Gone Astray | 1994 St. Louis Runway Collision
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TWA Flight 427 was a regularly scheduled TWA passenger flight departing St. Louis Lambert International Airport (STL) in Bridgeton, Missouri on November 22, 1994, operated using a McDonnell Douglas MD-82. On the takeoff roll it struck a Cessna 441 Conquest II, killing both of its occupants. It was the second of two flights numbered 427 that would be involved in an incident that year, the other being USAir Flight 427, which crashed in September near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania killing all 132 on board.
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As a former airline employee, I really miss seeing the old carriers like Pan Am, Eastern and TWA among others. There was just something different about flying thirty or forty years ago that has disappeared never to return. I guess i was fortunate to have enjoyed it for a short while.
I worked for five major carriers. Only one of them exists today.
I still have my Ambassadors Club and Ionosphere Club tags. Flying was an adventure in the 70s and 80s,
If you think freedom is dumb, pack up your shit and go live in North Korea, or Cuba.
I miss Northwest, my first flight in 1994 was on a DC-9.
@@aequoria2949 "Freedumb" as in "dumb about freedom", I assume. More specifically, hypocritical: "Sure the government can tell me to put clothes on before I go outside -- for no particular reason -- but a face covering to limit the spread of death in a pandemic..."
How about some kudos for the TWA crew? They took almost certain disaster and made it survivable for everyone on their aircraft.
Absolutely. A wing could have been tore off or any scenario could have turned into a massive explosion and fire. They did a great job avoiding disaster.
That’s my type of pilot..absolutely knows how to make things work..
I was a flight attendant for TWA and AA for a total of 44 years, and I happened to work a flight out of STL early the next morning after that accident. We carried First Officer Randy Speed home to his commuter city after the accident and initial debrief and as can be imagined, he was tired and a bit shook up from the accident. It was an honor to fly him back to his home and family. If I remember correctly (long time ago) I think that he said that he eventually walked back down the runway in the dark after they secured their own aircraft and passengers to see if he could locate and assist the other aircraft and found the wreckage of the fuselage of the Cessna and found the dead passenger and pilot. He mentioned how shaken up he was by that. Kudos to the TWA crew who did everything they could to avoid a direct hit (fuselage to fuselage) by swerving and saving many more lives that night.
@@bullibill8277 Nice story thanks for sharing.
Yikes. What a SNAFU ranging from the incomplete ATIS, Cessna pilot’s apparent fatigue and preconceived notions, ATC attitudes toward active/inactive runways, and generally all-around sh*t show. I’m so sorry the Cessna occupants died.
TWA died not long after that too, and I’m very sorry for that. I flew TWA lots of times. There, you know my age😁.
I am impressed, however, with 2Officer Speed’s flight hours. Over 10K and he was just 33 at the time.
Well done, Allec. RIP Cessna.
equating the bankruptcy of an airline to the death of people. Very nice.
I think he was speaking more metaphorically than literally, And I'm old enough to have flown Pan Am!
@@CoIoneIPanic • Oh, please. Surely you can read better than that.
@@acbulgin2 • Not on your life. I’m so ready for my real home, where my citizenship is! Looking so forward to meeting my Savior. I’m busy with my children and grandchildren, teaching them the Bible. One is wayward, yet I know God loves the family and I’m praying she come back to her First Love.
@@gomphrena-beautifulflower-8043 you are bad people, yes?
If anyone doesn’t know, Iron Mountain is in Michigan.
Yep way up north. Ford had a big plant there from the early 1920s until it closed in 1951.
There is also an Iron Mountain in Missouri.
@@jefferyindorf699 But this was Ford Airport in Iron Mountain, MI. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TWA_Flight_427
Yep. I was wondering why Allec Joshua Ibay didn't put Ford Airport in Iron Mountain as the destination.
I was at a corporate convention in St Louis in June, 1999. After leaving Lambert, I was shocked at the rows of abandoned homes and businesses all across North St Louis. I took one look at the base of the Gateway Arch, I attended one day of meetings and left early, three days later. It reminded me of Detroit too much.
Good thing you didn't visit the ghettos in East St. Louis.
The rotting remnants of a “Pro-Life” culture where quality of life is of no importance.
@@jimroscovius - I heard all about East St Louis, from a former roommate who hails from there.
@@Dilberto88 I have a friend who stopped at a gas station there. The guy working there told him to get back into his car and keep going. He said he didn't want to be there.
@@jimroscovius jesus
It was the second of two flights numbered 427 that would be involved in an incident that year, the other being USAir Flight 427, which crashed in September near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania killing all 132 on board.
for what its worth 427 is or used to be the most commonly used flight number for all airlines.
Sounds like some confirmation bias killed the cessna pilot. Gotta pay close attention to what ATC tells you and ATC has to make sure their instructions are clear. R.I.P. to the cessna pilot and the passenger. I can only imagine what the pilots and passengers of the TWA flight felt
I was in the Air Force many years ago and was regularly crossed active runways. We were required to repeat the tower’s instructions back to them. That was really beneficial to us because their radio overpowered ours to the point we couldn’t understand them. The length of their message was how we determined what we were supposed to do. If they came back on yelling and screaming like a bunch of wild savages, it was assumed that they took the long way to tell you to “hold short “ and you shouldn’t cross.
Interestingly, Runway 31 at KSTL at the time was converted from Taxiway Foxtrot due to increased operations at the airport, which was located right next to the GA ramp the Cessna pilot was leaving from, and the Cessna pilot had to taxi along the displaced threshold of Runway 31 in order to reach Runway 30R. It's also likely that the pilot had used Taxiway Foxtrot (as I think the ground controller would've referred to it as) while taxiing to the GA area. Other pilots had also confused 31 for 30R prior to this accident, so the lighting on runway 31 was dimmed so that aircraft landing 30R would have an easier time identifying the correct runway to land on, and might have been dimmed while the Cessna pilot was taxiing. Aside from the Runway 31 sign leaving the GA ramp and the displaced threshold arrow markings, I wonder if the pilot mentally registered Runway 31 as a taxiway and not an actual runway.
Also, KSTL had just installed newly-functioning ground radar to help prevent a collision like this but it wasn't working on this day due to a "computer hard drive failure," so yay computers I guess.
That further convinces me that pilot was betrayed / deceived - whatever you like to call it. (I'm not very descriptive at the moment).
He was clearly a conscientious pilot.
That was a momentary assumption any of us could make. (I don't fly).
That layout was all wrong, along with the very rare usage pattern for 31, that it's normally a taxiway, that suddenly oh this is our other runway just right now but we assume you know what we mean.
30R vs 31: night and day - right?
No.
The two visits he had made it almost inevitable he would make logical assumptions about where he was going.
I dunno how to say it, but that place was all wrong.
Christian, I was looking at the airport on Google Earth and wondering why it doesn't show a R 31. It appears to have been reconverted to a taxiway again.
As a former flight attendant for TWA, the runway configuration at STL is highly confusing. I remember hearing pilots complain about them all the time. 30L+R were the primary active runways, but 31 was a smaller runway, and generally used for departures that utilized regional props/jets. TWExpress used this runway, frequently.
I can't believe I've never seen an episode on the Lynyrd Skynyrd crash on this channel. It's an interesting case.
That crash has been done by other channels I'm quite sure...
@@psalm2forliberty577 Probably, but nobody goes into the great detail as this channel.
Check out Forest Haggerty’s channel for that flight.
The crash that killed Mamonas Assassinas rock band in Brazil also very interesting, with a mix of factors and errors.
I actually grew up very close to the accident site, and met some of the first responders. The wreckage was brought to my hometown soon after the crash. There is actually a very nice memorial there now.
In my days of flying 40 years ago, all clearances required a read-back - in this case, people may not have died.
Read back is correct....
Thankfully with TCAS, ADS-B and ground radar, controllers and pilots have a far better "view" of the planes, but you are correct, if humans don't follow ATC instructions or there's a miscommunication, incidents, incursions, and collisions are probable.
Very good point. They still do require a read-back, which might have alerted the pilot to his false assumptions and possibly even the TWA pilots, if they’d been able to hear the transmission. A tragedy all round.
@@moiraatkinson There's a few clips from VASAviation I've heard where especially KJFK, KLGA, KORD, the controllers get on pilots that use incomplete or substantially abbreviated read back, incomplete flight/tail ident, etc. The pilots get annoyed and sometimes argumentative, but annoyed living pilots is a better outcome than complacent dead pilots and their passengers.
Back in the day. Unfortunately with the pilot shortage things will definitely change even more. I'm sure you know what ropes at TWA were.
30R had a big dip starting from about 3,000 feet from the threshold and the Cessna was sitting in that dip. That is why the TWA plane couldn't see him until it was too late. I was TWA and flew out of STL for about 7 years.
Randy Speed! Sounds like a character in a pulp novel.
What a great name.Agree.
It's that weird time when traffic won't let you upshift your bike... randy speed.
Or another pseudonym for Archer
RIP to the victims. Everyone can have a "moment", it's just human nature, but yes, procedures could be tightened up in a high traffic area. Great research and presentation as always. This would be great episode on Mayday if it isn't already!
The TWA pilots almost missed the cessna ...IF ONLY..They did well to keep from having serious injuries on their own plane
Thank you so much, it was father that died in the small plane.
I know that airport since I’m from Missouri. I’ve been there plenty of times. So far, this is the most recent accident at this airport.
Did you just jinx this airport?
czcams.com/video/BLUkgRAy_Vo/video.html
@@CoIoneIPanic No fr this is the newest crash at or near the airport
@@KreativeK-iq2jo Look, man, I don't play that game.
@@CoIoneIPanic It’s not a game it’s a game of survival
Runway 31 was Dx'd as a runway in 2008, its now called taxiway F
unless Harrison Ford goes there
Awesome photo @7:22 always loved classic airliners and both the MD80 and 727 were my favorites.. sad crash though..
TWA was beautiful airline
The pilot put himself under pressure and unfortunate died as a result, the MD 82 attentive pilots to the lost rip.
That Cessna pilot had something wrong with his perception of current events, very simply. He very simply made a terrible mistake. Fatigue, confusion, who knows? So sad that two people had to die because of it. Nice video, Allec...
I used to have to drive alot at night.It is very tiring if you are not on shift work.The brain always thinks it time for sleep.Perception of time and situation are easily blurred.
@it seems to be good practice to repeat the directions given back to the atc to clarify ...making sure you understood them clearly..
You talking about my father, It wasn't his fault, WE WON!!! AND WE SUE THEM BIG TIME, It was control tower fault,
Now that's some effort there! all the work is appreciated!
Allecs videos are always well done 💯
As always, a thorough review of the incident and very good video. Thanks.
Lets go Allec :) You deserve so many more subs. Keep up the great work :)
Yeah, it’s actually a potential channel. But honestly the quality of the animation he uses never improves. I don’t know if the channel and the patreon do not provide him with enough income to upgrade the software or what. Check out TheFlightChannel, whose creator upgrades the software every other time.
I remember this one well. Somewhere I have a picture of the 441 still sitting on the centerline with top of the fuselage cleanly sheared off.
If I am remembering correctly, that was one of several ground incidents occuring at the time.
Great video Allec! Keep the vids coming.
WTF are vids?
What I find interesting, is that the MD-82 was repaired, and kept the same registration. In other USA-based accidents, registrations have been changed. Is this practiced in the USA only when there are fatalities on the airframe, or is the registration change random?
Registration numbers get changed for various reasons. Ownership changes or additional conflicting/similar N numbers to a fleet or just one request from owners.
Randy Speed=Max Power
It's Thursday. I'm ready for the next video! Hurry up!!!!! Checking my notifications all morning!!!!
RIP to the 2 victims.
Miraculous that was all !
Alec, great vintage photography here of the classic TWA livery on what is, to me, the very sleek & aero McDonnell Douglas MD-82.
I was snapping screenshots in between your descriptions (to get plane pic only).
Am I the only one doing this ?
Snapping them in my mind, anyway. I had forgotten how sharp that livery looked. Compare and contrast with what Swissair decided to go with for their MD-80's. I understand that DAC conducted an informal employee poll, hoping to gather data which would convince Swissair to consider something else. Apparently that dark brown stripe was a turnoff for some.
czcams.com/video/BLUkgRAy_Vo/video.html
Thirty right and thirty one said fast could sound the same on radio easily if tired and expecting to hear 30R. The phenomena is known as expectation bias. He even said "ready to go from the right" (he thought he was cleared to back taxi and takeoff from 30R...not lost). RIP.
This is why they should say “three zero right” and “three wun”. Rather than the annoying habit of some US controllers of using the whole number.
Me whenever I see that Allec has posted a new video: 😀
Me when I see that the video takes place at night: 😭
That was awesome I look forward to each new vid man (just an aviation enthusiast myself my dad was a pilot) This incident could have been so much worse 😞
WTF is a vid?
@@K1OIK How much time did you save by not typing "hat he uck"? 😀
@@Eternal_Tech Time was not the issue, profanity was.
This accident would end up being the second accident that year where the flight number was 427.
Like 182?
@@kurtkensson2059 yeah,same with 191 flight number
I was just thinking the same. US Airways 427 😞😞😞 and TWA 427. Both in 1994.
czcams.com/video/BLUkgRAy_Vo/video.html
I wish there was a period airport diagram to look at, because they must have reworked the naming of the airport since then. Either way, I feel like recommending the ATIS specificity what each and every runway is doing is a bit short sighted. Giving a pilot a vague taxi instruction such as back taxi without an actual route and not checking for a correct runway read back is just sheer complacency on the part of the controllers.
A story of "Assumptions", on ALL parts, save the TWA crew, but to include the NTSB- it took to the end to get to the REAL heart of the matter- but included all kinds of guesses and suppositions.
My old math teacher taught me about the word "Assume". He said, "When you Assume, you make an ASS, out of U, AND ME.".
He was right.
Well that’s an interesting take on it by your old maths teacher. I’m sure everyone else will also be happy to hear such an original and unexpected take on “assume”. Thanks.
Controller should have known something was wrong when the Cessa radioed, "Ready to go on the RIGHT."
And if he would have said "30right" ATC may have caught the error
Hold 31 I assume means the Cessa was cleared to be ON runway 31 (as opposed to holding short), but he was on 30R. I was a little confused about whether the Cessa was supposed to be on a runway, or holding to be on one. The issue was he was on the wrong one. Tragic outcome. Luckily the jet was able to avoid a more serious incident and a lot more casualties. Well done video!
Those TWA pilots did a great job. Could have been worse for them.
I remember seeing the accident aircraft (N954U) in OMA back in 2017.
Obviously the Cessna was in the wrong place - but he REPORTED his position ("Ready on the right side") and the tower controller missed the error & TWA wasn't up on tower freq or missed his report as well. First night departure from STL for the pilot...it can be tough unless you're EXTRA vigilant.
I can understand how you could hear 31 as 30L if you have had no indication that 31 even existed.
That's a simple explanation, but not so simple for a pilot. Runway 30 and Runway 31 don't mean that they're the 30th and 31st runways. They're numbered by their compass orientation; 300 and 310 degrees, respectively. Their opposite ends would be 12 (120 degrees) and 13 (130 degrees). As @Ed Young mentioned in a separate comment, read-back of instructions can be vital, and should be done whenever practicable.
Such a shame two people lost their lives, such a miracle the TWA didn't go up in flames, the pilots did a great job avoiding hitting the cessna after/while taking off, and getting the plane stopped on the ground. All the factors mentioned could happen to most of us humans, especially at that time of night. "By the grace of God go I...."
Unfortunately it sounds like the Cessna pilot misunderstood ATC or just made assumptions and it cost 2 lives. Very sad.
Pilots couldn’t avoid the the collision, but they were able to abort the takeoff after colliding. The damage was minor
Cool video, Rest In Peace
"Randy Speed" is the best name for a pilot of all time
If only his folks had named him “Jet”!
Or a drug dealer, just as likely.
Noticed the flight number...427. Same as the US Air 737 that crashed near Pittsburgh the same year.
Flight number 191 is an unlucky number too
This is a great channel, but could you change the color of the text. It’s sometimes hard to read the text which is white on a very light background. I’m not complaining, far from it. It’s just a question I had to ask. Keep the great vids coming.
Shout out to the TWA pilots, that could have been an accident with many multiples more deaths
What's up cutie?
Rip for who died
What about those that lived?
@@K1OIK I said the dead were not the survivors
@@Renzoo_ Then what was the purpose of, "for who died?"
Love you videos
Wow! I'm actually early! Great video!!!
Great? Why?
czcams.com/video/BLUkgRAy_Vo/video.html
Fascinating how the industry evolved, and what it took for changes to happen. Though sometimes you can't regulate common sense or human behavior. Being in that Cessna had to have been awful.
______________________________________________________________________
As ridiculous as it sounds, I thought a documentation of the events on Twilight Zone's "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" would be an idea for a Halloween episode.
These are tragic events, they could have been prevented, but we are only human. The only recourse to our fallibility is to take an arbitrary point of view in an objective manner: give me a reason why I shouldn't do this despite all the reasons one has to do it. Question not only one's own authority, but the authorities empowering our decisions making that leads to complacency. Read back to ATC everything that forms the reasons for the actions taken. Remember, we are looking for reasons not to do it, not a reason to do it.
This is my local airport. Back during this time, St. Louis was TWA's main hub. It's a shame that the Cessna pilot got mixed up somewhere and found himself in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Never have two pilots with the same first name in the cockpit, I thought everyone knew this was bad luck.
0:54 - too many randy's in the cockpit!!!
Understandable mistake. Bad day. Very sad
This plane decide to quickly abort takeoff back to airport maintenance luckily no one was injured accept to Cessna.
In this simulation the final actual photo is of a damaged 727. In the simulation the a/c is an MD 80. Flight 427 equipment was not an md 80. (15 1/2 years with Transworld. )
The subtitles are extremely hard to read, it would be nice if you could make the letters bigger or a different color so they would stand out against the video
Or you might need corrective lenses. I'm reading this on a smartphone even with CZcams minimized so i can multitask and i see the words just fine. On some frames, the text is already taking up 50% of the screen, so no, he should not make the letters bigger.
Big airports and lots of crossing intersections, easy to get confused. Even with your taxi diagram in front of you can be confusing add night time to that and a simple taxi instructions can be confusing . Only time it hasn’t been confusing was in the G550 I use to fly with charts up on the screen and your position on the taxi chart via the GPS
ATC should have made sure sure Cessna pilot acknowledged runway 31 since it was rarely used. Would have likely saved 2 lives and a airplane.
RIP to the victims
I thought the title was “Gone Ashtray”
Still, tragic
What happened to Runway 31? Does it still exist now in 2021? Or has it been eliminated from that Airport?
"Runway 31" was a temporary designation for a taxiway to allow GA aircraft to depart from it. It still exists (as taxiway F), but is no longer used for departures.
I personally find the taxiways at major airports quite confusing and irritating. even as a car driver i would be overwhelmed
Even though it was 1994, there is only 1 photo of the accident in existence ?
They probably didn't release pic of the other plane due to being too graphic. With the damage on the bigger plane, it might have hit the cockpit area.
Wow, maybe if the Cessna pilot had repeated back the instructions to the controller this may have been avoided. That should be standard procedure. But, there were factors working against this pilot - RIP two souls.
you release videos on fridays right?
Well, I don't know about you, but I find this whole video extremely confusing. Perhaps if you were to include a taxi chart, a diagram of the airport it might help in visualizing the field and the accident area. I can't even begin to imagine anyone calling the ground controller to inform him/her that he is ready to taxi for departure and receiving a taxi clearance like the one in the video; it just doesn't make any sense... Any instruction to back-taxi and hold in position on an active runway would come from the 'Tower Controller', not the 'Ground Controller'. And, to top it off, I can't seem to find a Runway 31 anywhere on the St. Louis airport. Did there used to be one? No wonder this guy got lost; apparently, the Ground Controller sent him to the Twilight Zone.
I fully expected this to be as gutting, horrifying, and disgusting as the LAX disaster in 1991. While I am grateful that the outcome was less barbaric than the LAX tragedy, it's still really frustrating that this happened whatsoever.
We've all made mistakes.
Would someone plaese point me in the direction of the source for the background music track? Thanks so much
Go to allecs full page and the tracks are listed there
What are those TWA pilots up to these days??
Retired after a long career likely.
Does this guy ever read the comments? How many more times must people say the text is very difficult to read, when a light background comes up? And sometimes the text is so big it takes up almost half the screen. Watch The Flight Channel to see how it should be done🙄🙄 It's a pity because this channel covers a lot of incidents that are not mainstream.
Sir
Try making a video on polish air force flight 101
hello. I was wondering. how can I
download flight simulator 2004 a century of flight?
The re-enactment animation did not show the planes crashing. Did they crash on the ground or while trying to take off?
It had to have been before V=1?
@Liberal Patriot Thanks. It seems I missed a part of this video. Perhaps it was my puter.
That's why it's called No Fault insurance.
1994 seems to have been a bad year for flying.
Total 140 passengers on board
Kinda similar to the Linate case in 2001, but less catastrophic.
Kinda?
When I heard a sound and I saw the wing is still good not destroyd
Ground radar would be helpful. This could easily happen again.
ur?
Sad.
😢
Why are the runways and taxi ways color coded.
What the hell this on the very day as I was born
czcams.com/video/BLUkgRAy_Vo/video.html
Dude, you still havent answered my question, is it Ii-bAy or is Ee-Bay acceptable to pronounce your name?
The thumbnail has the plane over NYC?
Why give the different runways such similar numbers? Why not 30 and 75? Or something? Surely that makes a more obvious distinction
I like the Trump 727 in the background of that last pic
In retrospect, it should have had a clown-sized red tie painted on the vertical stab. One way or the other, it's just plain hard to make a 727-200 look bad. I assume the design spec read something like "Build a really cool-looking airliner... and maybe figure on some performance / payload / range stuff too".
I don't know why airports use such similar numbering for runways. Use odd words that never rhyme or start with the same letter. Apple, Zebra, Popcorn, Litterbox, Origami...
Runways are designated by their magnetic orientation on the compass, which tells pilots in which direction they'll be landing or taking off, which in turn helps with navigation, especially in the landing approach. Landing on Runway 30 means flying in the direction of 300 degrees on the compass. The same runway used in the opposite direction is Runway 12. I do have to admit that I kind of like the idea of landing on Runway Popcorn. Litterbox would give me some pause, although it's a lot better than Junkyard.
@@dblack2630 I didn't know about the magnetic orientation. I prefer my naming approach :) Okay, so how about Popcorn 30?
Japan Airlines Flight 715 next, please!
Please Do Dana Air Flight 992
Gone Astray | 1994 St. Louis Runway Collision
Gone Astray | 1994 St. Louis Runway Collision
Nothing like seeing this fella.
@@C-Midori I know right! So many odd regulars in the comments, I look forward to seeing them every time lol
@@ECEAaronXavierLobo why? There beginning, to become fine annoying...
@@JosephStalin-yk2hd yeah they're quite annoying tbh
…….randy speed at the controls…what could go wrong?
Again a short video concerning the flying part. @Allec: are you busy?