OT Behind Closed Doors - Discovery Channel's Mayday Series

[Guest guest]

Watched a great documentary last night - " Behind Closed Doors " - part

of the Discovery Channel's " Mayday " series - synopsis from their

website here:

" Wed., April 16 at 10 p.m. ET/11 p.m. PT

An explosion rips a gaping hole in the cabin of a brand-new DC-10.

Investigators discover a serious problem with the design of the

plane's rear cargo door and recommend ways to fix it. Two years later,

another DC-10 takes off on a routine flight - only to suffer the exact

same problem, with deadly consequences. The accident could have - and

should have - been prevented. But why wasn't it? "

the story is also documented here

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkish_Airlines_Flight_981

I summarized here based on the Discovery Channel show - apologies if

it's a bit wordy but given the analogy to today's issues I thought it

would be worth posting as i think we can all relate....

June 12, 1972 - American Airlines Flight 96 - McDonnell DC10 -

en-route to Buffalo NY makes an emergency landing in Windsor, Ontario

after the cargo door blows off and they experience " explosive

decompression " in the cabin

March 3, 1974 Turkish Airlines Flight 981 - another DC10 - en-route

to Paris - same problem - this time the decompression blows out the

floor, 2 rows of seats, and destroys the hydraulics and other controls

- the plane hits the ground at 800 km/hour - no survivors

Investigative journalist Eddy visits the crash site of Fight 981

and gets a " heads up " from the transport safety official there to

" have a look at the Windsor incident " . He starts to make the

connection. He finds that after the Windsor incident, the FAA and

McDonnell reach a " gentlemen's agreement " - no " air worthiness

directive " is issued by the FAA (which would ground the aircraft until

repaired and inspected), as this would " shake public confidence " in

the aircraft. MD apparently assures the FAA that they will " look into

it " .

Then as the journalist combs thru volumes of documents related to the

incident, he finds a memo written by Dan Applegate, Director of

Product Engineering for Convair, the McDonnell subcontractor

who built the door - the " Applegate Memorandum " is documented here

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Applegate

" Applegate voiced his concerns to management about potential design

faults in the McDonnell DC-10 aircraft's cargo doors after a

cargo door blew off American Airlines Flight 96, a DC-10, over

Windsor, Ontario, Canada on June 12, 1972 "

" Management believed that his proposed changes would be too costly to

implement and so the necessary changes were never made. Applegate

never 'blew the whistle' and in 1974, a DC-10 aircraft (Turkish

Airlines Flight 981) crashed on the outskirts of Paris, France,

killing all 346 people onboard. It was later ascertained that the

crash was due to the same technical fault Applegate had foreseen two

years prior. "

the memo itself stated that " The fundamental safety of the cargo door

latching system has been progressively degraded since the program

began in 1968... The airplane demonstrated an inherent susceptibility

to catastrophic failure when exposed to explosive decompression of the

cargo compartment in 1970 ground tests "

McDonnell knew from ground tests done 2 years prior to the

original Windsor incident (and their back room dealings with the FAA)

that this was likely to happen - they did nothing. After Windsor,

they simply convinced the agency responsible for public safety to

" keep it quiet " . By 1974, they still had not fixed the problem. 346

people died.

fast forward to today - substitute FAA for FDA, McDonnell for

Merck, Eddy for Kirby - deja-vu....?