Mayday: Air Disaster

Just out of Honolulu the cargo door of United Airlines Flight 811 opens at an altitude of 33,000 feet, ripping a hole in the 747 taking out five rows of seats and nine passengers.

At the height of thunderstorm season in Arkansas, American Airlines 1420 ends in disaster. The MD80 ploughs off a wet runway down an embankment and breaks apart, killing 11 people.

The pilot of Swissair Flight 111 smells smoke in the cockpit. Minutes later fire and complete electrical failure cause them to crash into the Atlantic killing all everyone on board

AeroPeru flight 603 crashed on a routine flight from Lima to Santiago in 1996, due to a severe failure with the flight instruments.

Shortly after Air Alaska Flight 261 takes off, the stabilizer malfunctions. The nose-diving plane rolls and dives into the ocean. The eighty-eight passengers and crew on board die.

An Air Transat Airbus runs out of fuel over the Atlantic and has to glide to a power-free landing. MAYDAY explores the causes that contributed to this near catastrophe.