 minutes since the explosive decompression, enough

time for some passengers to write their families farewell notes.

Investigators concluded that the crash was caused by a faulty repair

job after the plane's tail struck the runway seven years previously.

The damage should have been fixed using a single plate and three

rows of rivets. But Boeing engineers used two separate plates, one

with two rows of rivets and another with one. Japan Air Lines failed to

detect the fault.

For Japan, the crash was deeply traumatic. "The effect was

profound," says Braithwaite. Extraordinarily, JAL opened a museum

dedicated to the disaster in April 2006. It includes wreckage from the

aircraft, letters written by passengers to loved ones and an aviation

safety library. All airline staff are obliged to visit it.


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There were suggestions that more passengers might potentially have

survived if the Japanese authorities had sent rescuers to the crash

site sooner, or if they had accepted an offer of help from a nearby

United States Air Force base.

And shortly after the disaster JAL maintenance official Hiroo

Tominaga killed himself, reportedly leaving a note saying: "I am

atoning with my death."

But the accident is rare among major air disasters in that it can be

attributed to a single and completely avoidable mechanical fault. With

the blame lying with the work of the engineers and JAL's inspection

procedures, there were no wider consequences for the air industry.

David Learmount, safety editor at Flight Global, says the botched

repair "was a massive error that should never have occurred". In

terms of technology and procedure "there was no real legacy".

It was quite a different matter with the disaster at Manchester Airport

10 days later. This proved to be a defining event in the history of

aviation safety.

As the charter flight to Corfu prepared for take-off, a punctured wing

fuel tank caused a huge ball of fire to ignite. The pilots heard a thump

and aborted take-off, but did not realise at first that the blaze was

under way. They steered the aircraft into a taxiway upwind of the fire,

carrying the flames towards the passengers in the fuselage.


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Nearly all those who died did so as a result of smoke inhalation: "The

survivors were shocked at how quickly it became impossible to

breathe," says Braithwaite. Investigators had found the evacuation

had been slowed down because the gap between the seats leading

to the over-wing exits was too narrow, and the hatch itself was too

difficult to remove.

Accounts of a terrifying crash

"Passengers were shouting: 'Fire! fire!' You're having a hundred

thoughts. Where's your family? How were they ever going to get

out?"

John Beardmore was one of the survivors of the British Airtours flight

28M, which burst into flames on Manchester Airport runway on 22

August 1985, killing 55 people. He recalled the terrifying experience

of trying to escape the plane.

The 1985 British Airtours disaster

As a result, there were a series of changes to commercial aircraft

design focused on increasing survivability. The exit row was widened

and fire-blocking seat covers, floor lighting, fire-resistant ceiling and

wall panels and revised evacuation rules were all introduced.


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The routine for pilots in the event of runway emergencies was

radically changed - they must now pull up as quickly as possible,

taking account of wind direction.

SCISAFE, a campaign group set up by victims' relatives, also

campaigned for the introduction of passenger smoke hoods but these

have not been adopted.

"There has to be something to justify 55 people losing their lives,"

says William Beckett, whose 18-year-old daughter Sarah died on the

Manchester runway. It was her first time on board an aeroplane. She

had chosen to sit at the back because the four survivors of Japan Air

Lines Flight 123 had been seated at the rear.

There were also changes introduced as a result of the Delta flight

191 crash in Texas on 2 August. The plane was coming in for landing

when it hit a microburst - a small-scale downburst, or column of

sinking air.

The aircraft crashed north of the runway and careered along the

ground into a highway, killing a driver, before hitting two water tanks

and bursting into flames. Of 163 passengers and crew, only 27

survived.

An investigation found that, although the pilot had been experienced,

there was a lack of training when it came to dealing with microbursts.

The radar on board the aircraft was able to detect thunderstorms but

not downbursts of this kind.

"One of the things that was not understood at the time was the

structure of a downburst," says Learmount.

"That was understood within a very short period of time. That was

coincidence but they very, very quickly developed a windshear

warning system for the pilots." The US Federal Aviation

Administration soon required all commercial aircraft to install these.

August 1985's final accident came when Bar Harbor Airlines flight

1808 struck short of the runway at Auburn/Lewiston Municipal Airport

in Maine, USA, and crashed. All six passengers and two crew

members were killed.


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American schoolgirl Samantha Smith was invited by Yuri Andropov to visit the USSR in

1983

The crash of a such a small aircraft would not normally have

attracted much attention, but one of the passengers was 13-year-old

Samantha Smith, who had attracted widespread media attention

three years previously when she wrote to Soviet premier Yuri

Andropov pleading for peace. She had subsequently made a widely

publicised tour of the USSR and acted in an American TV drama.

In the Soviet Union there was speculation of foul play, but an

investigation found no evidence of this. It concluded that there had

been a ground radar failure and the pilots had been inexperienced

fliers on what was a rainy night. Both US President Ronald Reagan

and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev sent their condolences.

It was a sad end to a tragic month. But according to Learmount it was

far less shocking than it would be today, due to the far greater

prevalence of airline accidents in the mid-1980s.

"Aviation was different then," says Learmount. "It's infinitely more

sophisticated now. Safety has been absolutely transformed. It would

be very difficult for people now to understand what it felt like. Crashes

were regular things."

Since the 1990s the number of annual aviation fatalities has been on

a downward trend - notwithstanding the spike in 2014, which saw two

disasters involving Malaysia Airlines planes - the disappearance of


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My Lariam dreams

MH370 and the shooting down of flight MH17 over Ukraine - as well

as the disappearance of an Air Asia flight to Singapore.

That improved safety record can be attributed, in part, to the changes

introduced in the wake of August 1985.

More from the Magazine

Over the course of eight days in the summer of 2014, three

passenger planes were lost in mid-flight. A cluster of disasters so

close together may seem an unlikely coincidence but is it?

How odd is a cluster of plane crashes?

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In today's Magazine


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