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On 12 June 1972, a McDonnell Douglas DC-10 operating as American Airlines Flight 96 suffers an explosive decompression after a cargo door in the lower rear fuselage bursts open. The crew makes an emergency landing at Detroit without any loss of life. Nearly two years later, on 3 March 1974, Turkish Airlines Flight 981 crashes near Senlis after suffering a similar sequence of events during a flight from Paris to London, killing all 346 people on board. A design flaw with the DC-10's cargo door locking mechanism was not rectified after the first accident, and the second DC-10's door opened during flight, causing the crash.
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00:03At the time, it was the worst crash in aviation history.
00:08It was just a scene of absolute, utter devastation.
00:12In 1974, more than 300 people died when their plane fell from the sky.
00:18There's barely anything left here that's recognizable as being a part of an aircraft.
00:24You couldn't walk anywhere without the danger you're going to stand on a part of a human being.
00:30The key to understanding the disaster is found thousands of kilometers away.
00:36An unusual piece of evidence that tells the troubling story of a crash that could have been prevented.
00:49Made it, made it.
01:14June the 12th, 1972.
01:18One of the newest members of American Airlines fleet is in Detroit, Michigan.
01:25John, Paige?
01:29Flight 96, a brand new DC-10, is getting ready for takeoff.
01:35Captain Bryce McCormick and co-pilot Paige Whitney have been in the plane for hours.
01:40Back there, so when we're in flight, if you can get a chance just to look at that.
01:44Detroit is just a stopover on a flight from L.A. to Buffalo and then to New York.
01:49What do you got there?
01:50Are you ready to try one, Paige?
01:52All right, sir.
01:59McCormick has flown the plane out from California, but Whitney is going to fly the next leg.
02:07Both men want as much time at the controls as possible.
02:11Neither one of them has more than 75 hours flying the DC-10.
02:18Few pilots have more.
02:20There simply aren't enough of the planes in the air.
02:26In 1972, the DC-10 had just been introduced.
02:31The plane is the latest advance to passenger jets.
02:35Its style and its size set it apart from other airliners.
02:41The McDonnell Douglas Corporation has spent more than a billion dollars developing it.
02:46In the late 60s, there was a race going among the three major manufacturers of jetliners,
02:52McDonnell Douglas, Boeing, and Lockheed, to see who could get the first jumbo out.
02:57So they got really busy on getting this DC-10 in to production as fast as they could.
03:02And one of the things that they could not suffer were many delays based on some problem with the design.
03:09American Airlines is one of the first companies to buy the plane.
03:18Flight 96 is one of those planes.
03:22Just the fifth DC-10 ever built.
03:32Sidia Smith has just been trained to be the chief flight attendant on the DC-10.
03:39I was excited because it was one of the first jumbos that we had.
03:43And I was going to have the opportunity to fly number one,
03:47which is what I always wanted to do, on a big jet.
03:54I gotcha.
04:00V-1, rotate.
04:08Just after 7 in the evening, Flight 96 lifts off from Detroit Airport.
04:21Just minutes after takeoff, the plane is rising easily through 3500 meters over Windsor, Ontario, Canada.
04:33I was sitting in my seat, and the captain had turned off the fasten seatbelt sign,
04:38and I was making my way to the galley, and I had to go sort of downhill,
04:43because we were climbing, to go to the galley to turn on the coffee.
05:00When I punched the coffee, and I moved over to one side, that's when it happened.
05:12I remember falling over because the plane was going, was like this, but all of a sudden it just went
05:18like this.
05:23I saw ceiling compartments fall, and I saw things coming out of pockets and everything,
05:31and I thought to myself, oh boy.
05:35It felt like the last day of my life.
05:40We hit something!
05:42We lost an engine here!
05:46In the cockpit, the crew is fighting for control of their jet.
05:51The throttles which control the three engines have snapped to idle.
05:56The plane loses almost all its thrust.
05:59The huge jet begins slowing down.
06:03The plane immediately took a huge drop.
06:09And the next thing that happened was I was hit in the face with a piece of the plane.
06:17My husband was frantically trying to find a stewardess to give me something to put pressure on my face to
06:25stop the bleeding.
06:27For the helmet!
06:30McCormick takes over control of the plane.
06:36He and Whitney wrestle the jet level.
06:43But Flight 96 has been badly damaged.
06:46Have we got no drawings?
06:48No. I've got full rudder here.
06:53The rudder on the tail which controls the direction of the jet is jammed to the right.
06:58That's forcing the plane to swing dramatically in that direction.
07:05While McCormick fights to turn his damaged plane back to Detroit,
07:10Sidia Smith is shocked to see a gaping hole in the floor of the main passenger cabin.
07:17People were asking me, you know, what to do, and I knew that I didn't know what to tell them.
07:22Smith has been able to account for all of her passengers.
07:26But Flight Attendant Sandra McConnell is missing.
07:30Sandra!
07:31Can you hear me?
07:33Sandra, where are you?
07:36And, finally, I saw her come out of one of the bathrooms.
07:42McConnell has to cross the hole in the floor to move to safety.
07:53And almost every step she took, the floor kept collapsing.
08:07The crew brings up power to the engines on the wings.
08:13But the third engine on the tail stubbornly refuses to respond.
08:18Senator, this is American Airlines Flight 96. We've got an emergency.
08:23American 96, roger. Type of emergency.
08:25We've got a jammed rudder. We need to get down and make an approach.
08:31Along with his engine and his rudder,
08:34McCormick is also having trouble controlling the elevators on the tail of the plane.
08:39They help him move the massive plane up and down.
08:42They're slow to respond, but he can move them.
08:47The situation isn't completely hopeless.
08:50I think it's going to fly!
08:53American 96, turn for the right, heading to 2-0-0.
08:59Without complete control of the elevators, and with a rudder that's frozen to the right,
09:04McCormick has to use his engines to turn the plane.
09:10By increasing the thrust on one side of the plane, he can change direction.
09:14But it won't be fast.
09:16I have no rudder control whatsoever.
09:19So our turns are going to have to be very slow and cautious.
09:27All of the passengers move as far away from the hole in the back as possible.
09:38But apart from the cut to Loretta Kaminsky, so far there are no other serious injuries.
09:51Captain, there's a hole in the back of the plane.
09:55A hole?
09:56Yes, sir.
09:57What do you want us to do?
09:59Get everyone ready for an emergency landing.
10:03Bryce McCormick's DC-10 is badly damaged.
10:08The lives of everyone on board now depend entirely on his ability to land a plane that can barely fly.
10:21With explosive suddenness, a short flight from Detroit to Buffalo has become the most challenging flight of Captain Bryce McCormick's
10:28career.
10:31As he heads back to Detroit, McCormick begins to slow his plane down so it can land safely.
10:40But when he does, his plane begins falling dangerously fast.
10:47Ideally, McCormick should be descending at 700 feet a minute.
10:53But now he's falling more than twice that fast.
10:571,600 feet per minute.
11:00What's the sink rate?
11:01Sink rate, 1,600!
11:04At this rate, McCormick will crash well short of the runway.
11:08He increases power to his engines to slow his fall.
11:13Sink rate, 700!
11:15McCormick has slowed the plane's descent to 700 feet per minute.
11:18But to do that, he's had to increase his forward airspeed, which means he'll be landing far faster than usual.
11:24For the first time since the beginning of the crisis, McCormick talks to the passengers.
11:29Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking.
11:33We've had a small problem, but the plane is under control now, and we're heading back to Detroit for an
11:38emergency landing.
11:40Bryce McCormick was as calm as if he were welcoming you on the plane.
11:48Less than half an hour after leaving, the badly damaged DC-10 struggles back to the Detroit airport.
11:56The few minutes that it took to get back to Detroit were the longest minutes that I will ever remember
12:03spending on an airplane.
12:04Because we were sure that we were not going to survive.
12:14Captain Bryce McCormick now needs to give the jet even more power to push the nose up for landing.
12:23His plane is still drifting to the right and traveling fast.
12:27I have no rudder to straighten it out when it hits!
12:33The DC-10 with 67 people aboard roars toward the runway.
12:37At almost 300 kilometers an hour.
12:42Bryce!
12:49The landing was the most frightening part of the entire flight.
13:03When the plane hits the ground, it begins veering hard to the right.
13:08Once the plane landed, it seemed like we just went on forever.
13:12I mean, it was just forever.
13:15One set of landing gear wheels runs off the runway and through the grass.
13:36After a harrowing touchdown, the plane eventually comes to a stop just 300 meters from the end of the runway.
13:48After a harrowing touchdown, the plane eventually comes to a stop just 300 meters from the end of the runway.
13:52Okay.
13:54Engines off at your discretion.
13:58Shut him down.
14:00Every woman wanted to hug him, and he was just amazing.
14:06Because it was just at that moment that we all realized that we were alive because of him.
14:12That he literally had saved our lives.
14:19If you take a look at something like this and you say, well, there's good flying and there's bad flying,
14:23this is beyond good.
14:24This is superlative.
14:25This is using every instinct you have as an airman and all the capabilities you have to stay calm enough
14:31to get the situation assessed.
14:36With the plane on the ground, the crew has its first opportunity to inspect the damage.
14:41The captain and I walked back when everybody was off.
14:46We walked back to the back and we just looked up and saw this hole.
14:53And it was just so weird.
14:56There's no indication that the jet hit something as the pilots first thought.
15:01What has caused such damage to the airliner?
15:04The hole was so enormous that if anyone had been sitting in the seats that were there, they would have
15:12been sucked out immediately.
15:13At that point, they still felt it might have been a bomb.
15:17But while the incident had happened with explosive suddenness, no indication of a bomb is found.
15:31As investigators begin their work, they discover that not all of the DC-10 is at the Detroit airport.
15:42A coffin that the plane was carrying in its cargo hold is discovered 30 kilometers away from the Detroit airport,
15:49near Windsor, Ontario, Canada.
16:01Investigators also find the plane's rear cargo door.
16:09Doors are not supposed to fall off airplanes, especially since it was a rather new airplane, you would not expect
16:17something like that to happen.
16:21When they examine the cargo area of the plane, they discover that the very design of the door makes it
16:26a potential weak spot.
16:31Most doors on a jet open inward.
16:33In fact, the door is slightly larger than the frame it fits into.
16:38As the pressure builds inside a jet, this type of plug door is actually forced into the frame of the
16:44aircraft.
16:45The design makes the door extremely safe.
16:51But McDonnell Douglas designed the cargo door on the DC-10 to open outward.
16:57That decision was made to increase the amount of storage space on the plane.
17:02When it's closed, hooks on the DC-10's door grab hold of a bar on the plane's door frame.
17:10To make sure it's closed, baggage handlers push down on a lever, which drives locking pins through the hooks, which
17:16hold them in place.
17:22When investigators examine the cargo area of the plane, they don't find any structural damage around the door.
17:33When they study the locks on the cargo door itself, they find that the latches are not completely closed.
17:42And the pins that are supposed to make sure the door is locked are not in their locked position.
17:48When we interrogated the cargo handle that closed the door, it became immediately apparent that he used excessive force to
18:01close the door.
18:02And in fact, he said he had to use his knee to get the door handle to go flush.
18:10Investigators make a frightening discovery.
18:13It's possible to close the lever on the outside of the door, even if the hooks and locking pins are
18:20not in the closed position.
18:27Paul Eddy is a journalist who investigated the history of the DC-10.
18:32What Windsor showed is that you could actually pull the handle in order to buckle the top fixture so that
18:40the handle went home properly.
18:42But the locking pins had not gone through the spools.
18:46This means that baggage handlers can believe the door is closed when it's not.
18:55Not only can the outside lever be closed without the locks being fully engaged,
19:01there's no way for the crew of the plane to know.
19:05The faulty locking pins will still turn off the warning light, even though they aren't in their proper position.
19:14The door was a ticking time bomb.
19:19As passenger jets climb, the difference between the pressure inside the plane and the pressure outside the plane grows.
19:28If a door isn't properly shut, it will blow out with explosive force.
19:34The problem on the American Airlines flight began as the plane passed through 3500 meters.
19:42When the door blew, the coffin in the cargo hold was sucked out.
19:48When the air pressure inside the plane was released, anything that wasn't firmly attached was pulled out of the airliner.
19:56It's a really startling thing if you're not expecting it.
19:59What you've got is a lot of air stuffed inside this pressure vessel that now wants to get out.
20:06And the bigger the airplane is, the more powerful the hurricane of air leaving the airplane is during that period
20:13of time.
20:14By itself, explosive decompression does not make a plane unflyable.
20:19So why had Captain McCormick experienced such difficulties controlling his jet?
20:28Investigators take a closer look at the back of the plane's cabin.
20:33And learn that the very design of the DC-10 makes it vulnerable.
20:40When the cargo door blew off, there was so much pressure on the floor of the cabin that it collapsed
20:46into the cargo compartment below.
20:49When it did, the floor ripped into some of the plane's critical control systems.
20:54When it collapsed the floor, it took the cables that controlled number two engine,
20:58and it took most of the cables, or impeded most of the cables that had to do with the flight
21:03controls in the back.
21:04I think it's going to fly!
21:07It left McCormick just enough control to keep his plane level.
21:14The remarkable flying of Bryce McCormick had saved the lives of everyone on board Flight 96.
21:24But there was a problem with one of the newest and most expensive planes flying over North America.
21:32In the Windsor incident, there was an obvious flaw.
21:36And that's where the NTSB said, look, here is really the smoking gun,
21:41the ability to close that thing without having all those locks engaged.
21:44Let's make sure we change this system right now.
21:47Every DC-10 operator needs to know this.
21:52Chuck Miller is the head of the NTSB's Aviation Safety Bureau.
21:57We have to check all the latches, okay?
22:00It's his responsibility to point out problems with the new DC-10 and propose solutions.
22:07He helps write the fixes he thinks McDonnell Douglas needs to make to keep the plane safe.
22:16He was a very, very professional man and he had, his investigators had enormous respect for him.
22:23Chuck didn't sit back in the office. Chuck was always on the scene.
22:27For Chuck Miller, fixing the DC-10 is a matter of professional pride.
22:34For McDonnell Douglas, the near accident over Windsor has enormous implications.
22:41Their billion-dollar gamble came close to tumbling from the sky.
22:45If anything else goes wrong, the company itself could be at stake.
22:58March the 3rd, 1974. A perfect spring-like day in Paris.
23:07It's been almost two years since a DC-10 came close to crashing near Windsor, Ontario.
23:16Now more than 50 of the new planes are flying around the world.
23:23One of them, Plane 29, is owned by Turkish Airlines.
23:31Normally the last leg of this trip from Turkey to England wouldn't be very crowded.
23:37But today the DC-10 is filling up fast.
23:43People are squeezing into seats throughout the plane.
23:48A strike at a British airline has passengers scrambling for any flight back to London.
23:57Wendy Wheel is one of many last-minute additions to the flight.
24:01A model, she's returning home after a shoot in Spain.
24:06We'd been married for 18 months and we were about to start a family.
24:12I believe the secret of her success for modeling was not just that she was a very attractive girl
24:19and good model material, but she was generally liked by all the photographers
24:25because she had such a pleasing, lovely, light personality.
24:32With all the new passengers boarding, the flight is a little behind schedule.
24:38And it's not only the crew who are waiting.
24:44At the back of the plane is baggage handler Mohamed Mahmoudi.
24:51With all the new passengers, he's not sure if there are any more bags to load.
25:03Not expecting any other luggage, Mahmoudi locks the rear cargo door.
25:21The DC-10 is set to go.
25:33The DC-10 is set to go.
25:38The DC-10 is set to go above Paris.
25:42London is less than an hour away.
25:45Price control, this is Tango Hotel Yankee 981.
25:49We're at 6-0.
25:51Requesting clearance to flight level 2-3-0.
25:57Tango Hotel Yankee 981, you record the flight level 2-3-0.
26:019-1, roger.
26:09As it flies away from the airport, the DC-10 continues to gain altitude.
26:182,700 meters.
26:223,000 meters.
26:253,300 meters.
26:43The huge jet shudders and banks to the left.
26:54What happened?
26:56The cabin flew out! Are you sure?
26:59Just 16 seconds after the start of the crisis, the crew struggles to save their crippled jet.
27:06The nose is pitching down, the plane picking up speed.
27:11Bring it up!
27:12Put our nose up!
27:14I can't bring it up! She doesn't respond!
27:19Passengers at the back of the plane witness a horrifying scene.
27:23Two rows of seats have simply disappeared.
27:26Through a huge hole in the floor, passengers can see the sky over France.
27:357,000 feet!
27:37Hydraulics!
27:39We've lost it!
27:40The crew discovers that they have no hydraulic power with which to control the plane.
27:48Without it, they can't move their rudder or elevators.
27:53Even without its most basic controls, the plane begins to level out.
27:58But it's fallen too far.
28:00Looks like we're going to hit the ground!
28:03Me!
28:04The DC-10 is traveling almost 800 kilometers an hour.
28:17The flight from Paris to London never even makes it to the English Channel.
28:23Just nine minutes after taking off, Turkish Airways Flight 981 becomes the worst plane crash of all time.
28:35There's barely anything left here that's recognizable as being a part of an aircraft.
28:41Flight 981 carrying 346 passengers virtually disintegrates on impact.
28:53There are no survivors.
28:56It was just a scene of absolute, utter devastation.
29:01And the litter of personal possessions, electric wires, bits of metal, bits of bodies, just strewn everywhere.
29:10I mean, you couldn't walk.
29:12You couldn't walk anywhere without the danger you were going to stand on a part of a human being.
29:21I still have nightmares about this, even though it was 33 years ago.
29:25Investigators for the French Accident Investigation Bureau are quickly on the scene.
29:31My first job was to evaluate the scope of the wreckage and to begin the first invasion on the spot.
29:48At first I was unable to know what has happened.
29:52I was just seeing that a terrible crash has occurred and that it will be a very hard work for
29:59the investigators.
30:02Despite the enormous force of the crash, the black boxes, made of three layers of hardened steel and insulation, survive.
30:14Their contents could provide valuable clues about the crash.
30:19Most of the speculation was that it must have been a bomb.
30:22Because, you know, you've got an almost brand new, very powerful aeroplane flying in clear blue sky and it gets
30:29to 12,000 feet and falls out of it.
30:34Investigators are called to a field 15 kilometers from the crash site.
30:41They find a piece of fuselage and two rows of seats from the DC-10.
30:48Somehow they fell free of the airliner before the rest of the plane smashed into the forest.
30:55When investigators arrive, the bodies of the passengers who were in the seats have already been removed.
31:05When relatives of those who died in the crash arrive in France, they're directed to a small church in the
31:11town of Saint-Lys.
31:15One of the saddest sights I've ever seen is in this church.
31:25They laid out on tables everything they'd found, you know, clothing, possessions, teddy bears, rings, watches.
31:36And then relatives who wanted to were allowed to come and walk around these trestle tables with all this stuff
31:43like that.
31:51They produced a little packet with my wife's wedding ring and rings, engagement ring.
31:58It was all pretty battered up, so you could imagine the thoughts that went through my mind.
32:05The next step is to be able to walk around these days.
32:08The next step is to be able to walk around these days.
32:11The next step is to be able to walk around these days.
32:14Since the accident involves an American plane, the NTSB's Chuck Miller joins the investigation.
32:22For the second time in two years, he's dealing with a problem with the DC-10.
32:28I don't believe that Miller suspected for one moment that the door hadn't been fixed after winter.
32:36The next step is to be able to walk around these days.
32:37But it becomes clear that the piece of fuselage found in France is in fact the plane's rear cargo door.
32:44It seems like a repeat of the Windsor accident.
32:50Miller is left with a haunting question.
32:53Why hadn't the problem been fixed?
32:56When he saw the door, of course, saw that it hadn't been done.
33:00The fix hadn't been made.
33:02That's when I think his anger became very, very strong indeed.
33:09Miller takes an unusual step.
33:13Although the official investigation is just beginning, he gives journalist Paul Eddy an important tip.
33:20I said, have you got any ideas what made the door come off?
33:22He said, yeah.
33:24If I were you, I'd go and look at a place called Windsor, Ontario.
33:34Hello.
33:37I'm Chuck Miller.
33:40Miller shares his suspicions with the French investigators.
33:47Will you please pass these around?
33:53These were taken on June 12th, 1972, right after the incident.
34:03We have asked for the report on the Windsor accident and our American colleagues were also volunteers to give us
34:15a lot of details.
34:17After all the work done during the American Airlines investigation,
34:22had something been overlooked?
34:25Was there another problem with McDonnell Douglas's enormous plane?
34:37With the information from Chuck Miller, French investigators take a closer look at the plane's cargo door.
34:46They make a shocking discovery.
34:50There is no new problem.
34:52It's just like the American Airlines case all over again.
34:59The latches that are supposed to hold the cargo door closed aren't locked.
35:08And since two rows of seats were sucked out of the DC-10 over Paris,
35:13it's clear that the floor on the plane collapsed just as it had in Windsor.
35:19It looks like we're going to hit the ground!
35:22It looks like we're going to hit the ground!
35:23I can't bring it up!
35:25It doesn't respond!
35:27In fact, when investigators listen to the cockpit voice recorder,
35:31they find that the Turkish flight crew had even less control of their plane than the crew of American Airlines
35:38Flight 96.
35:40We need to get down and make an approach.
35:43I think it's going to fly!
35:45Over Windsor, Bryce McCormick was able to recover his plane and land it.
35:51But in Paris, all the hydraulic systems were destroyed.
35:57Hydraulics!
35:59We've lost it!
36:00The hydraulic fluid helps crews move the rudder and elevators on the tail.
36:06Not being able to control them meant the crew couldn't keep their plane in the sky.
36:12The basic problem was the Paris flight was much heavier in terms of the number of people on board.
36:17The floor, when it collapsed, collapsed with such a tremendous amount of pressure
36:21that it literally severed all the cables and controlled the back.
36:24They had no hope after that point.
36:31Shortly after the crash of Turkish Airlines Flight 981, Chuck Miller is back in the United States.
36:38Our first witness this morning is Mr. C.O. Miller, Director of the Bureau of Aviation Safety of the NTSB.
36:45This time, he's facing questions from American senators.
36:48A potentially catastrophic design defect...
36:51A special hearing begins to find out how a problem that was identified in 1972
36:56could bring another plane down two years later.
37:00Of course, our understanding up to this time, they all had been.
37:03What you've got to now discover is why wasn't that door fixed?
37:10Less than a month after the near crash over Windsor, the NTSB had made two very specific recommendations.
37:19Miller and his investigators recommended that a change be made to the locking mechanism.
37:25Engage the lever.
37:26They wanted to make sure that it was physically impossible for baggage handlers to close the lever
37:31without the locking pins being in place.
37:34They also suggested that vents be put into the floors of all DC-10s.
37:41This would rapidly allow the pressurized cabin air to equalize without collapsing the floor.
37:50But in the two years since the accident, neither one of these recommendations was implemented.
37:57There is a fundamental problem at the heart of aviation safety and that has been in the United States for
38:03a very long time.
38:04And that is that it's the job of the NTSB to discover what's happened and to come up with recommendations
38:13as to how to prevent it happening again.
38:15But it has absolutely no authority to implement them.
38:19The NTSB does not have regulatory authority. They have to turn to the FAA as they did and say, we
38:24want these things done.
38:25And that's where the system went wrong.
38:29If the FAA, the Federal Aviation Administration, issues an airworthiness directive, planes are pulled out of service until the proper
38:37fix is made.
38:39But as serious as the problems on the DC-10 were, no airworthiness directive was ever issued.
38:48A so-called gentleman's agreement between the head of the FAA and the head of McDonnell Douglas stopped it from
38:54happening.
38:55The gentleman's agreement is the root cause of Paris.
38:58There is no question that if an airworthiness directive had been issued, as it should have been after Windsor, Paris
39:06would not have happened.
39:08It was an entirely avoidable accident.
39:12McDonnell Douglas assured the FAA that it would fix the problem voluntarily.
39:17An airworthiness directive would cast a shadow on the still fledgling DC-10.
39:22The last thing in the world you want is for the public or any of the airlines who are going
39:28to be operating these airplanes to think, uh-oh, maybe there's some flaws in this bird.
39:32And so an airworthiness directive, especially one that requires you to go back and re-engineer something, is a really
39:37horrific thought for a manufacturer.
39:41McDonnell Douglas did make changes to the way the cargo door was built.
39:47A peephole was cut in the bottom of the door so baggage handlers could see if the locking pins had
39:52engaged.
39:54Several warning signs were also attached to the plane's door.
39:59The company also made other changes to the DC-10.
40:03These included increasing the length of the locking pins and attaching a plate to the inside of the door.
40:10This plate would make it physically impossible to push down the lever if the door wasn't properly locked.
40:18But each of the proposed fixes had its own problem.
40:24Many baggage handlers didn't know what the small window in the door was for.
40:30And the baggage handler in Paris read and spoke three languages, but not English, the only language in which the
40:37warning signs were written.
40:42The support plate that was supposed to be installed in the door was never attached to the jet that crashed
40:47in Paris.
40:52Papers confirming the completion of the work are also uncovered.
40:56But no matter what the paper trail says, the fix was never made.
41:03Again, the problem is, you don't have an independent FAA inspector coming along to look and see it,
41:10and then put his stamp on it, because it wasn't an Airworthy's directive.
41:16In the years following the Turkish Airlines crash, an enormous flurry of lawsuits are filed in California.
41:24As time went by, I learned more and more about what actually happened,
41:28and realized that it was not an accident as we would call an accident.
41:34It was totally avoidable.
41:37My goal was to expose these people.
41:43In the weeks leading up to the trial, lawyers who were involved in the case have access to the entire
41:48history of the DC-10's development.
41:52They're not the only ones who pour through the evidence.
41:56So does journalist Paul Eddy.
42:00We were determined to get to those documents and that testimony.
42:04Somebody gave us a key to the depository where the documents were,
42:08and so at night we would go in and then had a huge accumulated pile of documents to go through
42:14in order to find out what they've been up to.
42:18Reading through the immense pile of paper, Eddie makes an incredible discovery.
42:26A memo written by Don Applegate, the director of product engineering for Convair, the company who'd built the cargo door
42:34for McDonnell Douglas.
42:41I think the point when we knew we got them was the Applegate memorandum that specifically pre-warned this would
42:48happen.
42:51The memo is a damning indictment of the cargo doors that were being made for the DC-10 and the
42:57lack of venting in the cabin floors.
43:03It warns that it's only a matter of time before there's a major disaster involving the doors.
43:13The airplane demonstrated an inherent susceptibility to catastrophic failure when exposed to explosive decompression of the cargo compartment.
43:31The memo, written just weeks after the near disaster in Windsor, recommends that immediate changes be made to the DC
43:38-10 cargo door.
43:43You know you've got them. You know you've got them. Because you know they knew.
43:47During the court case, another chilling find is made.
43:52Not only did McDonnell Douglas know about the problem after Windsor, they knew during the development of the DC-10.
44:04Four years before the Paris crash, two years before Windsor, the cargo door failed during a pressure test.
44:12The company knew there was a problem.
44:15But the fundamental design of the door stayed the same.
44:20I could not believe a large corporation, McDonnell Douglas at the time, could do such a thing.
44:27Could risk our lives, ordinary people's lives, for the sake of money.
44:34Well, in aviation, it's called tombstone technology.
44:37In other words, we always have the balance of money.
44:40And unfortunately, over the years, it has been true more times than not that we have had to wait until
44:46we had enough people die in an accident to say,
44:48you know, we really are going to have to spend the money over here.
44:50The Applegate memo and other information that comes out during the court case leads to one of the biggest settlements
44:58in the history of aviation.
45:02McDonnell Douglas paid over $80 million in damages.
45:10After the Paris crash, foolproof changes were finally made to the DC-10 cargo door.
45:18And this time, nothing was left to chance.
45:22The FAA issued an airworthiness directive that ensured the doors would never again open in mid-air.
45:30And it worked.
45:32After Paris, there wasn't another serious incident involving the cargo doors on a DC-10.
45:41But the plane's history, and an intensely competitive industry, did have an impact.
45:50McDonnell Douglas sold far fewer commercial DC-10s than it had once hoped for.
45:57Most of the pilots that I know who have flown the DC-10 over the years really love the old
46:01bird.
46:03She's probably a little more clunky than the 747 in terms of her heaviness of flight controls.
46:08But it's still a lovely bird to fly.
46:11That's fine, but you can't disassociate either the airplane or the company from the awful reputation that the crash left.
46:23Eventually, McDonnell Douglas itself disappears.
46:27The company was bought by Boeing in 1996.
46:35In the forest outside Paris, a monument now stands honoring those who were killed on Flight 981.
46:43A permanent reminder of one of the most disturbing crashes in the history of aviation.
46:54You never forget.
46:58I've gone on to lead my life for 30-odd years, but I've never forgotten.
47:06People, to this day, will think it was an accident.
47:11And it wasn't.
47:13.
47:13.
47:13.
47:13.
47:14.
47:14.
47:14,