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***image1***It was July 19, 1989, and Captain Haynes found himself in a DC-10 aircraft at 37,000 feet with no working flight controls. A catastrophic engine
malfunction severed lines in the plane’s three hydraulic systems, rendering the aircraft’s flight controls useless. When the crew radioed personnel on the ground that all three of the aircraft’s hydraulic systems had been lost, maintenance personnel initially couldn’t believe it.
The malfunction the aircraft experienced was thought to be impossible even by the experts. After comprehending the damage, the maintainer speaking to the crew shut off his microphone and told his coworkers that the plane didn’t have a chance.
Retired United Airlines Capt. Al Haynes recently spoke to KMC operations personnel, aircraft maintainers and emergency responders at Ramstein Aug. 27. He told the story of United Airlines Flight 232.
After the loss of the flight controls, the plane initially maintained level flight but soon began to roll right and nearly went inverted three different times. The crew discovered they could control the aircraft somewhat by varying the thrust of the aircraft’s two remaining engines. The control they had of the airplane was marginal and the aircrew had serious doubts that they would be able to make it to an airport.
After 45 minutes of learning the new technique of controlling the plane,
Flight 232 spiraled down over the midwest and miraculously made it to the Sioux City Airport in Iowa, where the aircraft crash landed. One hundred twelve people died and 184 survived.
Captain Haynes attributed the survival of those 184 people to five main factors: luck, communications, preparation, execution and cooperation. Their luck gave them an airplane that remained flyable, an ideal location not over water or mountains, clear weather and a perfect time of day. Calm air traffic control, cockpit and cabin crew training and inter-communications training among ground units contributed to the communications factor. An ambitious practice drill held at the Sioux City Airport led to improvements and better planning for disasters. Thorough training of cockpit and cabin crews helped prepare everyone for this seemingly impossible situation.
Everyone responded as their training dictated. The situation required total cooperation from every agency as well as the general public. These factors allowed what appeared to be a non-survivable accident to be one in which a large percentage of those aboard survived.
Sioux City’s practice drill involved an accident of an aircraft larger than any that flew to their airport. When asked why they would practice for such an unlikely event, the answer was that they wanted to be prepared for a worst-case scenario. If they could handle the worst, then they would be prepared for anything. Just a year after that live drill, United Flight 232, an aircraft larger than any that routinely flew to Sioux City crashed at that airport. In fact, this accident has become a textbook case for how disaster preparedness should be practiced.
Captain Haynes is now 77 years old. He continues to enjoy life with his family in the Seattle, Wash., area. When asked to speak about Flight 232, he packs his bags and gets on the road to share the story about how the “impossible” can happen and why it is best to be prepared for a worst-case scenario.
