Once the thread had failed, the horizontal stabilizer assembly was subjected to aerodynamic forces that it was not designed to withstand, leading to the complete failure of the overstressed stabilizer assembly. As the NTSB investigation continued, so too did the criminal investigation and the saga of John Liotine. Gotta get it over again said Thompson. Weve run just about everything. Investigators later uncovered a critical maintenance. 3.4M views 1 year ago #mayday #planecrash #survivalstory Air Alaska Flight 261 dives into the ocean shortly after takeoff, killing the 88 passengers and crew on board. Assigned to lead the Systems Group for the NTSB go-team, I needed to understand the crew conversations, cockpit alerts and switch clicks related to what we suspected was a horizontal stabilizer trim system failure. Nine days after the accident, the first major piece of wreckage recovered was the horizontal stabilizer by Portland car accident lawyers. Alaska flight 261 departed Puerto Vallarta, Mexico at 1:37 pm on January 31, 2000 destined for San Francisco. [5] Captain Theodore "Ted" Thompson, 53, had accrued 17,750 flight hours, and had more than 4,000 hours experience flying MD-80s. At this time, pilots from aircraft flying in the vicinity reported in, with one pilot saying, "and he's just hit the water." On board flight 261, Captain Thompson vented to First Officer Tansky: Drives me nuts, he said. The longer it went without being greased properly, the faster the jackscrew wore down the threads on the nut. You mean, use this again? Tansky asked, presumably pointing at the trim switches. The green grease did appear to be more wet to me. Folks, we have had a flight-control problem up front here, first officer Ted Thompson told the passengers over the PA system. Testing revealed that the nonstandard tools ("restraining fixtures") used by Alaska Airlines could result in inaccurate measurements and that if accurate measurements had been obtained at the time of the last inspection, these measurements possibly would have indicated the excessive wear and the need to replace the affected components. The NTSB formed a Metallurgy Group which later determined that the threads inside the acme nut were worn down and incrementally sheared off by the jackscrew prior to the accident. As a result, the horizontal stabilizer failed at 17,800 feet (5,400m)[6]:6 and the aircraft rapidly pitched over into a dive while rolling to the left. And then, as the plane passed through 23,400 feet, a warning light flicked on in the cockpit: AUTOPILOT TRIM, it said. This was not one of those cases. We also discovered that the airline, with no objection from the FAA, was allowed to extend the end play check interval years before the accident (see graphic 9). At least upside down, were flying!. citizens. By nightfall, working with the help of flood lights from squid fishing boats, recovery workers managed to find just seven bodies. On January 31st, 2000, Alaska Airlines Flight 261 suddenly nosedived into the Pacific Ocean and the crash had deadly implications. After the jackscrew failed, the plane pitched down -70 degrees and was rolling over to the left. Nevertheless, investigators praised the pilots for their heroic last-ditch efforts to save their aircraft, even attempting to fly upside down when they found they could not level the plane. The trim might be, and then it might be uh, if somethings popped back there. Nine years after the cost-cutting began, Alaska Airlines was posting profits again, its fleet was expanding, and passenger numbers were higher than ever. It was the first sign that something was in fact gravely wrong with their airplane. I dont anticipate any big problems once we get a couple of sub systems on the line. In fact, by now there were several other airplanes in the area that were keenly watching the unfolding situation. We also noted that accessing the area for the lubrication was unwieldy, especially on a tail stand at night (images 10 & 11). [43], The crash has appeared in various advance fee fraud ("419") email scams, in which a scammer uses the name of someone who died in the crash to lure unsuspecting victims into sending money to the scammer by claiming the crash victim left huge amounts of unclaimed funds in a foreign bank account. Neither the flight crew nor company maintenance could determine the cause of the jam. With no grease at all, the rate of wear would increase by a factor of ten or more. The investigation concluded, "FAA surveillance of Alaska Airlines had been deficient for at least several years". The maintenance technician, having received all the information he could get, said, Okay, thank you sir, see you there., Meanwhile, the conversation had apparently encouraged Captain Thompson to try moving the stabilizer again. Indeed, the final, terrifying dive was the culmination not just of hours of failed troubleshooting, but of years upon years of negligent maintenance, blatant corruption, and lax federal oversight, a deadly combination that led to an unprecedented failure of the stabilizer trim jackscrew one of the scariest malfunctions any flight crew has ever faced. The tragedy of 261 forced us to change, he said. Animation of Alaska Airlines Flight 261 Plane Crash - YouTube PLANE CRASH, Alaska Airlines Flight 261, Pacific OceanOther Videos:https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLqoJItjw7txOS5AjsLzo8x95z9cvoMFxeAlaska Airlines Fl. I went tab down, right, and it should have come back. Alaska Flight 261 bound for Seattle crashes into the Pacific Ocean on [7] Three Seattle-based flight attendants were also on board, completing the five-person crew. Instead it went the other way., What do you think. But when we slowed down lets slow it, lets get it down to two hundred knots and see what happens., Now Thompson and Tansky slowed down and deployed the flaps and slats, simulating a landing configuration, to make sure the plane would be controllable on final approach. In 1998, fed up with a maintenance environment that did not seem to prioritize safety, John Liotine blew the whistle and alerted the FAA to some of Alaskas numerous violations. They had no way of knowing at this stage that the problem was mechanical in nature. [42], Two victims were falsely named in paternity suits as the fathers of children in Guatemala in an attempt to gain insurance and settlement money. gakirah barnes death video; Financial Planning. The outcomes of wrongful death suits against Alaska filed by the victims families are unknown, but it has been reported that the airline eventually settled with the families out of court for a total of at least $300 million, all of which was covered by insurance. Profiles of Alaska Flight 261 victims | The Seattle Times Home From C-Check to Tragedy: Lessons Learned from Alaska flight 261. Different speeds and phases of flight require the stabilizer to apply varying amounts of downforce on the tail in order to keep the plane level, and further adjustments must be made to ensure that the pilots dont have to continuously pull up or push down using the elevators in order to climb or descend. Shortly after the accident, Liotine discovered that the jackscrew nut he had inspected in 1997 was not in fact replaced and had actually gone on to cause the crash. The lead mechanic that day was John Liotine, a rare Alaska Airlines employee who still took safety seriously. The crash of Alaska Airlines flight 261: Analysis - Reddit Within the next several minutes the pilots expected to pass abeam Los Angeles off the coast, and they were strongly considering a diversion to LAX, given that none of their troubleshooting had fixed the problem. Many workers who greased jackscrews didnt apply additional grease to the screw itself after greasing the nut. Indications of questionable maintenance were noted, including the fact that the airline was using a newer type of grease on the jackscrew called Aeroshell 33. As investigators recovered more and more of the plane from the ocean floor, a troubling picture of the sequence of events began to emerge. Los Angeles controllers gave flight 261 permission to approach the airport, but Thompson asked to stay out over the ocean while they tested the controllability of their airplane. [6], The jackscrew assembly was designed with two independent threads, each of which was strong enough to withstand the forces placed on it. Were going to LAX, Thompson told the dispatcher. At 16:09, he said, Im gonna click it off. Families of those killed in the Alaska Airlines disaster off Port Hueneme gathered at a memorial to remember their loved ones with a special ceremony. The probable cause was stated to be "a loss of airplane pitch control resulting from the in-flight failure of the horizontal stabilizer trim system jackscrew assembly's trapezoidal nut threads. "For that and for your loss . Were pretty busy up here working this situation. Families gather in Port Hueneme to honor Alaska Flight 261 crash When he measured the wear on the jackscrew nut and found it to be exactly one millimeter (0.040in), he concluded that the nut had reached the end of its service life and issued a work card ordering its replacement. On January 31, 2000, the aircraft operating the route, a McDonnell Douglas MD-83 . Kiteyu. By carefully measuring the divot, we could accurately determine the wear rates for each type of grease and also the rate from using no grease. "[21] ATC then tried to contact the plane. "[21] Although the CVR captured the co-pilot saying "mayday", no radio communications were received from the flight crew during the final event. Still flying inverted, the plane leveled further, to nine degrees nose down. Okay, well, your discretion, said maintenance. A few months after the accident, Alaska Airlines pointed the finger at Boeing for not only its single point failure jackscrew design, but also for the grease that Boeing tacitly approved. For the next few minutes, they calculated landing weights and center of gravity and other values while controllers in Los Angeles prepared to accommodate them. And therein lay the problem: throughout the period leading up to the crash, Alaska Airlines slowly removed all the procedural layers of redundancy which were designed to prevent the jackscrew from deteriorating to the point of failure. After months of constant movement back and forth, the tests showed normal wear rates with both grease types. Eventually, this gap increases as the acme nut threads wear. This and other evidence suggested to the NTSB that "the SFO mechanic who was responsible for lubricating the jackscrew assembly in September 1999 did not adequately perform the task". A chunk of the vertical fin was brought up next. The acme nut was still attached but its threads were missing! As the jackscrew rotates, it moves up or down through the (fixed) acme nut, and this linear motion moves the horizontal stabilizer for the trim system. In some accidents, relatives of those who died can take some small comfort in the possibility that their loved ones never knew what hit them. The mechanic went to federal authorities in late 1998 claiming the airline was cutting back on maintenance and falsifying records to get planes back into operation faster. The plane dropped from about 31,500ft (9,600m) to between 23,000 and 24,000ft (7,000 and 7,300m) in around 80 seconds. The block-on-ring test rigs were lubricated with grease where they made contact. The 88 passengers and crew members aboard Alaska Airlines Flight 261, which crashed off the coast of Ventura County on Jan. 31, 2000, will not soon be forgotten. And hes just hit the water, said one pilot. An Alaska Airlines pilot, involved in the investigation of the horrific crash of Alaska Flight 261, has listened to the cockpit voice recorder from the downed plane and he reported that for the . As they struggled to regain control, Thompson radioed Los Angeles and said, Center, Alaska two six one, we are in a dive here, and Ive lost control, vertical pitch! An overspeed warning blared in the cockpit. [44][45], As of May 2022, Flight 261 no longer exists, and Alaska Airlines no longer operates the Puerto VallartaSan FranciscoSeattle/Tacoma route. Hes ah, down.. A new jackscrew has a gap less than 0.010-inch. For their heroic efforts to save the plane, both pilots were posthumously awarded the Air Line Pilots Association Gold Medal for Heroism. The FDR indicated that the crew flew the airplane manually for over an hour with constant back pressure on the control yoke due to an out-of-trim condition. Increasing the interval between lubrications meant that every lubrication had to be done correctly in order to prevent accelerated wear and tear. [15], Alaska Airlines Flight 261 departed from Puerto Vallarta's Licenciado Gustavo Daz Ordaz International Airport at 13:37 PST (21:37 UTC), and climbed to its intended cruising altitude of flight level310 (31,000 feet or 9,400m). Some applied grease only through the single zirk fitting of the acme nut we learned that numerous pumps of the grease gun did not provide enough grease on the jackscrew after it was run up and down. The NTSB Maintenance Group and my group examined the accident airplanes records and found that two years earlier, a lead mechanic at the airlines Oakland maintenance facility had found that the jackscrew end play was worn to its maximum limit of 0.040 inch. But in the end he was forced to accept a mere $500,000 settlement, far less than the $20 million he had sought, and only then on the condition that he resign from his job. Testimony from an FAA inspector regarding an extension granted in 1996 was that Alaska Airlines submitted documentation from McDonnell Douglas as justification for their extension.