Lesser Known Aviation Mysteries

Hello everyone, welcome back to another episode of side projects. These are all

lesser

-

known

aviation

mysteries

. Not Amelia Earhart. Here these are ones you probably haven't heard of. Most of us are, at least in part, familiar with well-

known

aviation

mysteries

like Amelia. Earhart's utter disappearance in 1937, the loss of US Navy Flight 19 over the Beauty Triangle in 1945, that too, and of course Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 that disappeared in 2014. It's been seven years now, where does he spend his time? That said, regional and long-haul flights became common after the Wright Brothers flew just a few feet above the ground at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, in 1903.

Dozens of military and civilian aircraft crashed and disappeared in strange circumstances, however, if faulty design, mechanical problems, and pilot error are Often the culprits in many incidents are shrouded in rumors, misinformation, competing theories, and espionage. Industrial theft. Dire insurance payments and religious fervor. Sometimes they also factor into the equation, also in the case of the Bermuda Triangle, which is not really something that people like. It's a giant sea monster. It's not just any case, missing planes and crashes often baffle investigators and in many cases the truth remains almost perpetually obfuscated, so now let's look at four

lesser

-known aviation mysteries as of late May 2003, a Boeing 727 that once belonged to American Airlines.

It was stolen from the 4 de Febero airport in Luanda Angola, prompting a series of investigations by the FBI and local authorities. The narrow-body trimotor 727-223 was manufactured in 1975, but after more than two decades carrying passengers for US airlines it was purchased by the Miami-Florida-based aerospace sales and leasing company, which was already past its prime as people transporter, ended up in Angola, where its seats were removed and replaced with large tanks capable of holding almost 14,000 US gallons of diesel fuel that it regularly transported to the region's mines with a maximum gross takeoff weight close to 200,000 pounds. , i.e. about 91,000 kilograms, the plane had a range of about 1,500 miles or 2,400 kilometers, but although the plane had been working as a fuel carrier for some time, it had been leased in various ways to other airlines, including tag Angola Airlines, Angola's state airline, however at the time of its mysterious disappearance it was apparently being modernized once again, I guess they just couldn't decide what to do with it this time for another local airline and it had been sitting on the tarmac For more than a year, during which time its owners allegedly racked up more than $4 million in airport fees that they simply did not pay in documents later released by the FBI, the plane was described as unpainted, silver in color with a stripe of blue. , white and red, in other words, the colors of American Airlines minus the letters.

The story goes that on May 25, 2003, at approximately 5 pm local time, just as the sun was setting, two men stealthily boarded the huge passenger plane. An airport employee reported seeing a person boarding. the plane, while others stated that they had seen two men, one believed to be an experienced American pilot and flight engineer, Ben Padilla, who was not certified to fly a 727, but I mean, if you're stealing one, I guess that who cares. The other was a Congolese mechanic named John Matuantu with Padilla at the controls and Matuantu monitoring the engines and vital systems. The plane's engines came to life and taxied erratically toward the runway without any proper communication or authorization.

Air traffic controllers at the tower repeatedly tried to make contact but had no luck because there were no lights, it lined up and took off heading southwest over the Atlantic Ocean before disappearing during the investigation. Padilla's sister admitted that her family suspected that he was involved, that he had been forced to steal the plane against her will, and that the plane had most likely crashed because he was not able to blow it up I guess certification actually matters. I had no idea. I guess I thought he could fly the plane, but maybe he wasn't certified. I don't know the US authorities. discovered that prior to the time Padilla had been caught in an accounting fraud scheme and that he was deeply in debt and in constant fear of prosecution and retaliation from those from whom he had stolen money after the disappearance, several sightings were reported in distant countries such as Sri Lanka, Nigeria and Guinea, but although they were examined, investigators found no evidence that any of them were true.

Almost a decade later, Air and Space magazine published an article re-examining the event surrounding the disappearance, but a Despite extensive investigation and interviewing many of those involved, they were also unable to draw any concrete conclusions. On Friday, November 8, 1957, just before noon, Pan Am Flight 7 took off from San Francisco International Airport bound for Honolulu, The Boeing 337 Strata cruise ship, nicknamed Romance of the Skys, was embarking on a multiple voyage. -Around-the-world flight stopped between California, Hawaii, and finally Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, but after taking off from the West Coast, the massive Pratt Whitney radial-engine airliner was never seen again with nearly four dozen on board, including passengers and crew, the globe-trotting bear moth disappeared and the search and rescue effort that followed was the largest since the disappearance of Amelia Earhart in June 1937.

Loaded with enough fuel for nearly 13 hours of flight at approximately 260 miles per hour, the 147,000-pound plane climbed to its cruising altitude of 10,000 feet. The plane crew made their last scheduled communication shortly after 5 pm that afternoon and less than 2 hours later the company alerted the coast guard that they had not returned at 6 pm in response to the merchant vessels, Warships, submarines, coast guards, and several planes were sent to mark huge swaths of the Pacific Ocean north and east of Honolulu, convinced that the plane might still be afloat if it had been able to make a relatively soft landing.

Pan American sent another strata cruiser loaded with supplies that could be air-dropped. to the survivors, as well as a Douglas DC-7 that carried enough fuel to search for more than 15 hours, but those small remains were detected, it was not until days later that a navy ship recovered 15 bodies, most of which They were alive. jackets and had serious injuries such as lacerations, burns and broken bones, watches were also found on some of the bodies, it stopped around 4:30 indicating what time the plane had gone down and post-recovery autopsies determined that many They had high levels of carbon monoxide in their systems pointing to faulty exhaust and ventilation systems, but despite the presence of toxic gases and physical trauma, it was determined that most of the victims had died from drowning, meaning that They had been alive while in the water for Pan Am, the FBI, and Civil Aeronautics. broad predecessor of the national transportation safety board or ntsb determining the cause of the accident was particularly complicated and foul play was suspected not only were no distress calls made but the wreckage was well outside the normal flight path One theory centered on a disgruntled airline employee named Eugene Crossway, who may have sabotaged the plane as revenge for contracting tuberculosis while working on the company's seaplanes in the east.

Furthermore, Crosswade was still distraught over the death of his wife three months earlier and was apparently so convinced that her daughter-in-law had murdered her that he reported her to the local sheriff. Investigators also investigated whether anyone on board had made any abnormal life insurance purchases and discovered the interesting case of a 41-year-old man named William Payne, the owner of a hunting lodge in California allegedly flying to Hawaii to Collecting a business debt Payne had taken out three life insurance policies just before flying and previously worked in the explosives and demolitions business, but the prospect was abandoned when it was discovered that his plane ticket cost more than the debt itself.

It is also well known that Strata cruisers had a number of persistent mechanical problems, including oil pressure problems and overspeed holocal propellers that, under certain circumstances, could throw their blades. Air travel in the past was super dangerous despite a series of promising leads in early 1959, civil aeronautics. The board ruled that no definitive cause of the accident could be determined and the case was closed. On the morning of June 5, 1969, a four-engine Boeing RC-135E radar and reconnaissance aircraft known as the Rivet Amber departed the base of the shemya air force alaska ilson afb on a non-operational mission with 19 personnel on board designated irene 92 at 9:36 a.m. local time, less than an hour after departure, Shenya controllers at Elmendorf AFB in Anchorage received a message that the plane was experiencing vibrations of unknown origin but that the plane was under control.

Minutes later, Elmendorf controllers asked for confirmation of that the crew was not declaring an in-flight emergency and they received a non-verbal radio click in response, followed by suspicious grunts and heavy breathing, followed by more clicks and the words crew go to oxygen the troubled crew transmitted additional clicks for almost an hour. hour after which there was no further communication even between the enigmatic and high-value air force inventory. Ember Rivet was a unique bird, specifically because it carried the world's most powerful airborne radar designed to track Soviet ICBMs from up to 300 miles away - in fact, it was so powerful that Soviet fighters and interceptors were usually ordered to stay As far as possible from the amber rivet developed by hughes industries the seven megawatt phased array radar added an additional 35,000 pounds to the overall weight of the aircraft and cost more than 35 million or about $300 million today, which making it the most expensive military aircraft of its time, but despite its impressive capabilities, the radar caused the plane many problems, in addition to putting undue stress on the engines.

It required so much energy to run and produced so much heat that they added an extra generator and radiator When the amber rivet went silent that paper day, a massive search was launched, multiple planes from bases in Alaska and the West Coast searched for weeks. but no remains were ever found, the search was eventually called off and to this day the fate of the plane remains a mystery, although it is most likely that the plane went down due to mechanical problems. Widespread theories abound, including those that the Russians are unhappy with the nearby airspace. borders are being happily marauded by a technological marvel while there is no evidence to support this claim, those who make it often point to the fact that if that were the case, the US government would probably cover it up to save face. , whatever happened to the amber rivet.

It was the last aircraft of its type to fly and more than five decades after its disappearance it remains one of aviation's most enduring mysteries. Egypt Air Flight 990 took off from Los Angeles, California, on the afternoon of October 31, 1999 before stopping in New York City and continuing on to Cairo, the long-range Boeing 767-3666 had two crews. separated for the long transatlantic portion of the flight, which was scheduled to last about 10 hours as planned. It took off from John F. Kennedy International Airport around 1:20 in the morning. After a 30-minute flight, it had descended to an altitude of 33,000 feet, but just a few minutes before 2 a.m. the plane began a series of erratic headings and Elevation changes first dived rapidly to approximately 16,000 feet at an angle of nearly 40 degrees during which time it accelerated to more than 750 miles per hour, much faster than the airframe was designed to go for just one minute.

Afterwards, the rapid descent stopped and the plane began to gain altitude again, this time reaching 25,000 feet before changing course and then the plane began its final and fatal descent. It traveled so fast that one of its engines came off. the gondola mounted on the wing and fell into the sea. All 237 on board, 203 passengers and 14 crew died instantly when the plane did the same.moments after the accident occurred on international flights. In marine waters it was initially investigated by the Egyptian Ministry of Civil Aviation, the ECAA, as well as by the United States National Transportation Safety Board, the NTSB;

However, citing inadequate funding and lack of experience, Egypt later turned over the investigation to the NTSB in its entirety, nearly 70 of the remains, including the cockpit voice. The recorder or black box was recovered from only 230 feet of water and just a few weeks into its investigation, the ntsb determined that the accident had been caused by operator intervention and was likely intentional and not accidental with a possible crime or terrorist event. in your hands. The NTSB proposed handing over the investigation to the FBI, but as was its right under international aviation agreements, the Egyptian government refused and the NTSB continued alone from the plane's black box.

It was determined that the first officer and relief co-pilot, Gamel Albertuti, had insisted on taking over the co-pilot's seat just 20 minutes after takeoff, then the pilot left the cockpit to relieve himself, after which the autopilot shut down. manually and the plane made its first erratic dive; in fact, the dive was so fast and violent that it apparently created zero gravity conditions inside the fuselage stumbling back to the cockpit the astonished captain repeatedly asked what was happening what is happening in arabic albatuti answered clearly i trust god there was additional evidence that The pilot and co-pilot were fighting over the controls, that is, because the right and left elevators in the tail were placed in opposite directions, one for climb on the pilot's side and the other for descent on the pilot's side.

Albertutti, then the engines turned off and moments later the electrical system failed; Among those on board were a large contingent of Egyptian military officers who simply completed training exercises in the US, their presence led some to suspect that the flight had been targeted by Egypt's enemies, i.e. Israel, although evidence was never presented to support that claim, as the country's official airline, Egypt Air, was an icon of national pride and the The ntsb's findings were far from popular, the ecaa later carried out its own investigation and issued a report vehemently rejecting the possibility that albatuty had caused the accident;

Instead, the Egyptians determined that sheared rivets and one of the elevator control mechanisms caused the plane's erratic maneuvers and that everyone in the cabin was working together to regain control until the moment it hit the water, so on that note I'm not going to ask if you enjoyed the video, but I hope you found it interesting, if so please use the like button below. Don't forget to subscribe and as always thanks for watching.