KLM and Pan American collision

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 502.

IX. Comment on the texts. Speak about other examples of air crash due to misunderstanding.

This catastrophe occurred at Tenerife airport in 1977. It was a collision of two Bs 747belonging to KLM and Pan Am America airlines that led to about six hundred fatalities. It remains the biggest and the deadliest crash in the history of aviation.

KLM plane was taking off in heavy fog on the airport's only RW and crashed into the top the Pan Am aircraft taxing to the opposite side.

The investigation concluded that there was a number of contributing factors that caused the crash:

1. KLM captain attempted to take off as soon as possible in order to comply with the company's duty-time regulations and before the weather deteriorated more. So he decided that Pan Am had already cleared the RW and started take off without distinct clearance from ATC.

2. Dense fog was another major reason of the crash as it limited the visibility so control tower and the crews of both planes were unable to see each other.

3. Simultaneous radio transmissions also resulted in the fact that no message was heard.

4. ATC's strong Spanish accent and deviation from the standard phraseology by the controller and the KLM pilot were also the contributing factors of the catastrophe.