Yesterday was the 25th anniversary of the day Air Florida Flight 90 crashed into the Fourteenth Street bridge on takeoff from Washington’s National Airport. On January 13, 1982, seventy-eight passengers, motorists, and crew members died with only a
Air Florida itself didn’t survive the disaster, which was attributed failures in safety protocols associated with deicing. It is considered a significant event in aviation safety history…and the lessons learned from it have prevented many accidents since.
We first learned the details of Air Florida 90 while flying to Florida on Jetblue some years ago in the middle of winter. Perhaps it was not the smartest thing to watch on LiveTV, but it did give us insights into the psychology of flying…and how many variables are involved in the safety of an aircraft.