From the New York City plane crash that happened shortly after 9/11 to the Charkhi Dadri mid-air collision in India, these aviation accidents shocked and horrified the world.
Ever since the Wright brothers first propelled an airplane into the sky, planes have accidentally fallen to the Earth. Sometimes these crashes involve small planes, with just a few passengers. But the worst plane crashes in history have had far more fatalities. In the deadliest accidental plane crash, the Tenerife Airport Disaster, 583 people perished.
Chillingly, many of the world’s deadliest plane crashes were completely preventable. They were caused by human error, miscommunications, or faulty equipment on the aircraft. And most are fatal for everyone on board — though some, like Japan Air Lines Flight 123, did have a few survivors.
These are the stories of the worst accidental plane crashes to ever occur, from the Tenerife Airport Disaster to the American Airlines Flight 191 incident, the deadliest non-terrorist-related plane crash in U.S. history.
Tenerife Airport Disaster: The Deadliest Accident In Aviation History
FAAKLM Flight 4805 and Pan Am Flight 1736, pictured shortly before the two planes collided.
On March 27, 1977, two planes at Los Rodeos Airport on the island of Tenerife, located in the Canary Islands, prepared to take off. But as the captain of Pan Am Flight 1736 moved into position, he saw another plane, KLM Flight 4805, barreling toward him. “There he is… look at him,” the captain exclaimed in shock. “Goddamn, that son of a bitch is coming!” His first officer shouted, “Get off! Get off! Get off!”
But it was too late. At 5:06 p.m., KLM Flight 4805 crashed straight into Pan Am Flight 1736. Tragically, 583 people were killed — including all of the passengers and crew members aboard the KLM plane — making the Tenerife Airport Disaster the deadliest accident in aviation history.
So how did it happen?
It had been an unusual day from the start. That morning, a terrorist group had detonated a bomb at Las Palmas on the island of Gran Canaria, which caused both planes to be diverted to Los Rodeos Airport. There, the KLM plane and the Pan Am plane were delayed during investigations. By the time they were cleared for takeoff, the passengers and crew members were impatient to leave, even though a heavy fog had descended on the runway.
Dutch National ArchivesThe aftermath of the Tenerife Airport Disaster, one of the worst plane crashes in history.
To make matters worse, both crews were confused about their takeoff plans. The airport had no ground radar, so the Pan Am plane began to taxi blindly toward the KLM plane. Meanwhile, the pilot of the KLM plane, Jacob van Zanten, apparently misunderstood the air traffic controller when they told the pilot, “Stand by for takeoff. I will call you.” According to HistoryNet, van Zanten seemingly only heard the word “takeoff.”
He began moving his plane forward, even as his second officer asked if the Pan Am flight was still on the ground. But it was too late. As the KLM plane broke through the fog, the Pan Am plane tried to get out of its way — and the KLM plane went partially airborne as van Zanten attempted to clear it. Instead, the KLM plane collided into the Pan Am plane.
Joani Feathers, then a 27-year-old on a dream vacation with her boyfriend, Jack Ridout, was aboard the Pan Am plane. Though the young couple couldn’t see the KLM plane, they knew it was somewhere ahead of them in the fog, and Feathers expressed fears of hitting it to Ridout. Her boyfriend joked, “Don’t worry, if he hits us, you won’t feel a thing.”
As it turned out, Feathers and Ridout barely escaped the incident with their lives. They witnessed the gruesome aftermath of the crash, including a woman who was sliced in half. “The plane went up like an atom bomb,” Feathers told the Daytona Beach News-Journal in 2018.
They were among just 61 survivors.
