{"id":409328,"date":"2025-09-09T02:35:10","date_gmt":"2025-09-09T02:35:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/409328\/"},"modified":"2025-09-09T02:35:10","modified_gmt":"2025-09-09T02:35:10","slug":"pilots-final-3-words-before-catastrophic-plane-crash-that-killed-70-world-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/409328\/","title":{"rendered":"Pilot’s final 3 words before catastrophic plane crash that killed 70 | World | News"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cockpit transcripts have revealed that the pilot at the helm of a fatal 1979 plane crash believed he had sufficient time to alter his course before tragically crashing<\/a> into a closed runway.<\/p>\n

The cockpit conversation was from a Western Airlines DC-10\u00a0 jumbo jet disaster<\/a> at Mexico City Airport on 31 October 1979. During the disastrous event, pilot Charles Gilbert crashed into a closed runway, hitting a construction vehicle and a storage building, before immediately bursting into flames.<\/p>\n

The horrific incident claimed the lives of 70 out of the 87 passengers and crew on board, including all three pilots. The news emerges as a man was accidentally decapitated by his best pal in gruesome car accident inspired horror film.<\/a><\/p>\n

The operator of the construction vehicle was also fatally wounded in the collision, reports the Express US.<\/p>\n

Aviation experts informed the NYT that the final cockpit conversation roughly included this exchange:<\/p>\n

Captain: “We’re cleared onto the right, is that correct?”.<\/p>\n

Copilot or engineer: “Yeah, that’s right.”<\/p>\n

Captain: “This is the approach to 23 left.”<\/p>\n

Company rules require that pilots announce every 100 feet below 1,000 feet and every 10 feet below 50 feet. However, the recordings reveal that no announcements were made whatsoever.<\/p>\n

Aviation experts were left baffled as to how an experienced flight crew lost track of their altitude, leading to a devastating crash onto a decommissioned runway.<\/p>\n

Standard protocol dictates that pilots should abort their landing approach in foggy conditions if they cannot see the runway upon reaching a certain low altitude.<\/p>\n

Cockpit transcripts reveal that Captain Gilbert realised he was mistakenly approaching the wrong runway and tried to use the electronic instrument landing system (I. L. S. ) to “sidestep” to the correct runway from 800 feet away.<\/p>\n

Tragically, moments after the final exchange in the cockpit, the aircraft plunged onto the unlit runway as the pilots pushed the throttles to full power in a desperate bid to climb and prepare for another landing attempt.<\/p>\n

However, the aircraft collided with a construction vehicle, swerved onto the closed runway and crashed into a storage unit, bursting into flames.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cockpit transcripts have revealed that the pilot at the helm of a fatal 1979 plane crash believed he…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":409329,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[11501,140902,140903,13,2132,140901,12,14,140900],"class_list":{"0":"post-409328","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-aircraft","9":"tag-charles-gilbert","10":"tag-cockpit-transcripts","11":"tag-headlines","12":"tag-mexico","13":"tag-mexico-city-airport","14":"tag-news","15":"tag-top-stories","16":"tag-western-airlines-dc-10-crash"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115172011048692311","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/409328","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=409328"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/409328\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/409329"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=409328"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=409328"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=409328"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}