I'll never forget that day. I may have been one of the last to see that aircraft. I was a young radio technician working on a station at Mt Egmont early that day. I looked up into the clear sky and saw a jet trail, mentioning to a colleague the time and track seemed right and it was likely the famous Erebus flight, thinking at the time how lucky they were...
The behaviour of the Air New Zealand employees in this investigation was appalling. Lie after lie after lie to try and pin the blame on the dead pilots. This Judge was quite correct, the lies were so obvious, none of them would give any straight answers. They were like kids who had been caught with their hands in the sweetie jar. They had no respect for justice and no respect for the families of the victims, all they cared about was saving their own skins. They should have all been thrown in jail
I don't disagree with any of that. But at the same time it''s true that most of the pilots had been ignoring the official advice to fly no lower than 16,000 feet in the Erebus area. (I accept that the airline must also have known about this).
Dear Scott: Have you ever heard of CYA ??? Cover Your Ass !!! The 1st rule of CYA is: "NEVER admit liability. Make the other side prove it." This simple rule saves corporations Big Money in the long run because there are liabilities that can't be proven at all even though you know they exist. As far as doing the "decent thing" is concerned: Wake Up !!! We're talking about Greedy Capitalists here who would sell their own mother if the price was right. ... jkulik919@gmail.com
A reminder to all of us involved in aviation that we have a part to play in breaking the chain and preventing dangerous situations. The crew were set up by so many mistakes prior to the flight, all lazy, stupid and arrogant. Post flight actions by those involved in Air NZ were disgraceful.
One of the few things that impresses me about the whole tragedy is the judge's facility for seeing lies when they're being told, and to call them out. Even in a situation like this, that's unusual.
'The orchestrated litany of lines' from of Air New Zealand . my late mum Sheila worked for Air New Zealand in the 70's in Mechanics bay before they moved into the building in QEII square . Mum said it was an old boys club . Most of the civilian staff who had managerial rolls were ex Navy who didnt have a clue about aviation and it was culture of jobs for the boys .Mum knew Jim Collins and said he was an absolute perfectionist as a pilot and there is no way in the world he would have been negligent . Mum also said Morrie Davis's was nicknamed 'Toad of toad hall'
That phrase “an orchestrated litany of lies”, for me the fact that even today, even with virtually all the main players are dead, Air New Zealand still refuses to acknowledge their guilt. RIP.
According to an Aviation disaster Blog, the crew of ANZ901 was finally exonareted, not by New Zealand aviation Authorities of course, but the were exonaeted by the World aviation Community thanks to Gordon Vette.
I know this might be a controversial thing to say, but it wasn't a good idea for a pilot to fly to Antarctica who had never flown there before, not even as an observer, co-pilot, or passenger. The co-pilot had also never flown there before, and the flight engineer only once. Surely at least one of them should have been more experienced for a first flight.
@@ajs41 At the end of the day: Air New Zealand was a mickey mouse airline that had such a cavalier culture amongst its pilots and such atrocious communication between its departments.
And now, 40 years after the crash - the NZ government finally admitted their fault & apologized to the families of the deceased, which fully exonerates Captain Collins.
@@tiadaidAnother perfect example of experts bending to the will of the mob, instead of facts, training and reality. An angry mob wanted somebody to pay, and then those who are most at fault are dead, they look for anyone. Clearly this is a documentary designed for the layperson who doesn't realize just how absurd it is to require the person flying them to have 100% factual, accident free and perfect information otherwise they are incapable of flying the plane. Just because your neighbor gives you bad directions or if your GPS isn't functional, be it device or interference, if you crash your car into a daycare and kill a bunch of kids, it's your fault. Nobody is in control of the plane except the pilot. If you trust that the only way a pilot can control a plane is to have 100% mistake free or without malicious intent of another, that person has no business flying a plane. All pilots are trained to fly without zero assistance, bad information and poor and no visibility conditions. It is the duty of the pilot and co pilot, however they decide to delegate it in the cockpit to fly the plane, navigate and trouble shoot. The first warning sign is in the cockpit, with an expert they have no clue where they are? So either they have to go IFR and if unable to get their bearings, go at a safe altitude and maintain a holding pattern and establish coordinates before proceeding. You don't just proceed. Any pilot should be able to safely fly a plane with the wrong coordinates, flight plan and faulty equipment. These excuses for these pilots are jaw dropping. Look, there is more than enough blame to go around. Yes, Air New Zealand was wrong, should be held accountable and should be prosecuted for any type of cover-up. But then to go and do the exact opposite and tell the public that if pilots don't have 100% accurate information and are not flying in ideal conditions, well it's not the pilots fault. Ask any pilot and they will tell you, who is responsible for the plane and it's passengers? The pilot. When it was clear to the pilots they were off course they didn't get their coordinates. The knew they waw supposed to be a 15,000 ft volcano 20 miles from them, but visibility is 40 miles. I'm sorry, but the people of New Zealand deserve better of their pilots. It's an insult to pilots everywhere to assume that if they don't have a perfect flight plan or one at all, they cannot safely fly a plane?
Certainly fault can be shared, yet through balancing causation's scales, Air New Zealand. . .a state owned airline in the day. . .was definitely at fault for deception.
Air New Zealand's behaviour really disgusted me, after the crash and during the inquiry. "Aviation is check, cross-check and check again" - so how come the chief navigator didn't do just that when he entered the coordinates of the new flight plan? And burglarizing Captain Collins' home for potentially incriminating documents is the lowest of the low; I mean, hadn't his wife and daughters been put through enough already?
Strictly speaking, the crew of every plane going on one of these Antarctic sightseeing trips should have checked the coordinates they'd been given as they were about to load them into the computer with a map to make sure they were the correct coordinates, because in aviation you can never be too careful and never do enough checks and crosschecks. But that wasn't a mistake by this particular flight and crew, it was a general mistake that I assume all of them were making, and the airline should have been reminding them to do it. I'm not totally sure about that of course: it may be that some of the crews for some of the flights were indeed checking them before entering them in the computer. That's something that was never mentioned on any of the documentaries, and it would have been interesting to know whether any of them did so before the flight on 28th Nov 1979. I think they probably didn't, because it would have been mentioned by the pilot in question at one of the inquiries.
It is a real shame that Air NZ employees have remained silent, and many have probably gone to their graves remaining silent. And 38.00 aprox onward, Capt Gemell, was an absolute disgrace.
My one quibble with this program -- which I find superlative despite production values that haven't aged particularly well -- is that they didn't plumb the question of from whence the allegation of Capt Gemell's removal of material from the crash site had come. It seems central to the portrayal of ANZ as callously self-preservational in this matter, and I'd sure like to know who made the allegation and under what circumstances.
@@CinemaDemocratica Actually, John Stanton was the mountaineer who accompanied Gemmell most of the time. Later, Stanton admitted to another mountaineer friend in Auckland, John Maine, that he (andGemmell) came across Collins satchel containing a chart and THE atlas. Stanton handed these to Inspector Mitchell at the Scott Base fire station. They were never seen after. So the only persons who knew were Stanton, Gemmell and Mitchell. Guess who received the only gongs in 1981 -MBEs for services rendered in Antarctica c/o PM Muldoon. I would suggest that the only person who knew and took the Atlas and chart back to Auckland was Gemmell. Same happened to the ring binder which did turn up in Auckland after the contents had been extracted/impounded by Air NZ. My forthcoming book Erebus and the Dragonfly with all these details is being published shortly.
He was overruled by the queens political counselors in London over his conspiracy theory. in 2008 he was awarded by the NZ Air Pilots Association an award named after Jim Collins celebrating this groundbreaking opinion that helps air investigations to this day.
@@martintheiss7666 Actually, if you were to read the Privy Council report, available free on line, you will see that other than to support the reduction of $150000 to $600 as that was the maximum award allowed under a 1980 Act, and criticism of the “orchestrated litany of lies” para 377, they praised Mahon. They mentioned the lack of time Mahon was given and then pretended to criticise him for not allowing that “time” to confront the liars. The Privy Council had to pretend that they did not know about the withholding of the minutes of directors meetings which were evidence of organisation of the defence of ANZ. Then the duplication of documents for use at such meetings. Then the directors and executives were able to learn their “songs” to sing at the Royal Commission. That is by any words “Orchestration” of lies but the PRIVY COUNCIL were not supposed to know this. As for the NZ Appeal Court, technically the “judgments” of Woodhouse and McMullin were void. Their children were employees of Air New Zealand. No judge is allowed to sit on a case where they have a personal interest. Any judgment is VOID. But the NZ courts were run by the Governments of the time and it suited them not to strike out those void judgments. I have already posted my criticism of Chippendale earlier.
An excellent documentary on a senseless and highly preventable national tragedy. May we never forget the events of November 28th 1979 -- or the 257 souls -- who were lost that fateful day. 🙏🕊️❤️
I can attest to that. I was on my way to Ramstein AB for the airshow there where the Frecce Tricolore crashed. Only reason I wasn't at the scene during the crash was that we were side tracked by another airshow we just ran across closer to home and decided to visit instead. First thing were noticed something was wrong was the sudden departure of just about every helicopter from that air base several hours before the event was to end.
Really?? How fascinating. You probably felt you had failed something and this was a disaster. Then this happens. I had a similar near-miss. Makes you philosophical doesn't it?
Al Gilmore One of the Sherpa that survived the avalanche that killed 16 of his coworkers this past spring was killed by a lightning strike in his village 10 days later. How the actual fuck does that even happen? Does the Creator all of a sudden realize 10 days after the fact that he's one short? I'll bet those last 10 days that that Sherpa had were ones in which he felt extremely blessed and that he looked upon the world in a more magical and humble way, though. Maybe we're only equipped to handle a certain amount of that special kind of knowledge?
***** "It does not do to dwell and forget to live." ... "Tomorrow is promised to no one." My two favorite quotes. We are fragile, mortal beings. "Awww fuck it! Who wants pie?!" - Dennis Miller XD
Nommadd75 "God played in the dirt, too." always made me giggle when I was kid, and I still smile at it even though I now know what it means. Seriously, though: How the actual fuck does that happen to a man who survived a fucking AVALANCHE? That's like a double fuck you from that cruel bitch mother nature.
I so admire this judge refusing to allow ridiculous answers to questions go unchallenged. If the U.S. had such diligent officials, O.J., Casey Anthony, Ted Kennedy, and many "higher ups" involved in the 2008 financial crisis would have gone to prison. BS would have "politely" been treated as BS.
28th November 2019 : On the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the Erebus disaster, NZ Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern (on behalf of the NZ government which owned the airline at the time), and Air New Zealand Board Chairwoman Dame Therese Walsh both declared a full and unreserved apology to those who lost their lives in the tragedy (along with their loved ones), and in addition to those deceased members of the flight crew whose reputations were damaged by the machinations of the government and airline in the aftermath. Prime Minister Ardern said : "After 40 years, on behalf of today's Government, the time has come to apologise for the actions of an airline then in full state ownership; which ultimately caused the loss of the aircraft and the loss of those you loved." "The pilots were not responsible for this tragedy, I stand here today to state that again ... But those findings were not accepted by our Government then. That was wrong, it caused trauma on top of grief, and persecution on top of pain." Dame Walsh followed : "I apologise on behalf of an airline which 40 years ago failed in its duty of care to its passengers and staff ... And I apologise again on behalf of the airline for the way in which the families of those lost on Mt Erebus were treated in the aftermath of the accident. Better care should have been taken of you."
And about time. Now a National Monument would be appropriate to the memory of the crew, passengers, families and a nation impacted. It impacted me 40 years ago as a 11 year old boy in love with aviation. It was a national tragedy.
This woman, has bigger balls compare those Air NZ employees , and the president (combined) They let a woman to apologize on thier behalf, 40 years later, when the direct recipient, passed away with a broken souls, without justice.
I do not remember this at the time, i do not know why. Thank you for making this video and others like these are records of History that should never be forgotten. The Teacher who used this Disaster as a project for his students has already passed on this disaster and I am sure the students will past it on too. Martin. (Thailand)
Further to that keeping only one copy ensures that there are no leaks to the press with surplus documents. I can see why he did that but he was obstructing justice by not being open and transparent with the inquiry.
Apparently, the cockpit voice recorder tape has disappeared. Some people wanted to have another go at transcribing it with modern techniques, but they couldn't find it anywhere.
@@TheCarin12 I think at the time this would have been regarded as a very quiet typewriter compared to the original ones that were used a few years earlier. Of course it sounds very noisy by today's standards.
I just watched a documentary on this disaster that recreated and told the stories of the policemen that were tasked with going to Erebus and retrieving the bodies of the people that had perished in the crash. It showed photographs taken by the people on flight 901 from just before the crash and as it was actually about to crash. That was very haunting, especially as I'd never seen them before. An unnecessary and avoidable tragedy, RIP to everyone that passed away on flight 901.
This crash was not due to the DC-10's design. It was to do with the wrong information being imputed into this DC-10s navigational computer. This was human error. Some earlier DC-10 crashes and accidents (flight 92 and 981) could be sourced to design problems but not this one. Even flight 191 (from the same year as this disaster) was due, primarily, to bad maintenance practices by American Airlines. As a point of note, the DC-10 went on to have a good overall safety record and it still flies today, mainly in the freighter role. Nearly every first and second generation jet airliner has a long list of crashes and accidents to its name (look into the 747's history)--but the DC-10 was caught up in some very high profile accidents in the media that made it appear far more dangerous than it really was. The cargo door problem was certainly McDonnell Douglas's fault and historically they should wear that; but each accident should be judged on its own merit.
I guess a dc 10 crash would have been good news for Boeing but rhis wasn't the main motivation for the crash maybe partial...the main reason was flat earth cover up no-one flies iver around Antarctica why! …the dome. and we in nz had to pat a very high price.
Correct, it was the original cargo door issue that created a perception in people's minds that the DC-10 was unsafe by design, when in fact, it was not at all.
@jack torrence Overall, the DC-10 was a solid airliner with an innovative design. But it was rushed into service with far too many cut corners. The insufficiently robust cargo door design, the lack of hydraulic fuses, inefficient & overly-complex maintenance procedures, too many safety devices like a right-seat stick shaker being "optional" instead of standard, etc. All of these problems were eventually addressed but only after several high-profile incidents had destroyed its reputation. That's why its successor (the MD-11) was a comparative failure that ended up being relegated to hauling cargo more often than people.
34:40 - The white-out effect at the poles is easy to understand: Because of the low angle of the sun, even when a pole is toward the sun, the light glancing off the ocean in all directions, combined with any amount of cloud, can blank out surface features, such as high mountains
Former Archives New Zealand archivist here. I vividly remember being told PERSONALLY, in 2002, before I worked for our national archives, about Mount Erebus records being "disappeared". I was told by a person in charge of an appraisal and disposal project involving physical, paper Police Records, about the event that happened only TWO weeks before I spoke to them. This was about late July or early August in 2002, when there was an appraisal and listing project involving thousands of boxes of Police Records for a subsequent Retention and Disposition of those records for an accession of the archival value records into Archives New Zealand custody. This listing project of physical records was relatively normal at the time. It was absolutely necessary to list all the file parts in every file box to compare the records marked for retention or destruction against an official Police Records Retention and Disposal schedule. The Police records marked for retention were to be transferred into the custody of Archives New Zealand. The thousands of boxes of poorly listed records dated from a time when government departments in New Zealand were completely inadequately listed, as was too often typical of the time. They were inadequately stored in a rented garage behind a padlocked wooden garage door in Newtown, Wellington. During this appraisal and disposal project, on a Friday afternoon, the listing team came across two records boxes that were both PARTIALLY - not completely - filled with files labelled " Mount Erebus Air Crash" . Considering how important the Mount Erebus crash is in New Zealand history, this was reported to the New Zealand Police records manager, because they were outside the coverage by the Police Records retention and disposal schedule. The Mount Erebus files were found on a Friday afternoon, the listing stopped about four p.m., I believe. On Monday morning, the Mount Erebus files and ONLY those files, were found to be MISSING from the two boxes. The non- Erebus files were still there. The padlocked door was STILL PADLOCKED when the team arrived three days later. I remember the long pause as my informant looked into my eyes as we both considered the implications. Both of us had no doubt that either a senior member of the New Zealand Police or a member of our Security Intelligence Services, removed archives of one of the most significant historical events in our country's history from public view.
Do you know whether it's possible to watch a film of the entire inquiry? I find the clips on here extremely interesting, but it's obviously only a small percentage of the whole thing.
3 vital items needed to be found in the wreckage of the aircraft. The 2 black boxes and Captain Collins's ring binder with his navigational drawings and charts in. It was actually found all intact and handed in to Air NZ. It turned up empty a while afterwards. Where did that paperwork and information go?? Hmmm.........
NZ should’ve exonerate the pilots. Build a monument on their behalf. They’ve died twice in a lifetime, 1st under the incompetence of the company they’ve trusted, died the most morbid way possible. And the 2nd time, thier souls crushes as they’re put to blame on a manslaughter. RIP to all passengers and crew of Air New Zealand Flight 901.
Fascinating -- especially the footage from the enquiry (would something like that make it into a documentary nowadays?). Only letdown was the rubbish music (but at least it wasn't near-ubiquitous, as seems the current fashion). Thanks for uploading!
Yeah, analog synths ruled the day back then, esp. when public or state funded channels produced documentaries. Rarely did the budgets allot for full orchestra. Then again, analog synth scores were popular, thanks to the work of Wendy Carlos, Vangelis, John Carpenter and other composers of the era.
Actually, you are way off base here. He spent a lot of time researching every critical element of the tragedy during his investigation from the INS to the radar data from McMurdo (conveniently missing) to the whiteout phenomenon. He was also years ahead of his time in that he considered ALL factors in the accident - not just blindly accept pilot error. I am not sure if you watched this documentary, as some of it was mentioned here. More information is available from other sources. Research it.
who ever heard of someone else running a standard flightplan for the crew. I worked for a Fortune 500 company that owned private jets. I was the flight Dispatcher. and never was I allowed to run the flight plan. it's true, it's all about check, recheck again and again b4 takeoff. I feel so sorry for everyone involved. a series of errors caused the good name of an excellent pilot to be run thru the mud. RIP.
This is one of the best postings on Erebus. Is there any more video of the actual Royal Commission hearings? I am in two minds as to whether Chippendale was conspiring with Des Dalgety and Muldoon or was he just incompetent and untrained to deal with a large airliner crash. TE901 was his first big airliner crash. His subsequent review in 1984 of the Bay of Plenty (ZK-BWA in 1961) was appalling. I am persuaded that Chippendale provided the accident report for Muldoon as instructed, and thereafter could not be sacked. His reputation and credibility were dented by Mahon’s report but a surprising number of so called professional pilots still think Chippendale was right. But they are then faced with the subsequent knowledge that Chips was ridiculously wrong on the Bendix Radar item. So much so that with hindsight, one could think he lied - not a mistake or error - but a deliberate falsehood thinking no one would recheck that opinion. Then the CVR transcript. Again his manipulation of the transcript with 54-55 changes to the Washington version that had the very best transcript - to support (HIS) accident report - that was bad. But some experienced pilots disregard that or in one case excuse it as “poetic licence” and still opine Chips report as good.
I wish the whole video of the hearings was available. It must be available somewhere in an archive. Instead, the only other thing to watch is the docu-drama, which obviously isn't as interesting, and mostly covers the same parts of the hearings, but with actors.
A re-enactment (I don't know when it was originally broadcast) of what happened after the crash. Part 1 ua-cam.com/video/VImFx0GrjHE/v-deo.html Part 2 ua-cam.com/video/avnBAtLvVqY/v-deo.html
Listening to the liars in this tape,was quite annoying and pathetic, they should have been put in prison, for their pathetic attempt at a cover up .. Its called perverting the court of justice ... However listening to that typewriter smash its way through the inquiry was very 😠 irritating
It would actually be called perverting the 'course' of justice. But in this case it wasn't a criminal investigation. A Royal Commission is not a criminal court. After the Mahon report was published it was never accepted as an official report until it was tabled in 1994. It also ruined Mahon's career who came under public criticism. That's why he is described as Flight 901's 258th victim. In the aviation community he is considered a hero because he got to the bottom of the issue and called out all the lies during the investigation.
this story makes me sick, the airline couldnt just come clean and man up, it had to hire a lawyer army aimed to BS thier way out of any trouble "your definition of error is different to mine". No dumbass a screw up is a screw up and the airline screwed up but doesnt want to take a negative hit to its "safety" and percieved "image" There was only a million opportunities to equip that aircrew to the true situation, to inform them and have them aware of where thier plane was aimed. They didnt, they let that plane go with a flight plan aimed into the side of a mountain then went full weasel mode when it comes back on them Makes you wonder if someone in the higher ups didnt actually want to murder someone on that crew, utterly appalling
Considering the reputation of the DC-10 and all the problems it's had, ie cargo door self opening during flight (Paris), loss of flight controls (Detroit), engine falling off (Chicago), tail engine blowing up (Sioux City), the first thing that should have been looked at was the plane itself.
Engine falling off was maintenance error and the cargo door issue was fixed almost immediately. UAL232 was a freak accident that was 1 in a 100 billion chance.
I had never heard of this accident until now. Most airlines crashes are blamed on pilot error but there are those, like this crash, where it may have seemed to be flight crew error but with deeper investigation turned out to be something completely different. I'm glad the judge to into account EVERYTHING and not just the opinion of crash investigators. Corruption, theft and lies by Air New Zealand goes to show the extent to which some aviation companies or mega companies in general will go to to place blame on somebody else to keep from paying out millions in lawsuit settlements or fines. In the end, all the lies, theft and corporate corruption didn't matter...they STILL got busted!! All those poor innocent victims.....I guess the end was merciful because it came quickly...but it's bad, I guess, if you had no time to reflect or say a "forgive me". But that's my opinion. RIP Flight 901.
Ultimately a committee of UK politicians who advise QE2 of her duties and plans ended up with a private viewing and hearing of the justices findings. The Privy Council threw out his case saying that there was no way an experienced pilot would have read the corrupted information as fact. Therefore no executive conspiracy at ANZ would have existed. However this is still etched in the memory of the People of NZ and the number plate of this particular airplane has never been reissued to anything from NZ. Aviation's version of non-reincarnation.
@@martintheiss7666 The Privy Council also admitted that Mahon was right about ANZ staff lying to him on the stand but that it was somehow "understandable" for them to do so under the circumstances. In addition, their conclusions about the pilots' actions and their response to that "corrupted information" were totally antithetical to normal aviation practice and everything we've learned in regards to air crash investigations over the past few decades. That's because unlike Mahon, the Council failed to take any time to learn about the subject for which they were asked to judge. I would call that a fatal flaw in their reasoning process. No wonder New Zealand ended Privy Council appeals back in 2003. What a waste of time.
With the benefit of hindsight, the absence of training of Collins and Cassin with respect to sector whiteout when ANZ sent them to a VFR recce with and for passengers at lower heights than the MSAs was a fundamental mistake. It was as serious as the coordinate change not being notified to Collins after being briefed with the 164.48 coordinate. The behaviour of the executives at ANZ with the cover ups and then doing everything to keep the whole truth from Mahon was the next big factor. The Chippindale/Chippendale saga - Chips had not been trained sufficiently to recognise the psychological effect such a large loss of life would have on the “contributors to the accident” of which there were many within ANZ - ie the lying or cover-ups by some, not all, of the executive pilots denying breaches of the MSAs. Gemmell’s influence on Chips must have been considerable. Both were under pressure albeit for different reasons which again is easy to see from afar! Can one ignore the possibility that Chips was so pressurised by the PM - Muldoon - of the time that he was forced to “probable cause - pilot error” end comment of the accident report. The “Bay of Plenty” accident of 1961 when Chips came to review in 1984 - with all the up to date technical advice on the metal fatigue fractures of the wing spars in Aero Commanders - illustrated that Chips was severely lacking in technical abilities. He could not bring himself to admit his departments last errors. Perhaps his subsequent accident reports should be reviewed to see whether there were more erroneous reports after Erebus. His obvious errors and mistakes such as the radar business and creating new CVR transcripts “to support his report” was once again verging on the criminal. In fact, had the Chippindale/Chippendale report followed the correct guidelines and avoid “Pilot Error” conclusions, there would not have been a need for the Royal Commission. The bitterness was so much greater due to the accident report conclusions being so wrong. And then to accuse the pilot’s widow and children of perjury - shows a psychological problem for the Inspector. He claims he could not find the maps on which Collins plotted the flight. He could have searched more efficiently - unless he did a Nelson who put the telescope up to his blind eye so that he could not see a flag signal! That’s history.
There were two red flags that I noticed with regard to the flight from a modern-day perspective. Firstly, Captain Collins had never flown to Antarctica before, and really he should have first been a passenger in the cockpit while someone else flew so he could see what it was like without actually being the main pilot. Secondly, in hindsight it wasn't a good idea to have the guide sitting in the cockpit distracting the pilots with his comments. Obviously Peter Mulgrew was only trying to help by pointing out landmarks that he thought he could see as they were flying near Mount Erebus, but in fact he was just confusing the situation for the pilots and navigators. His observations were not correct, (understandably). These days, the guide for the passengers would not be sitting in the cockpit where he might, as I said, distract the people actually flying the plane. I believe it's known today as "sterile cockpit conditions".
@@ajs41 you make good points. Collins was underbriefed. Deliberately so by Gemmell not providing training to cope with sector whiteout. Peter Mulgrew a distraction! Interesting slant but I doubt it. If you read Concorde by Mike Bannister, it was common practice for most airlines to have folk in the cockpit. As a lad, I was always invited and sometimes sat in the left hand seat with TCA and the Rh seat with BOAC. There that dates me! I have just completed a book “Erebus and the Dragonfly” and I go into much of this with the help of witnesses and one accident inspector still alive who was involved in both the 1962 loss of ZK-AFB Brian Chadwick as well as TE901. Then also help from Stuart Macfarlane.
such a wonderful documentary. Feel sorry for the caption Collins and the passengers. while mere resign or suspended from their positions seems a bit of leniency for those who tried to covered the mistakes. It's one thing to make a mistake, it's the other try to cover it with the measure of steal.
Edmond Hillary of Everest fame was scheduled to be a jump seat tour guide on this flight. One of his best friends filled in. He later stole his wife. Really.
A friend was working on the plane until 2 Am the day it left. He said beauitful bird with most update computer systems for navigation. Had been days in hanger for maintanace so straight away everyone knew nothing wrong with plane. He said it was most surreal feeling to see plane he had been on in a miliion pieces virtually the next day.
the 'burglary' of the first officers home reminds me of the watergate burglary which led to the downfall of the presidency of Richard Nixon. I am appalled that the ANZ ceo retired thinking that would satisfy things...my my, such an important man...which reminds me of a upper level executive in a company my son worked at - this exec type wanted to have an elevator reserved for his personal use... one more thing and that is that the navigation ppl did not let the flight crew know of changes they made...
I think the real "cover-up" so to speak, is the perception that the Royal Commission found the "true cause" of the accident. Since then it seems the public has unquestioningly embraced its findings. To blame the crash on a misprogrammed computer when that very computer was not designed for the task on which it was being relied, is paradoxical. The Mahon report failed to ask a deeper question: if you cannot visually identify where a mountain is, are you entitled to descend below MSA without the aid of ground instruments? Most pilots on the forums where I have discussed this think not. cheers
cchris874 Was ANZ a crown corporation when this crash occurred, cchris874? Reminds me of Air Canada trying to foist blame on to Captain Bob Pearson and his First Officer Maurice Quintal when the real problem was piss poor training and desperately understocked maintenance bays provided by a crown corporation company. The upper brass were scared shit less that they'd lose their jobs so they tried to say that some bad maths, that the pilot needn't have performed had the computer been working, caused the greatest emergency landing in aviation history. If Captain Pearson weren't the motherfucker of a pilot that he is that crown corporation would have killed a lot of people and likely still tried to pass the buck.
***** My comments above are not meant to exonerate the airline, but to point out that there seems to many pilots something fundamentally wrong with the underlying assumptions of the Mahon report. My own take is that neither the crew nor the airline were entirely without blame, but putting the exact proportion on that is a tough call. The truth seems to lie somewhere in between the Chippindale and Mahon reports. re Gimli Glider, well look at it this way, even though the Toronto Pearson airport was named after someone else, it is fitting it still bears his last name. That is _de facto_ vindication, is it not? cheers
cchris874 - Hullo again... I'd be willing to put forward the argument that when it comes to "visually identify[ing] where a mountain is", the crew in this case thought they had, and furthermore had Peter Mulgrew (whose experience on the flights and of the region generally was considered unimpeachable) seeming to confirm it via his identification of landmarks during the circling descent phase - the catch was that Mulgrew's identifications were incorrect as a result of the uncanny similarity in appearance between the entrances to McMurdo Sound and Lewis Bay in those conditions and at those altitudes. In fact I'm pretty certain that Capt. Vette's research in part began with an attempt to answer the question as to just how in the hell someone as experienced as Mulgrew could have been misled. We've had online discussions with the same pilots in the past - some of whom are known to be connected with/supporters of Chippindale, and in every case their attempts to support his arguments have hinged on technicalities with little regard to practical aspects of the case - in fact there's often seemed to be an underlying tone that a legal mind such as Mahon's had no business sticking his nose in the affairs of pilots. Macfarlane's "Erebus Papers" hint strongly at there being an even larger can of worms existing within ANZ and NZCA at the time than even Mahon believed was probable.
Shameful stuff from Air New Zealand. It is understandable (to some degree) to try and protect the company. However the orchestrated lawyer-advised 'litany of lies' and obfuscation over the deaths of so many is disgusting. The lawyers for Air New Zealand were thinking only of 'winning points' in a narrow legal sense. The higher management should have balanced this advice with the broader aspects of how this will reverberate in history, and how it will damage reputation. A terrible mistake that is faced and learned from can be regretted but moved on from in certain senses. This 'next quarter results' attitude where bean counters and lawyers run the show from their own perspectives can be technically clever but not very wise. Maybe Air New Zealand is now a good outfit. This episode has stained them forever though.
Air NZ is one of the best airlines in the world now, and I'm actually sure some of it came about due to their efforts to expunge this memory. The shameful behaviour of the management, all the way down from that scumbag Morrie Davies, was certainly a lot to make up for. They all pretty much 'retired' quickly after the enquiry was concluded.
Air NZ is an absolute disgrace to the nation. Their arrogance still prevails to this day. I despise having to fly the airline but they are good at two things. Propaganda and Bullying competition and opponents. Evil to the core
Nice report. Also take a look at 2 important leaders at this time...muldoon and Morrie Davis. they just about from the same mold. Stubbon. Intimidating. "You can't pin anything on me even if I'm wrong" Attitude.I am NZ born and have patritism but after this enquiry I have never flown with this Air Company again.
A little bit off topic: It's kind of stupid to run a wide body aeroplane on a sightseeing tour. After all, the ratio of windows to passengers is very low. It would be better to fly a small regional jet (if possible), where 2/3 of the passengers sit next to a window.
Peter Wexler no, the only thing in ANZ's inventory with the required range was the DC-10. From the in flight footage shown of earlier flights, you can clearly see that the cabin is far from full, so it stands to reason they took the limited window space into account and didn't actually sell all the seats. This would also have meant lower fuel requirements and higher aircraft performance at low altitude, thus increasing loiter time over Antarctica and allowing lower and slower flight for prolonged viewing pleasure of the passengers.
starquant I am sure that the flights were packed because such a jaunt would be great fun! I'm just saying that if you want to make the trip more enjoyable, don't use a DC-10. Given rules about flight capabilities, how about a 3-engine 727? How about a trans-ocean rated 737? Simply run more of them! I'm just saying that the trip would suck, for me, if I got stuck in the middle column of seats in a DC-10, which I think that this was, right?
The cargo door problems should have been fixed before the DC 10 ever entered service and it took far too long to actually fix it properly. The engine falling off should not have resulted in the loss of the plane, there are several other failings of the DC 10, it should have been grounded much sooner than it was and not flown again, the Concorde would not have crashed if it was not for a piece falling off a DC 10.
the Turkish flight near Paris likely occurred because the American civil aviation authorities were more interested in protecting the manufacturer so instead of a notice to fix the cargo doors immediately a bland 'by the way' check those doors when you have time' I believe the US FAA etc does not operate this way today.
LOL, those are *great!!!* Don't you think common sense dictates that attaching jet engines to the hull and / or tail-- in a triangular pattern-- is just *asking* for unnecessary vibrational stress and metal fatigue cracks? Keep the engines on the wings-- more vibration dampening, especially since the wings are filled with kerosene. The jet's hull isn't much thicker than an aluminum cigar tube-- under pressure. I call the Airbus "The Flying White Elephant Dumbo Jet". And *AirBussed = Airbust* has a nice echo to it.
Some of the blatent and damning distancing language used by the guilty Air NZ employees in court in 1980 stands out a mile in 2023. Terrible cowards, prepared to blame innocent pilots who couldn't defend themselves in order to cover their backsides. Sickening to watch.
The engine mount was a bad design as was the cargo door and that was not fixed properly for some time, eventually it was fixed after many people died who should not have. You can fly in it if you like, I never will again.
The engine mounts braking because people were not using the right tools to do the job. In the end all that stuff was fixed right and is a very good plane today! Even tho it is getting old.
The whole idea of low altitude "sight-seeing" trips over Antarctica, which is an entirely different world, was the biggest mistake. 2nd one was too much reliance on computers...especially when error prone humans program them.
Yes, and they did get interrogated the same time they made VHF contact with Ice Tower. But they subsequently lost contact with both again several minutes later, but likely believed it to be due to the famously underpowered facilities
The thing about this accident is there was so much went wrong. None of it however was pilot error. That however didn't come out till recent times when the pilots were cleared. Back then tho, it was just a witch hunt and the 2 dead pilots that couldn't defend themselves were the easiest to blame...
Nobody was ever prosecuted. Morrie Davis retired with his pension to think about things. Several others were forced out of Air Nz over time. Chippendale wrote a flawed report with errors including that the aircraft's radar could tell height above terrain. He also corrupted the transcript of the Cockpit voice recorder in a way to make the pilot and c/pilot seem incompetent. (there are two versions of the transcript floating around. ..the original transcript and the Chippendale version. Chippendale came in for serious criticism from Justice Mahon.
Precisely. It's an interesting thought experiment to detach the idea of causality from blame, and wonder whether CAD and Air NZ would have acted the same way if their insurance wasn't on the line...
I know it was a boat in the sea but it’s a shame that the costa Concordia didn’t learn from this disaster as they were both on sightseeing trips following routes that they shouldn’t have been following. Unfortunately this is what happens when you deviate from the assigned route plan.
Costa Concordia was the fault of the Captain and his cowardice after the accident didn't help. In the case of ANZ 901, the flight crew were NOT at fault. ANZ had changed the route the night before the flight and they didn't inform the flight crew - who had been briefed on a different route. Flight crew thought they were on the right route, but because of the change made the night before, they weren't. Costa Concordia deviated on purpose, ANZ 901 did not.
@@muttley8818 agreed. I have learnt a lot more about this disaster since i wrote my original comment and you are spot on. My mistake and my apologies. Hold my hands up to say I’m wrong. 👍👍
"Unfortunately this is what happens when you deviate from the assigned route plan." Yep. Happened to the cruise ship Mikhail Lermontov too, in the Marlborough Sounds. One fatality on that occasion, but even that's one too many.
kye rosendale Only reason why the DC-10 crashes is at first, manufacturing problems by the company. From then onwards, it was basically airlines' faulty maintenace procedures, but they never take the blame and always keep on firing hot shots at McDonnell-Douglas..especially American Airlines using an unapproved procedure in the most negligent manner and when push comes to shove, they went "IT IS NOT OUR FAULT, IT IS MCDONNELL-DOUGLAS' FAULT!" But thank god that now that company improved the aircraft with better systems due to airlines refusing to take some responsibility...
why do people even mention the DC-10. did anyone know that the DC-10 is the 11th safest airliner. I'll bet if it had been a 707 or 747 these aviation experts would say they're the ones that suck or are accident prone! anyway has anyone noticed the fascinating similarities between the bold face lies that the company witnesses stated. And all of the explanations we have been getting the last five or so years from our government. excellent posting thank you for your time and trouble
![[UA] NAVI vs MOUZ | BO5 | IEM Rio 2024](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/CMBYk0cbGoA/mqdefault.jpg)
I'll never forget that day. I may have been one of the last to see that aircraft. I was a young radio technician working on a station at Mt Egmont early that day. I looked up into the clear sky and saw a jet trail, mentioning to a colleague the time and track seemed right and it was likely the famous Erebus flight, thinking at the time how lucky they were...
Wow! So you were there! I'm sure you'll never forget that day. Thanks for sharing. R.I.P. to the passengers and crew...
Probs we’re the last Kevin
What a pleasure to watch a tv documentary without a constant talking head on the screen boringly hogging the camera. Just the facts ma'am.
How about the clack on that courtroom keyboard though? Wow. It must be directly beside the mic.
They don’t make these anymore. AirNZ are lying cunts
The behaviour of the Air New Zealand employees in this investigation was appalling. Lie after lie after lie to try and pin the blame on the dead pilots. This Judge was quite correct, the lies were so obvious, none of them would give any straight answers. They were like kids who had been caught with their hands in the sweetie jar. They had no respect for justice and no respect for the families of the victims, all they cared about was saving their own skins. They should have all been thrown in jail
What a shame none of the airline people involved did not come clean at some stage and confess to the cover up. Many of them would be dead now.
Scott1433
Comady central
actually - they should have been put on a dc-10 and flown to the south pole with bad co-ordinates.
I don't disagree with any of that. But at the same time it''s true that most of the pilots had been ignoring the official advice to fly no lower than 16,000 feet in the Erebus area. (I accept that the airline must also have known about this).
Dear Scott: Have you ever heard of CYA ??? Cover Your Ass !!! The 1st rule of CYA is: "NEVER admit liability. Make the other side prove it." This simple rule saves corporations Big Money in the long run because there are liabilities that can't be proven at all even though you know they exist. As far as doing the "decent thing" is concerned: Wake Up !!! We're talking about Greedy Capitalists here who would sell their own mother if the price was right. ... jkulik919@gmail.com
A reminder to all of us involved in aviation that we have a part to play in breaking the chain and preventing dangerous situations. The crew were set up by so many mistakes prior to the flight, all lazy, stupid and arrogant. Post flight actions by those involved in Air NZ were disgraceful.
One of the few things that impresses me about the whole tragedy is the judge's facility for seeing lies when they're being told, and to call them out. Even in a situation like this, that's unusual.
'The orchestrated litany of lines' from of Air New Zealand . my late mum Sheila worked for Air New Zealand in the 70's in Mechanics bay before they moved into the building in QEII square . Mum said it was an old boys club . Most of the civilian staff who had managerial rolls were ex Navy who didnt have a clue about aviation and it was culture of jobs for the boys .Mum knew Jim Collins and said he was an absolute perfectionist as a pilot and there is no way in the world he would have been negligent . Mum also said Morrie Davis's was nicknamed 'Toad of toad hall'
That phrase “an orchestrated litany of lies”, for me the fact that even today, even with virtually all the main players are dead, Air New Zealand still refuses to acknowledge their guilt. RIP.
You really have to be suspicious, when the airline is the first one pushing "Pilot Error" as the cause of the crash.
Moneymoneymoneymo-ney.. MONEY!
Shit falls down hill
According to an Aviation disaster Blog, the crew of ANZ901 was finally exonareted, not by New Zealand aviation Authorities of course, but the were exonaeted by the World aviation Community thanks to Gordon Vette.
I know this might be a controversial thing to say, but it wasn't a good idea for a pilot to fly to Antarctica who had never flown there before, not even as an observer, co-pilot, or passenger. The co-pilot had also never flown there before, and the flight engineer only once. Surely at least one of them should have been more experienced for a first flight.
@@ajs41 At the end of the day: Air New Zealand was a mickey mouse airline that had such a cavalier culture amongst its pilots and such atrocious communication between its departments.
And now, 40 years after the crash - the NZ government finally admitted their fault & apologized to the families of the deceased, which fully exonerates Captain Collins.
@@tiadaidAnother perfect example of experts bending to the will of the mob, instead of facts, training and reality. An angry mob wanted somebody to pay, and then those who are most at fault are dead, they look for anyone. Clearly this is a documentary designed for the layperson who doesn't realize just how absurd it is to require the person flying them to have 100% factual, accident free and perfect information otherwise they are incapable of flying the plane.
Just because your neighbor gives you bad directions or if your GPS isn't functional, be it device or interference, if you crash your car into a daycare and kill a bunch of kids, it's your fault.
Nobody is in control of the plane except the pilot. If you trust that the only way a pilot can control a plane is to have 100% mistake free or without malicious intent of another, that person has no business flying a plane.
All pilots are trained to fly without zero assistance, bad information and poor and no visibility conditions.
It is the duty of the pilot and co pilot, however they decide to delegate it in the cockpit to fly the plane, navigate and trouble shoot.
The first warning sign is in the cockpit, with an expert they have no clue where they are? So either they have to go IFR and if unable to get their bearings, go at a safe altitude and maintain a holding pattern and establish coordinates before proceeding.
You don't just proceed.
Any pilot should be able to safely fly a plane with the wrong coordinates, flight plan and faulty equipment. These excuses for these pilots are jaw dropping.
Look, there is more than enough blame to go around. Yes, Air New Zealand was wrong, should be held accountable and should be prosecuted for any type of cover-up. But then to go and do the exact opposite and tell the public that if pilots don't have 100% accurate information and are not flying in ideal conditions, well it's not the pilots fault.
Ask any pilot and they will tell you, who is responsible for the plane and it's passengers? The pilot. When it was clear to the pilots they were off course they didn't get their coordinates. The knew they waw supposed to be a 15,000 ft volcano 20 miles from them, but visibility is 40 miles.
I'm sorry, but the people of New Zealand deserve better of their pilots. It's an insult to pilots everywhere to assume that if they don't have a perfect flight plan or one at all, they cannot safely fly a plane?
Certainly fault can be shared, yet through balancing causation's scales, Air New Zealand. . .a state owned airline in the day. . .was definitely at fault for deception.
Air New Zealand's behaviour really disgusted me, after the crash and during the inquiry. "Aviation is check, cross-check and check again" - so how come the chief navigator didn't do just that when he entered the coordinates of the new flight plan? And burglarizing Captain Collins' home for potentially incriminating documents is the lowest of the low; I mean, hadn't his wife and daughters been put through enough already?
Strictly speaking, the crew of every plane going on one of these Antarctic sightseeing trips should have checked the coordinates they'd been given as they were about to load them into the computer with a map to make sure they were the correct coordinates, because in aviation you can never be too careful and never do enough checks and crosschecks. But that wasn't a mistake by this particular flight and crew, it was a general mistake that I assume all of them were making, and the airline should have been reminding them to do it. I'm not totally sure about that of course: it may be that some of the crews for some of the flights were indeed checking them before entering them in the computer. That's something that was never mentioned on any of the documentaries, and it would have been interesting to know whether any of them did so before the flight on 28th Nov 1979. I think they probably didn't, because it would have been mentioned by the pilot in question at one of the inquiries.
@@ajs41 Let’s be Frank: Air New Zealand must’ve been a Mickey-mouse organisation.
They were being too clever and thought they can lie their way out
this needs a Air Crash episode, probably the biggest and most interesting crash without...
Another way to look at it might as one of the most thorough and determined inquiries you have ever seen.
It is a real shame that Air NZ employees have remained silent, and many have probably gone to their graves remaining silent. And 38.00 aprox onward, Capt Gemell, was an absolute disgrace.
My one quibble with this program -- which I find superlative despite production values that haven't aged particularly well -- is that they didn't plumb the question of from whence the allegation of Capt Gemell's removal of material from the crash site had come. It seems central to the portrayal of ANZ as callously self-preservational in this matter, and I'd sure like to know who made the allegation and under what circumstances.
@@CinemaDemocratica Actually, John Stanton was the mountaineer who accompanied Gemmell most of the time. Later, Stanton admitted to another mountaineer friend in Auckland, John Maine, that he (andGemmell) came across Collins satchel containing a chart and THE atlas. Stanton handed these to Inspector Mitchell at the Scott Base fire station. They were never seen after. So the only persons who knew were Stanton, Gemmell and Mitchell.
Guess who received the only gongs in 1981 -MBEs for services rendered in Antarctica c/o PM Muldoon. I would suggest that the only person who knew and took the Atlas and chart back to Auckland was Gemmell. Same happened to the ring binder which did turn up in Auckland after the contents had been extracted/impounded by Air NZ. My forthcoming book Erebus and the Dragonfly with all these details is being published shortly.
This judge was a badass! We could use a few like him over in the U.S. I really like this guy. He doesn't F around.
He was overruled by the queens political counselors in London over his conspiracy theory. in 2008 he was awarded by the NZ Air Pilots Association an award named after Jim Collins celebrating this groundbreaking opinion that helps air investigations to this day.
@@martintheiss7666 Actually, if you were to read the Privy Council report, available free on line, you will see that other than to support the reduction of $150000 to $600 as that was the maximum award allowed under a 1980 Act, and criticism of the “orchestrated litany of lies” para 377, they praised Mahon. They mentioned the lack of time Mahon was given and then pretended to criticise him for not allowing that “time” to confront the liars. The Privy Council had to pretend that they did not know about the withholding of the minutes of directors meetings which were evidence of organisation of the defence of ANZ. Then the duplication of documents for use at such meetings. Then the directors and executives were able to learn their “songs” to sing at the Royal Commission. That is by any words “Orchestration” of lies but the PRIVY COUNCIL were not supposed to know this. As for the NZ Appeal Court, technically the “judgments” of Woodhouse and McMullin were void. Their children were employees of Air New Zealand. No judge is allowed to sit on a case where they have a personal interest. Any judgment is VOID. But the NZ courts were run by the Governments of the time and it suited them not to strike out those void judgments. I have already posted my criticism of Chippendale earlier.
An excellent documentary on a senseless and highly preventable national tragedy. May we never forget the events of November 28th 1979 -- or the 257 souls -- who were lost that fateful day. 🙏🕊️❤️
That’s a narrative. I just feel sorry for the passengers.
If I hadn't had to re sit an exam i would have been on that flight.......still can't forget it.
I can attest to that. I was on my way to Ramstein AB for the airshow there where the Frecce Tricolore crashed. Only reason I wasn't at the scene during the crash was that we were side tracked by another airshow we just ran across closer to home and decided to visit instead.
First thing were noticed something was wrong was the sudden departure of just about every helicopter from that air base several hours before the event was to end.
Really?? How fascinating. You probably felt you had failed something and this was a disaster. Then this happens. I had a similar near-miss.
Makes you philosophical doesn't it?
Al Gilmore
One of the Sherpa that survived the avalanche that killed 16 of his coworkers this past spring was killed by a lightning strike in his village 10 days later.
How the actual fuck does that even happen?
Does the Creator all of a sudden realize 10 days after the fact that he's one short?
I'll bet those last 10 days that that Sherpa had were ones in which he felt extremely blessed and that he looked upon the world in a more magical and humble way, though. Maybe we're only equipped to handle a certain amount of that special kind of knowledge?
*****
"It does not do to dwell and forget to live." ... "Tomorrow is promised to no one." My two favorite quotes.
We are fragile, mortal beings. "Awww fuck it! Who wants pie?!" - Dennis Miller XD
Nommadd75
"God played in the dirt, too." always made me giggle when I was kid, and I still smile at it even though I now know what it means.
Seriously, though: How the actual fuck does that happen to a man who survived a fucking AVALANCHE? That's like a double fuck you from that cruel bitch mother nature.
Thank you for posting this.
I so admire this judge refusing to allow ridiculous answers to questions go unchallenged. If the U.S. had such diligent officials, O.J., Casey Anthony, Ted Kennedy, and many "higher ups" involved in the 2008 financial crisis would have gone to prison. BS would have "politely" been treated as BS.
28th November 2019 : On the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the Erebus disaster, NZ Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern (on behalf of the NZ government which owned the airline at the time), and Air New Zealand Board Chairwoman Dame Therese Walsh both declared a full and unreserved apology to those who lost their lives in the tragedy (along with their loved ones), and in addition to those deceased members of the flight crew whose reputations were damaged by the machinations of the government and airline in the aftermath.
Prime Minister Ardern said : "After 40 years, on behalf of today's Government, the time has come to apologise for the actions of an airline then in full state ownership; which ultimately caused the loss of the aircraft and the loss of those you loved."
"The pilots were not responsible for this tragedy, I stand here today to state that again ... But those findings were not accepted by our Government then. That was wrong, it caused trauma on top of grief, and persecution on top of pain."
Dame Walsh followed : "I apologise on behalf of an airline which 40 years ago failed in its duty of care to its passengers and staff ... And I apologise again on behalf of the airline for the way in which the families of those lost on Mt Erebus were treated in the aftermath of the accident. Better care should have been taken of you."
And about time. Now a National Monument would be appropriate to the memory of the crew, passengers, families and a nation impacted. It impacted me 40 years ago as a 11 year old boy in love with aviation. It was a national tragedy.
This woman, has bigger balls compare those Air NZ employees , and the president (combined)
They let a woman to apologize on thier behalf, 40 years later, when the direct recipient, passed away with a broken souls, without justice.
I do not remember this at the time, i do not know why. Thank you for making this video and others like these are records of History that should never be forgotten. The Teacher who used this Disaster as a project for his students has already passed on this disaster and I am sure the students will past it on too. Martin. (Thailand)
So, why the guy who ordered destruction of papers was not arrested for obstruction of justice?
There wasn't a criminal investigation pending at the time..."Obstruction of justice" would not have been a consideration....
Further to that keeping only one copy ensures that there are no leaks to the press with surplus documents. I can see why he did that but he was obstructing justice by not being open and transparent with the inquiry.
Apparently, the cockpit voice recorder tape has disappeared. Some people wanted to have another go at transcribing it with modern techniques, but they couldn't find it anywhere.
awesome judge. damn type writer sound must have made them crazy.
Its a machine used to record shorthand dictation used in courtroom settings. The mike is quite close to it.
@@TheCarin12 I think at the time this would have been regarded as a very quiet typewriter compared to the original ones that were used a few years earlier. Of course it sounds very noisy by today's standards.
RIP
To the passengers and crew of Air New Zealand Flight 901
I just watched a documentary on this disaster that recreated and told the stories of the policemen that were tasked with going to Erebus and retrieving the bodies of the people that had perished in the crash. It showed photographs taken by the people on flight 901 from just before the crash and as it was actually about to crash. That was very haunting, especially as I'd never seen them before. An unnecessary and avoidable tragedy, RIP to everyone that passed away on flight 901.
RIP🙏🏼🌷💐cap. Collins and everybody else
This crash was not due to the DC-10's design. It was to do with the wrong information being imputed into this DC-10s navigational computer. This was human error. Some earlier DC-10 crashes and accidents (flight 92 and 981) could be sourced to design problems but not this one. Even flight 191 (from the same year as this disaster) was due, primarily, to bad maintenance practices by American Airlines. As a point of note, the DC-10 went on to have a good overall safety record and it still flies today, mainly in the freighter role. Nearly every first and second generation jet airliner has a long list of crashes and accidents to its name (look into the 747's history)--but the DC-10 was caught up in some very high profile accidents in the media that made it appear far more dangerous than it really was. The cargo door problem was certainly McDonnell Douglas's fault and historically they should wear that; but each accident should be judged on its own merit.
Canaan Perry Exactly, but some people keep pinning Flight 191 and Flight 232 at McDonnell-Douglas, especially the airlines involved in the accident.
I guess a dc 10 crash would have been good news for Boeing but rhis wasn't the main motivation for the crash maybe partial...the main reason was flat earth cover up no-one flies iver around Antarctica why! …the dome. and we in nz had to pat a very high price.
Correct, it was the original cargo door issue that created a perception in people's minds that the DC-10 was unsafe by design, when in fact, it was not at all.
Those cargo doors were true unnecessary disaster there was one of them where the badass pilot got everyone home with no hydraulics right?
@jack torrence Overall, the DC-10 was a solid airliner with an innovative design. But it was rushed into service with far too many cut corners. The insufficiently robust cargo door design, the lack of hydraulic fuses, inefficient & overly-complex maintenance procedures, too many safety devices like a right-seat stick shaker being "optional" instead of standard, etc. All of these problems were eventually addressed but only after several high-profile incidents had destroyed its reputation. That's why its successor (the MD-11) was a comparative failure that ended up being relegated to hauling cargo more often than people.
Thank you very much for this, needed it for a school history project! You're a big help!
Thanks for posting this documentary. Air New Zealand shady for sure.
34:40 - The white-out effect at the poles is easy to understand: Because of the low angle of the sun, even when a pole is toward the sun, the light glancing off the ocean in all directions, combined with any amount of cloud, can blank out surface features, such as high mountains
My grandfather Otmar Zoll was one of the passengers. Never got to meet him.
Christian Zoll same here! My grandfather was on that flight. Sadly, I never got to meet him
@@sandradeearna3342 i am so sorry to you both.
Former Archives New Zealand archivist here. I vividly remember being told PERSONALLY, in 2002, before I worked for our national archives, about Mount Erebus records being "disappeared".
I was told by a person in charge of an appraisal and disposal project involving physical, paper Police Records, about the event that happened only TWO weeks before I spoke to them. This was about late July or early August in 2002, when there was an appraisal and listing project involving thousands of boxes of Police Records for a subsequent Retention and Disposition of those records for an accession of the archival value records into Archives New Zealand custody.
This listing project of physical records was relatively normal at the time. It was absolutely necessary to list all the file parts in every file box to compare the records marked for retention or destruction against an official Police Records Retention and Disposal schedule. The Police records marked for retention were to be transferred into the custody of Archives New Zealand.
The thousands of boxes of poorly listed records dated from a time when government departments in New Zealand were completely inadequately listed, as was too often typical of the time. They were inadequately stored in a rented garage behind a padlocked wooden garage door in Newtown, Wellington.
During this appraisal and disposal project, on a Friday afternoon, the listing team came across two records boxes that were both PARTIALLY - not completely - filled with files labelled " Mount Erebus Air Crash" . Considering how important the Mount Erebus crash is in New Zealand history, this was reported to the New Zealand Police records manager, because they were outside the coverage by the Police Records retention and disposal schedule. The Mount Erebus files were found on a Friday afternoon, the listing stopped about four p.m., I believe.
On Monday morning, the Mount Erebus files and ONLY those files, were found to be MISSING from the two boxes. The non- Erebus files were still there. The padlocked door was STILL PADLOCKED when the team arrived three days later.
I remember the long pause as my informant looked into my eyes as we both considered the implications. Both of us had no doubt that either a senior member of the New Zealand Police or a member of our Security Intelligence Services, removed archives of one of the most significant historical events in our country's history from public view.
Do you know whether it's possible to watch a film of the entire inquiry? I find the clips on here extremely interesting, but it's obviously only a small percentage of the whole thing.
Thanks for sharing this, I read it a few times over.
It certainly doesn’t surprise one bit. smh
Far better than the modern Microsoft Flight Simulator “recreations” that manage to bungle basic facts of the case. A+!
3 vital items needed to be found in the wreckage of the aircraft. The 2 black boxes and Captain Collins's ring binder with his navigational drawings and charts in. It was actually found all intact and handed in to Air NZ. It turned up empty a while afterwards. Where did that paperwork and information go?? Hmmm.........
Shredded by that f’r from Air New Zealand
NZ should’ve exonerate the pilots. Build a monument on their behalf. They’ve died twice in a lifetime, 1st under the incompetence of the company they’ve trusted, died the most morbid way possible. And the 2nd time, thier souls crushes as they’re put to blame on a manslaughter.
RIP to all passengers and crew of Air New Zealand Flight 901.
Huh? Justice Mann was the one who cleared the pilots and took special note of the airlines cover up attempts. He seemed pretty spot on.
Who made that fricking stenography machine?? Black & Decker??
Singer of the Sewing Machines.
Fascinating -- especially the footage from the enquiry (would something like that make it into a documentary nowadays?). Only letdown was the rubbish music (but at least it wasn't near-ubiquitous, as seems the current fashion).
Thanks for uploading!
Yeah, analog synths ruled the day back then, esp. when public or state funded channels produced documentaries. Rarely did the budgets allot for full orchestra. Then again, analog synth scores were popular, thanks to the work of Wendy Carlos, Vangelis, John Carpenter and other composers of the era.
Actually, you are way off base here. He spent a lot of time researching every critical element of the tragedy during his investigation from the INS to the radar data from McMurdo (conveniently missing) to the whiteout phenomenon. He was also years ahead of his time in that he considered ALL factors in the accident - not just blindly accept pilot error. I am not sure if you watched this documentary, as some of it was mentioned here. More information is available from other sources. Research it.
who ever heard of someone else running a standard flightplan for the crew. I worked for a Fortune 500 company that owned private jets. I was the flight Dispatcher. and never was I allowed to run the flight plan.
it's true, it's all about check, recheck again and again b4 takeoff.
I feel so sorry for everyone involved. a series of errors caused the good name of an excellent pilot to be run thru the mud. RIP.
+MrTtrn001 - I feud be terrified to fly in those conditions!. Now I'll never fly again commercially!
This is one of the best postings on Erebus. Is there any more video of the actual Royal Commission hearings?
I am in two minds as to whether Chippendale was conspiring with Des Dalgety and Muldoon or was he just incompetent and untrained to deal with a large airliner crash. TE901 was his first big airliner crash. His subsequent review in 1984 of the Bay of Plenty (ZK-BWA in 1961) was appalling. I am persuaded that Chippendale provided the accident report for Muldoon as instructed, and thereafter could not be sacked. His reputation and credibility were dented by Mahon’s report but a surprising number of so called professional pilots still think Chippendale was right. But they are then faced with the subsequent knowledge that Chips was ridiculously wrong on the Bendix Radar item. So much so that with hindsight, one could think he lied - not a mistake or error - but a deliberate falsehood thinking no one would recheck that opinion. Then the CVR transcript. Again his manipulation of the transcript with 54-55 changes to the Washington version that had the very best transcript - to support (HIS) accident report - that was bad. But some experienced pilots disregard that or in one case excuse it as “poetic licence” and still opine Chips report as good.
I wish the whole video of the hearings was available. It must be available somewhere in an archive. Instead, the only other thing to watch is the docu-drama, which obviously isn't as interesting, and mostly covers the same parts of the hearings, but with actors.
A re-enactment (I don't know when it was originally broadcast) of what happened after the crash.
Part 1 ua-cam.com/video/VImFx0GrjHE/v-deo.html
Part 2 ua-cam.com/video/avnBAtLvVqY/v-deo.html
This, is, a, *fantastic* documentary.
Listening to the liars in this tape,was quite annoying and pathetic, they should have been put in prison, for their pathetic attempt at a cover up .. Its called perverting the court of justice ... However listening to that typewriter smash its way through the inquiry was very 😠 irritating
the Justice was there to serve as a queens representative inquiring into aircraft safety. It was not a court case as such.
It would actually be called perverting the 'course' of justice. But in this case it wasn't a criminal investigation. A Royal Commission is not a criminal court. After the Mahon report was published it was never accepted as an official report until it was tabled in 1994. It also ruined Mahon's career who came under public criticism. That's why he is described as Flight 901's 258th victim. In the aviation community he is considered a hero because he got to the bottom of the issue and called out all the lies during the investigation.
@@DarkLight753 well it bloody well should have been
Any links to the music?
show sum respect to the people who had lost their lives
Thanks for the upload
this story makes me sick, the airline couldnt just come clean and man up, it had to hire a lawyer army aimed to BS thier way out of any trouble "your definition of error is different to mine". No dumbass a screw up is a screw up and the airline screwed up but doesnt want to take a negative hit to its "safety" and percieved "image"
There was only a million opportunities to equip that aircrew to the true situation, to inform them and have them aware of where thier plane was aimed. They didnt, they let that plane go with a flight plan aimed into the side of a mountain then went full weasel mode when it comes back on them
Makes you wonder if someone in the higher ups didnt actually want to murder someone on that crew, utterly appalling
Considering the reputation of the DC-10 and all the problems it's had, ie cargo door self opening during flight (Paris), loss of flight controls (Detroit), engine falling off (Chicago), tail engine blowing up (Sioux City), the first thing that should have been looked at was the plane itself.
Engine falling off was maintenance error and the cargo door issue was fixed almost immediately. UAL232 was a freak accident that was 1 in a 100 billion chance.
I had never heard of this accident until now. Most airlines crashes are blamed on pilot error but there are those, like this crash, where it may have seemed to be flight crew error but with deeper investigation turned out to be something completely different. I'm glad the judge to into account EVERYTHING and not just the opinion of crash investigators. Corruption, theft and lies by Air New Zealand goes to show the extent to which some aviation companies or mega companies in general will go to to place blame on somebody else to keep from paying out millions in lawsuit settlements or fines. In the end, all the lies, theft and corporate corruption didn't matter...they STILL got busted!! All those poor innocent victims.....I guess the end was merciful because it came quickly...but it's bad, I guess, if you had no time to reflect or say a "forgive me". But that's my opinion. RIP Flight 901.
Ultimately a committee of UK politicians who advise QE2 of her duties and plans ended up with a private viewing and hearing of the justices findings. The Privy Council threw out his case saying that there was no way an experienced pilot would have read the corrupted information as fact. Therefore no executive conspiracy at ANZ would have existed. However this is still etched in the memory of the People of NZ and the number plate of this particular airplane has never been reissued to anything from NZ. Aviation's version of non-reincarnation.
@@martintheiss7666 The Privy Council also admitted that Mahon was right about ANZ staff lying to him on the stand but that it was somehow "understandable" for them to do so under the circumstances. In addition, their conclusions about the pilots' actions and their response to that "corrupted information" were totally antithetical to normal aviation practice and everything we've learned in regards to air crash investigations over the past few decades. That's because unlike Mahon, the Council failed to take any time to learn about the subject for which they were asked to judge. I would call that a fatal flaw in their reasoning process. No wonder New Zealand ended Privy Council appeals back in 2003. What a waste of time.
With the benefit of hindsight, the absence of training of Collins and Cassin with respect to sector whiteout when ANZ sent them to a VFR recce with and for passengers at lower heights than the MSAs was a fundamental mistake. It was as serious as the coordinate change not being notified to Collins after being briefed with the 164.48 coordinate. The behaviour of the executives at ANZ with the cover ups and then doing everything to keep the whole truth from Mahon was the next big factor.
The Chippindale/Chippendale saga - Chips had not been trained sufficiently to recognise the psychological effect such a large loss of life would have on the “contributors to the accident” of which there were many within ANZ - ie the lying or cover-ups by some, not all, of the executive pilots denying breaches of the MSAs. Gemmell’s influence on Chips must have been considerable. Both were under pressure albeit for different reasons which again is easy to see from afar! Can one ignore the possibility that Chips was so pressurised by the PM - Muldoon - of the time that he was forced to “probable cause - pilot error” end comment of the accident report. The “Bay of Plenty” accident of 1961 when Chips came to review in 1984 - with all the up to date technical advice on the metal fatigue fractures of the wing spars in Aero Commanders - illustrated that Chips was severely lacking in technical abilities. He could not bring himself to admit his departments last errors. Perhaps his subsequent accident reports should be reviewed to see whether there were more erroneous reports after Erebus. His obvious errors and mistakes such as the radar business and creating new CVR transcripts “to support his report” was once again verging on the criminal. In fact, had the Chippindale/Chippendale report followed the correct guidelines and avoid “Pilot Error” conclusions, there would not have been a need for the Royal Commission.
The bitterness was so much greater due to the accident report conclusions being so wrong. And then to accuse the pilot’s widow and children of perjury - shows a psychological problem for the Inspector. He claims he could not find the maps on which Collins plotted the flight. He could have searched more efficiently - unless he did a Nelson who put the telescope up to his blind eye so that he could not see a flag signal! That’s history.
There were two red flags that I noticed with regard to the flight from a modern-day perspective. Firstly, Captain Collins had never flown to Antarctica before, and really he should have first been a passenger in the cockpit while someone else flew so he could see what it was like without actually being the main pilot. Secondly, in hindsight it wasn't a good idea to have the guide sitting in the cockpit distracting the pilots with his comments. Obviously Peter Mulgrew was only trying to help by pointing out landmarks that he thought he could see as they were flying near Mount Erebus, but in fact he was just confusing the situation for the pilots and navigators. His observations were not correct, (understandably). These days, the guide for the passengers would not be sitting in the cockpit where he might, as I said, distract the people actually flying the plane. I believe it's known today as "sterile cockpit conditions".
@@ajs41 you make good points. Collins was underbriefed. Deliberately so by Gemmell not providing training to cope with sector whiteout. Peter Mulgrew a distraction! Interesting slant but I doubt it. If you read Concorde by Mike Bannister, it was common practice for most airlines to have folk in the cockpit. As a lad, I was always invited and sometimes sat in the left hand seat with TCA and the Rh seat with BOAC. There that dates me!
I have just completed a book “Erebus and the Dragonfly” and I go into much of this with the help of witnesses and one accident inspector still alive who was involved in both the 1962 loss of ZK-AFB Brian Chadwick as well as TE901. Then also help from Stuart Macfarlane.
such a wonderful documentary. Feel sorry for the caption Collins and the passengers. while mere resign or suspended from their positions seems a bit of leniency for those who tried to covered the mistakes. It's one thing to make a mistake, it's the other try to cover it with the measure of steal.
Edmond Hillary of Everest fame was scheduled to be a jump seat tour guide on this flight. One of his best friends filled in. He later stole his wife. Really.
@@martintheiss7666 True. The man who filled in was Peter Mulgrew.
Awesome documentary!
A friend was working on the plane until 2 Am the day it left. He said beauitful bird with most update computer systems for navigation. Had been days in hanger for maintanace so straight away everyone knew nothing wrong with plane. He said it was most surreal feeling to see plane he had been on in a miliion pieces virtually the next day.
the 'burglary' of the first officers home reminds me of the watergate burglary which led to the downfall of the presidency of Richard Nixon. I am appalled that the ANZ ceo retired thinking that would satisfy things...my my, such an important man...which reminds me of a upper level executive in a company my son worked at - this exec type wanted to have an elevator reserved for his personal use... one more thing and that is that the navigation ppl did not let the flight crew know of changes they made...
I think the real "cover-up" so to speak, is the perception that the Royal Commission found the "true cause" of the accident. Since then it seems the public has unquestioningly embraced its findings. To blame the crash on a misprogrammed computer when that very computer was not designed for the task on which it was being relied, is paradoxical. The Mahon report failed to ask a deeper question: if you cannot visually identify where a mountain is, are you entitled to descend below MSA without the aid of ground instruments? Most pilots on the forums where I have discussed this think not.
cheers
yeah, I agree with you....best wishes
cchris874
Was ANZ a crown corporation when this crash occurred, cchris874?
Reminds me of Air Canada trying to foist blame on to Captain Bob Pearson and his First Officer Maurice Quintal when the real problem was piss poor training and desperately understocked maintenance bays provided by a crown corporation company. The upper brass were scared shit less that they'd lose their jobs so they tried to say that some bad maths, that the pilot needn't have performed had the computer been working, caused the greatest emergency landing in aviation history.
If Captain Pearson weren't the motherfucker of a pilot that he is that crown corporation would have killed a lot of people and likely still tried to pass the buck.
*****
My comments above are not meant to exonerate the airline, but to point out that there seems to many pilots something fundamentally wrong with the underlying assumptions of the Mahon report. My own take is that neither the crew nor the airline were entirely without blame, but putting the exact proportion on that is a tough call. The truth seems to lie somewhere in between the Chippindale and Mahon reports.
re Gimli Glider, well look at it this way, even though the Toronto Pearson airport was named after someone else, it is fitting it still bears his last name. That is _de facto_ vindication, is it not?
cheers
cchris874 - Hullo again... I'd be willing to put forward the argument that when it comes to "visually identify[ing] where a mountain is", the crew in this case thought they had, and furthermore had Peter Mulgrew (whose experience on the flights and of the region generally was considered unimpeachable) seeming to confirm it via his identification of landmarks during the circling descent phase - the catch was that Mulgrew's identifications were incorrect as a result of the uncanny similarity in appearance between the entrances to McMurdo Sound and Lewis Bay in those conditions and at those altitudes. In fact I'm pretty certain that Capt. Vette's research in part began with an attempt to answer the question as to just how in the hell someone as experienced as Mulgrew could have been misled. We've had online discussions with the same pilots in the past - some of whom are known to be connected with/supporters of Chippindale, and in every case their attempts to support his arguments have hinged on technicalities with little regard to practical aspects of the case - in fact there's often seemed to be an underlying tone that a legal mind such as Mahon's had no business sticking his nose in the affairs of pilots. Macfarlane's "Erebus Papers" hint strongly at there being an even larger can of worms existing within ANZ and NZCA at the time than even Mahon believed was probable.
Shameful stuff from Air New Zealand. It is understandable (to some degree) to try and protect the company. However the orchestrated lawyer-advised 'litany of lies' and obfuscation over the deaths of so many is disgusting. The lawyers for Air New Zealand were thinking only of 'winning points' in a narrow legal sense. The higher management should have balanced this advice with the broader aspects of how this will reverberate in history, and how it will damage reputation.
A terrible mistake that is faced and learned from can be regretted but moved on from in certain senses. This 'next quarter results' attitude where bean counters and lawyers run the show from their own perspectives can be technically clever but not very wise.
Maybe Air New Zealand is now a good outfit. This episode has stained them forever though.
Air NZ is one of the best airlines in the world now, and I'm actually sure some of it came about due to their efforts to expunge this memory. The shameful behaviour of the management, all the way down from that scumbag Morrie Davies, was certainly a lot to make up for. They all pretty much 'retired' quickly after the enquiry was concluded.
Air NZ is an absolute disgrace to the nation. Their arrogance still prevails to this day. I despise having to fly the airline but they are good at two things. Propaganda and Bullying competition and opponents. Evil to the core
Nice report. Also take a look at 2 important leaders at this time...muldoon and Morrie Davis. they just about from the same mold. Stubbon. Intimidating. "You can't pin anything on me even if I'm wrong" Attitude.I am NZ born and have patritism but after this enquiry I have never flown with this Air Company again.
This is a great doc but it's 30 years old. When's ACI gonna take this up?
i seem to remember that they had changed the computors and didn't tell crew
Anyone ever find out why there was a big training exercise a day or two before the crash? Also wish they would release the voice recorders.
Roughest flight I have had and the problems with the cargo door and engine mounts put me off it.
I would have gotten cold feet BEFORE boarding that flight.
One hell if a cover up by air New Zealand at the time. I still remember when it was announced on the news, the the flight was 2 hrs overdue.
Yes it was a very unbeliable and bizarre story, R.I.P to all of them
Does anyone else see a human face on the wreckage at 6.44? Spooky
Yes in the "cloth" waving in the wind, it's very clear too...odd indeed.
A little bit off topic: It's kind of stupid to run a wide body aeroplane on a sightseeing tour. After all, the ratio of windows to passengers is very low. It would be better to fly a small regional jet (if possible), where 2/3 of the passengers sit next to a window.
agreed, but not really possible for this flight, the distance is too great for a regional jet to have taken on.
karlmnz Then, the next best thing would be a decked out DC-9 (super 80 / MD 80).
Peter Wexler
no, the only thing in ANZ's inventory with the required range was the DC-10.
From the in flight footage shown of earlier flights, you can clearly see that the cabin is far from full, so it stands to reason they took the limited window space into account and didn't actually sell all the seats.
This would also have meant lower fuel requirements and higher aircraft performance at low altitude, thus increasing loiter time over Antarctica and allowing lower and slower flight for prolonged viewing pleasure of the passengers.
starquant I am sure that the flights were packed because such a jaunt would be great fun! I'm just saying that if you want to make the trip more enjoyable, don't use a DC-10. Given rules about flight capabilities, how about a 3-engine 727? How about a trans-ocean rated 737? Simply run more of them!
I'm just saying that the trip would suck, for me, if I got stuck in the middle column of seats in a DC-10, which I think that this was, right?
Peter Wexler
the 727 lacked the range, the 737s available at the time were not ETOPS rated and lacked the range too.
The cargo door problems should have been fixed before the DC 10 ever entered service and it took far too long to actually fix it properly. The engine falling off should not have resulted in the loss of the plane, there are several other failings of the DC 10, it should have been grounded much sooner than it was and not flown again, the Concorde would not have crashed if it was not for a piece falling off a DC 10.
the Turkish flight near Paris likely occurred because the American civil aviation authorities were more interested in protecting the manufacturer so instead of a notice to fix the cargo doors immediately a bland 'by the way' check those doors when you have time' I believe the US FAA etc does not operate this way today.
one must conclude that management will stop at nothing to protect itself...perhaps they awarded themselves large bonuses?
Ah, the legendary DC-10: the pub dart of the skies. "DC" in certain circles informally stands for "Death Count".
... And the legendary DC-9, the *lawn dart* of the skies.
It actually stands for 'Death Cruiser'. That is the formal title by the manufacturer.
ROTFLMFAO ...
'Death Cruiser', 'Death Contraption', 'Daily Crash', 'Donald's Disaster', 'Crowd Killer'... I'm not riding on MD 't-tails' either. And then there's 'Scarebus'! I'm better off riding ScamTrak! (govt. subsidized, right?) XD
LOL, those are *great!!!* Don't you think common sense dictates that attaching jet engines to the hull and / or tail-- in a triangular pattern-- is just *asking* for unnecessary vibrational stress and metal fatigue cracks? Keep the engines on the wings-- more vibration dampening, especially since the wings are filled with kerosene. The jet's hull isn't much thicker than an aluminum cigar tube-- under pressure.
I call the Airbus "The Flying White Elephant Dumbo Jet". And *AirBussed = Airbust* has a nice echo to it.
A perfect example of latent errors, very sad people lost their lives
Some of the blatent and damning distancing language used by the guilty Air NZ employees in court in 1980 stands out a mile in 2023. Terrible cowards, prepared to blame innocent pilots who couldn't defend themselves in order to cover their backsides. Sickening to watch.
Do not think I could think with that recording machine noise in background. Well keeps me from watching this video.
The engine mount was a bad design as was the cargo door and that was not fixed properly for some time, eventually it was fixed after many people died who should not have. You can fly in it if you like, I never will again.
The Trews theme tune at the start!
The engine mounts braking because people were not using the right tools to do the job. In the end all that stuff was fixed right and is a very good plane today! Even tho it is getting old.
The whole idea of low altitude "sight-seeing" trips over Antarctica, which is an entirely different world, was the biggest mistake. 2nd one was too much reliance on computers...especially when error prone humans program them.
Wasn't there transponders to identify their altitude and location?
Yes, and they did get interrogated the same time they made VHF contact with Ice Tower. But they subsequently lost contact with both again several minutes later, but likely believed it to be due to the famously underpowered facilities
@@mattthrun-nowicki8641 A "perfect storm" so to speak. This crash is one i will never forget.
@@mattthrun-nowicki8641 And thank you for your response. Interesting information.
Love that judge
I love the L1011
Worst plane I ever flew in, once only, never again
The thing about this accident is there was so much went wrong. None of it however was pilot error. That however didn't come out till recent times when the pilots were cleared. Back then tho, it was just a witch hunt and the 2 dead pilots that couldn't defend themselves were the easiest to blame...
That is wrong. The crew WERE to blame, but there was blame on AirNZ as well
I don't think a non-flag carrier would have survived the cover up & lies perpetrated by Air New Zealand.
Was anyone ever prosecuted for the cover-up & obstructing the accident investigation?
Nobody was ever prosecuted. Morrie Davis retired with his pension to think about things. Several others were forced out of Air Nz over time. Chippendale wrote a flawed report with errors including that the aircraft's radar could tell height above terrain. He also corrupted the transcript of the Cockpit voice recorder in a way to make the pilot and c/pilot seem incompetent. (there are two versions of the transcript floating around. ..the original transcript and the Chippendale version. Chippendale came in for serious criticism from Justice Mahon.
Seems to me that New Zealand Air was trying to keep their insurance premiums from going up...
Precisely. It's an interesting thought experiment to detach the idea of causality from blame, and wonder whether CAD and Air NZ would have acted the same way if their insurance wasn't on the line...
Gemmel is such a liar
I'm researching on the Mt Erebus disaster for my social studies assignment
This narrator sounds like the guy who narrated The Gods Must Be Crazy. It's kind of distracting.
The cargo door problem was fixed and the engine mount problems were caused by engineers from the airlines
Is that Edmund Hillary at 29:45?
It could be. He did fly as guide on prior flights. Interestingly, he would later marry the widow of Peter Mulgrew, who died onboard this flight.
@@tiadaid Thanks for the reply. It looks very much like him to me but other people might be more familiar with what he looked like than I am.
I know it was a boat in the sea but it’s a shame that the costa Concordia didn’t learn from this disaster as they were both on sightseeing trips following routes that they shouldn’t have been following. Unfortunately this is what happens when you deviate from the assigned route plan.
Costa Concordia was the fault of the Captain and his cowardice after the accident didn't help. In the case of ANZ 901, the flight crew were NOT at fault. ANZ had changed the route the night before the flight and they didn't inform the flight crew - who had been briefed on a different route. Flight crew thought they were on the right route, but because of the change made the night before, they weren't. Costa Concordia deviated on purpose, ANZ 901 did not.
@@muttley8818 agreed. I have learnt a lot more about this disaster since i wrote my original comment and you are spot on. My mistake and my apologies. Hold my hands up to say I’m wrong. 👍👍
"Unfortunately this is what happens when you deviate from the assigned route plan."
Yep. Happened to the cruise ship Mikhail Lermontov too, in the Marlborough Sounds. One fatality on that occasion, but even that's one too many.
The narrator sounds like the same person who played the suave lawyer in the first few episodes of Prisoner Cell Block H.
I wish cineflix would made aci mayday episode about this crash
Is the stenographer crying @ 23:57 ?
Flight 901 has been covered up to this very day
it was a DC-10.......
If it isn't one thing with the DC-10 it is another...
Ian Cameron It wasn't without good reason it was nicknamed Death Contraption 10
Melina Richards Yip, another variant I've heard is "Death Coffin 10".
kye rosendale Only reason why the DC-10 crashes is at first, manufacturing problems by the company. From then onwards, it was basically airlines' faulty maintenace procedures, but they never take the blame and always keep on firing hot shots at McDonnell-Douglas..especially American Airlines using an unapproved procedure in the most negligent manner and when push comes to shove, they went "IT IS NOT OUR FAULT, IT IS MCDONNELL-DOUGLAS' FAULT!" But thank god that now that company improved the aircraft with better systems due to airlines refusing to take some responsibility...
DC 10 shit plane
Air New Zealand is guilty. They need to be charged.
why do people even mention the DC-10. did anyone know that the DC-10 is the 11th safest airliner. I'll bet if it had been a 707 or 747 these aviation experts would say they're the ones that suck or are accident prone!
anyway has anyone noticed the fascinating similarities between the bold face lies that the company witnesses stated. And all of the explanations we have been getting the last five or so years from our government.
excellent posting thank you for your time and trouble
Yes that is true about people that should not have died. I have flown one.
Oh? Why was that? I think it is a nice old plane.
Sounds like a bunch of not checking and miscommunication on all points to the cost lives
All have a hand
Auto pilot, how much more do we even need to know.
There’s a reason Antartica is a restricted area.
yes, Americans.
a series of errors.