Remembering the deadliest incident in aviation history: When a KLM Boeing 747 Collided with a Pan Am Boeing 747 on the tarmac at the Tenerife Airport
Started by Shark Nelson
Posted 03/28/2023 02:41AM
Shark Nelson
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Join date: Mar 2023
Location: Colorado CO, US
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The 747 was the result of the work of some 50,000 Boeing people. Called “the Incredibles,” these were the construction workers, mechanics, engineers, secretaries and administrators who made aviation history by building the 747 — then the largest civilian airplane in the world — in roughly 16 months during the late 1960s.
The incentive for creating the giant 747 came from reductions in airfares, a surge in air-passenger traffic and increasingly crowded skies.
On Mar. 27, 1977 two Boeing 747s were involved in the deadliest incident in aviation history.
On that day, a KLM Boeing 747 and a Pan Am Boeing 747 collided on the tarmac at the Tenerife Airport, resulting in the deaths of 583 people.
The accident happened when KLM flight 4805, carrying 248 passengers and crew, attempted to take off from the same runway where Pan Am flight 1736, which had 396 people on board, was taxiing.
Due to bad weather, the pilots on the two planes were unable to see each other from a distance and were relying on air traffic control to guide them.
The error was only spotted when the KLM flight was just 2,000ft away from the Pam Am plane – but it was already too late.
Seconds before crashing, Pan Am pilot Victor Grubbs was recorded saying: “Look at him! Goddamn, that son of a bitch is coming!”
The incentive for creating the giant 747 came from reductions in airfares, a surge in air-passenger traffic and increasingly crowded skies.
On Mar. 27, 1977 two Boeing 747s were involved in the deadliest incident in aviation history.
On that day, a KLM Boeing 747 and a Pan Am Boeing 747 collided on the tarmac at the Tenerife Airport, resulting in the deaths of 583 people.
The accident happened when KLM flight 4805, carrying 248 passengers and crew, attempted to take off from the same runway where Pan Am flight 1736, which had 396 people on board, was taxiing.
Due to bad weather, the pilots on the two planes were unable to see each other from a distance and were relying on air traffic control to guide them.
The error was only spotted when the KLM flight was just 2,000ft away from the Pam Am plane – but it was already too late.
Seconds before crashing, Pan Am pilot Victor Grubbs was recorded saying: “Look at him! Goddamn, that son of a bitch is coming!”