Back to the clubhouse and armed with the airspace restrictions, I was ready to fly. All of us realized that many people had lost their lives and that there was a bit of mystery surrounding why a relatively new L1011 crashed into the Everglades on a clear, dark night. My mother never told me the flight attendant's name, but she did say that she had suffered a broken back in the crash. On May 11, 1996, the ValuJet Airlines McDonnell Douglas DC-9 operating the route crashed into the Everglades about 10 minutes after taking off from Miami as a result of a fire in the cargo compartment caused by mislabeled and improperly stored hazardous cargo. I don't pretend to understand why it happens. It has a flat bottom and a high seat and a cobweb-draped engine and propeller. Photo credit: Don Boyd of Sun Bird Photos. The oven choices for airlines were either Nordskog or the Bowmar/Calrod brand. Raposa did not have any blankets. [10], Most of the dead were passengers in the aircraft's midsection. After a few minutes they saw the lights of rescue helicopters, circling, searching, much too far east and south. Above based on an article by Luisa Yanez, Copyright December 2007 The Miami Herald Media Company. Of the 176 passengers and crew members aboard Flight 401, 77 survived the initial crash. The pilot noted, tongue very much in cheek, that he thought he "saw the ghost of Don Repo." Brief Synopsis. . It was closing in on midnight on Dec. 29, 1972. In the cockpit, the first of six radio altimeter warnings began, signaling an impending crash. The mud of the Everglades may have blocked wounds sustained by survivors, preventing them from bleeding to death. [25] A television movie of the same name was broadcast in October 1978. It was an easy way to break the monotony of intense study, tour the good old USA and also earn a few bucks and I must emphasize the aspect of the earnings. Isell Delgado 1/23/25 He rescued some terrified folks - he doesn't know how many - before the regular cavalry of official rescuers arrived in helicopters, directed to the carnage by his head lamp. I do recall that some gremlins were on it though and they kept messing up my landing!!!!". No roar of unmuffled high-horsepower engines. You can see the brand name on the oven instruction plate. When Eastern Airlines Flight 401 crashed out of the sky over the Florida Everglades in December 1972 it was without a doubt one of the worst commercial air disasters in American history, with over 100 people losing their lives. This was only about 12 hours after the L1011 crashed! Riding with him were two Federal Aviation Administration officials. She looked into the distance, saw the dim lights of Miami framed against a coal-black horizon and noticed how far away it was. I vaguely remember that we ended up taking a total of five people on that flight. All photos by Southern Airboat, who coordinated the event. [12][13] The training is designed to make problem solving in a cockpit much more efficient, thus causing less distraction for the crew. I wouldnt be a bit surprised if the speed hed been traveling was well over a hundred miles an hour., Leonhard added, The guy weighed around 160, but it still took eight of us carrying a stretcher filled with his dead weight to carry him out. Five hours after the crash, the welcome sounds of voices and legs sloshing through water, labored breathing and flashlight beams probing the dark broke the silence. James followed all of the rules and more often than not, brought home venison for the family each deer season. A Malaysia Airlines flight carrying 298 passengers crashed in eastern Ukraine on Thursday while traveling from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur. Frank Borman called it all a bunch of "crap" and considered suing the producers of the 1978 made-for-TV movie about the ghost stories for libel. An Eastern Air Lines Lockheed L-1011 crashed at 2342 eastern standard time, December 29, 1972, 18.7 miles west-northwest of Miami International Airport, Miami Florida. Whether youre looking for a new reading nook or a rare find, here are all the local shops were booking it to. Makeshift tailgate strip clubs, dog poop versus machete matches and a whole lot alligators in unwanted now = new Date The crash was documented in Rob and Sarah Elder's 1977 book Crash. Off I went to check with the FAA Flight Service Station. Colonel. It crashed into the Everglades 18.7 miles northwest of the airport, eight miles north of Tamiami Trail, about 100 yards east of the L-67 canal levee. It promised to be an exciting week in Miami, especially for people who had bucks for a meal at Joe's Stone Crabs and a night at the Fontainebleau Hotel, where the sexy dancer Ann-Margret was headlining. A glance out a window, after all, would have shown nothing but the black Everglades below. He was a retired aircraft Engineer with Eastern Airlines in Miami, a survivor of the December 1972 crash of the L-1011 in the Everglades, and a Navy veteran of WWII. "The three of us toast to life on that day every year.". It didnt sound like they were in midair anymore. . Raposas survivors became upset. Airline employees began spreading stories of apparitions to the point where Eastern management warned employees that they could face dismissal if caught, and any log book entries about such matters would be removed. She had no first-aid kit. A fireball rushed through the fuselage, and the plane began pinwheeling like a giant Ferris wheel spun loose from its mount. Below Left - In red, stewardess Beverly Raposa at the memorial. They rushed to rescue survivors. Not shown, Sharon Transue (she was taking the photo). With the $250,000 legal settlement, Micale thought he had it made. Two passing pilots saw it and called the airport. Flight 401 flew into the ground on Friday night, Dec. 29, 1972, at 13 seconds past 11:42 p.m. The breakup of the fuselage had freed it from its stowage and activated its inflation mechanism. Bud wants to. He has fallen backwards and his arms are spread apart. Muriel J. Ames 11/30/40 But the passengers were her peopleher responsibilityand it was still her job to help them. The mood was festive as people were leaving the coldness of New York to bring in 1973 on the beaches of Florida. Join FlightAware View more flight history Purchase entire flight history for AAL401. Leonhard hit the gas as he toggled on the blue light and siren. Bud saw bodies strapped into seats upside down in the water. Back in the day, when he spent so much time in the wilderness, only the airplanes overhead reminded him of civilization. The petite brunette stood just 5 feet 1.5 inches tall. Not long after, "ghosts" of Loft and Repo were seen on more than twenty occasions by crew members on other Eastern Tri-Stars, especially those planes which had been fitted with parts salvaged from the Flight 401 wreckage. After about an hour, he saw the first helicopter. A similar situation appeared in the Thai movie Dark Flight, directed by Kongkiat Khomsiri, produced in 2012. It became his navigation beacon. That was a godsend because I got to meet and befriend many of the club members, most of whom were successful small business owners enjoying the fruits of their labor by owning and operating private aircraft (something that is almost cost prohibitive in today's aviation, regulatory and business environments). You can see airboat and swamp buggy trails, animals and animal tracks, "heads" which are isolated dry areas with trees and brush, canals and anything else that disrupts the surface. Like a lot of other aspiring commercial pilots, I had had a checkered aviation career, having worked, among other things, as the full-time chief pilot of a regional oil company while attending college. Ground crew with Eastern Airlines Flight 401 before its fateful flight; Photography courtesy Ron Infantino. Julia Lustig 5/30/25 Abover right - Over 100 airboats participated in the evenet. Jerrold Solomon, who had walked away from the crash unscathed, flew home to New York three days later. She had nothing. Warren Terry 2/16/34 He'd get that look. Flight 401 soared above a primordial swampland filled with poisonous snakes and alligators crawling through razor-sharp sawgrass and open-water sloughs. The landing gear from Flight 401 at the crash site; Photography courtesy Ron Infantino. That was the last transmission before the left wing sliced into the Everglades at 225 mph. An account of the paranormal happenings even appeared in a 1974 issue of the US Flight Safety Foundation newsletter. They were both 26 years old. Official Eastern Air Lines Flight 401 - History, Photos, Survivors and Tribute - Investigation Investigation Later that morning the world woke to news of the tragedy. After the wreckage is removed, salvageable parts from the plane are used to repair other aircraft. His wife Nancy - they married when she was 15 - could always tell when it was on his mind, though. Eastern Air Lines Flight 401 was a scheduled flight from New York JFK to Miami.Shortly before midnight on December 29, 1972, the Lockheed L-1011-1 TriStar crashed into the Florida Everglades, causing 101 total fatalities. [23], According to Robert J. Serling's 1980 book From the Captain to the Colonel: An Informal History of Eastern Airlines, the claim that wreckage from Flight 401 was installed and later removed from other Eastern aircraft was false, and no Eastern employees had ever claimed to have seen or believed in the alleged ghost sightings. Eastern Air Lines CEO (and former Apollo astronaut) Frank Borman termed the ghost stories about the crash "garbage". But he and his helper had 30 pounds of legs. Charles Kuchenbrod 7/16/30 2023-Feb-14. Yes, they are, Raposa assured them. Jorge Gonzalez 1/16/38 If one more time he could harvest a mess of frog legs in the Everglades. Last edited on 22 February 2023, at 02:18, intentional infliction of emotional distress, "Airliner carrying 167 crashes in Everglades", "Giant jetliner goes down in 'gator infested swamp", "Eastern Airlines, Inc. L-1011, N310EA, Miami, Florida, December 29, 1972", "Robert "Bud" Marquis's Obituary on San Francisco Chronicle", "PART TWO: THE CRASH "It felt like a wild rollercoaster ride", "A Lesson on the Importance of Crew Resource Management", "Lessons Learnt from the Crash of Eastern 401", Eastern Flight 401 The Story of the Crash, The Crash of Eastern Air Lines Flight 401-Epilogue, ASN Aircraft accident Lockheed L-1011-385-1 TriStar 1 N310EA Everglades, FL, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Eastern_Air_Lines_Flight_401&oldid=1140849286, This page was last edited on 22 February 2023, at 02:18. Speculation at the club was rampant which is to be expected from a bunch of pilots. It's like it's a charm," she said. Blackness. Little did I expect to see what he actually had. She choked on the acrid fumes from the 43,000 pounds of aviation gas that had spilled from the plane and screamed, Dont light any matches!. In December 1972, there was a deadly | by Verity Partington | The Mystery Box | Medium 500 Apologies, but something went wrong on our end. The Ghost of Flight 401. The warden noted nothing of interest. Luis Bancroft 10/10/48 I saw young couples broken up. They also told me that Bill had been called shortly after he got home by the police department helicopter unit to come back to the airport (the police helicopter unit was based at Opa locka) for emergency flight duty. In recent months Canti and others have made pilgrimages to Bud's screened door to hear his story. Fuller recounts stories of paranormal events aboard other Eastern aircraft and the belief that these were caused by equipment salvaged from the wreckage of Flight 401. He had promised to show a slight acquaintance, Ray Dickinson, how to gig frogs. Leonhard, Raposa, and Infantino never connected during the rescue operation, except for one tenuous bond that drew them together in spirit: the sound of a distant Christmas carol drifting throughthe night. If he saw legs kicking, he turned the seat over. "You didn't have nothing to worry about," he'd tell her, finding a seat on the porch, from where he could hear the barred owls and their singular "who-cooks-for-you" calls, exciting and mournful at once. Unfortunately it did so as a scattered wreck over the marshes of Florida's Everglades. Her face burned from the jet fuel. Hey, whats happening here? the captain shouted. "You couldn't even say goodbye to each . On December 29, 1972, Flight 401 was en route to Miami International Airport but due to a malfunctioning landing gear light and other distractions, plowed into the swampland, making the incident the second deadliest single aircraft disaster in United States history. On the day of the crash, Flight 401 was operated using a Lockheed L-1011-1 TriStar (registration N310EA), which had been delivered to the airline on August 18, 1972. The accident in a nutshell According to the Aviation Safety Network, Eastern Air Lines had 163 passengers and 13 members of crew onboard, totaling 176 occupants altogether. It is featured in season1, episode3, of the TV show Why Planes Crash, in an episode called "Human Error" (2010). Beverly Raposa stumbled out of the nightmarish apocalypse, hurt, disheveled and covered in clumps of dripping swamp grasses. Part 243 - PASSENGER MANIFEST INFORMATION. Bud Marquis had experienced better nights of frogging. I don't remember the take-off or the landing that day, but I vividly remember the meteorological conditions and the crash site. N310EA, the aircraft involved in the accident. He lost interest in his job and just wanted to be alone. Patricia A. Ghyssels 3/31/45 Ways to check-in for your flight including online and on your mobile. Robert A. Loft, then 55 years old, with 30 years experience and 29,700 flight hours under his belt, attempted to lower the landing gear. I lost my boot., Well, Raposa said, Ill help you find it., Thats okay, Raposa said. The Everglades is flat, covered with tall saw grass and immersed in water that ranges from a few inches deep to three to four feet deep in some areas. Stick with the book. Perhaps the most extraordinary and credible research into the ghost phenomenon ever documented is the so-called "Ghosts of Flight 401."On December of 1972, an Eastern Airlines Tri-Star jetliner, Flight 401, crashed into a Florida swamp.Read the accident report (PDF). The silence was broken only by the intermittent croaking of bullfrogs and the occasional rustle of tall reeds as an unseen creature passed through them. Of five survivors The Herald located this week, three talked freely about Flight 401. He'd see the lights and hear the roar as the jets climbed into the black night over the swamp or descended toward Miami International Airport. Bud revved up the engine and headed northwest. [5]:3, The flight was routine until 23:32, when the airplane began its approach into Miami International Airport. While the Flight Crew tried to troubleshoot the faulty indicator, the steering yoke was accidentally nudged, causing a function of the autopilot to begin a . John G. Fuller, the best-selling author of The Ghost of Flight 401, carried out an investigation into the hauntings with the aid of several cautious airline personnel. This quote, which was obviously a joke, was presented in the Ghost of Flight 401 as fact. On the clear, moonless night of Dec. 29, 1972, a young rookie game warden sat behind the steering wheel of a light-green 1969 Plymouth four-door sedan with a blue gumball emergency light mounted on the rooftop. Was closing in on midnight on Dec. 29, 1972, at 13 seconds 11:42. 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