Delta Air Lines Flight 191 was destined for Los Angeles from Fort Lauderdale with a stopover at Dallas-Fort Worth. The Lockheed L-1011 TriStar departed from Florida's Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport at 4:03 PM eastern daylight time. There were 152 passengers and 11 crew members on board the airplane.
The weather was clear in Florida but thunderstorms were detected as the plane flew over Louisiana and started its descent. The pilot changed the flight path in order to avoid the approaching turbulent weather.
Events Leading to the Crash of Delta Airlines Flight 191
The weather at Dallas was worsening and a thunderstorm was forming. It was difficult to detect the storm because it was contained within a cluster of large, white clouds. The thunderstorm was not picked up on the equipment at the National Weather Office in Dallas.
Captain Price, the pilot of Flight 191, followed landing instructions from air traffic control and proceeded to fly through the clouds. As the plane descended with the landing gear engaged, the pilots started to see flashes of lightning in the clouds.
Within the storm a microburst had formed, which was not detected. A microburst is a column of sinking air that produces damaging and erratic winds on the ground. Sudden changes in wind speed and wind direction over a small area is known as wind shear. A microburst has the strength of a tornado but doesn’t have converging winds like a funnel cloud.
At the end of the runway assigned to Flight 191, a severe updraft had formed and it was not picked up on weather instruments in the airplane or on the ground. The violent winds had created dangerous conditions for the pilots.
Based on a report by Chris Kilroy at Air Disaster.com, the following activities occurred in the cockpit of Flight 191:
- When the plane descended to an altitude of 800 feet, it picked up speed without the pilots touching any controls. The projected landing speed of the plane was 149 knots but the plane accelerated to 173 knots. Captain Price closed the throttles in order to slow down the plane.
- By this time, Captain Conners realized that the sudden acceleration of the plane was caused by wind shear and told Captain Price to open the throttles. The aircraft picked up speed then dropped down to 133 knots. The plane started to speed up as the throttles kicked in to full speed and the pilots were relieved to see an increase. All of a sudden the speed dropped to 119 knots.
- In order to avoid a stall, the pilots pushed the nose over and their vertical speed increased. It was too late. The ground proximity warning system sounded an alarm and that was the last form of communication from the cockpit before crashing.
The Aftermath of the Crash of Delta Airlines Flight 191
The aircraft hit the ground north of runway 17L at the Dallas-Fort Worth Airport and then bounced back into the air and crossed over State Highway 114. When the plane struck the ground again, one of the engines hit a car on the highway and killed the driver.
The plane skidded into the airfield at Irving, Texas before hitting two 4-million-gallon water tanks at the ground speed of 200 knots. The plane burst into flames upon impact. The rear section of the aircraft broke away before the plane collided with the water tanks and some people from this section survived the crashed.
The final death toll, according to Absolute Astronomy was, “ 8 of 11 crew members and 126 of the 152 passengers on board and one person on the ground: a total of 135 deaths.”
Investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board of Flight 191
The NTSB concluded that the cause of the crash of Delta Airlines Flight 191 was due to pilot error and to extreme weather phenomena caused by microburst-induced wind shear.
The NTSB also recognized the inability of aircraft radar equipment to detect wind changes and microbursts. At the time, only thunderstorms could be detected. As a result, NASA developed and tested on-board Doppler radar for airplane cockpits that are capable of detecting wind shear conditions. All commercial airplanes are now equipped with this device.
Crash of Delta Air Lines Flight 191 on Film
- The crash of Delta Air Lines Flight 191 was told in a Discovery Channel production of Invisible Killer and National Geographic Channel production of Slammed to the Ground in their Mayday series.
- The Weather Channel produced an account of the crash of Delta Flight 191 in an episode of When Weather Changed History.
- The made for television movie, Fire and Rain chronicled the crash of Delta Flight 191.
It is interesting to note that there have been five airline disasters with a flight number of 191. Some airlines no longer use flight number 191 in their schedules.
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