It wasn’t until I was already an adult that my father happened to mention that he should have been on this plane. He decided the day before the flight that he would ride with one of his coworkers back home. This way he would help his friend drive the 12 hour trip from Salinas, Ca. to Calexico, Ca. He had never mentioned the horrible coincidence to my mother or any of his family so as not to upset us at the time. Something like that could really haunt you I would imagine.
@@Eddie_000 it may take about 8 hrs now but in 1978 it would have taken way longer because the roads and the fastest routes may have been different, and the car would also have been slower ig
My younger brother attended St.Augustine HS down the street from the crash. He and some classmates were the first to arrive on scene. Their gymnasium was used as a temporary morgue that morning. He came home that day with his lower pants legs and shoes covered in dried blood. I never heard him talk about that day, not once.
Thanks for the "re-run" of these season 11 episodes from 2012! In the noughties and 2010s, Mayday was one of the best shows on TV. It was educational and extremely well produced. Some of the younger viewers here seem to believe these are new episodes, which goes to show how well they stand the test of time.
Yeah I watched this episode for the first time when I was 16 in 2013. I was big into the show at that time and it's really cool to have them reuploaded!
I disagree. They give the wrong impressions, leave out details and often oversimplify the conditions. Bad education is not wise or helpful. The flying public still has no understanding of aviation or airlines.
My father had a reservation on this flight. He decided at the last minute to drive instead because it was a nice day that day. My stepmom had to tell my mom my father had driven instead because my mom was freaking out about what was she gonna tell us. My dad cheated fate that day. He lived another eight years before dying from brain cancer when I was 18.
This took place just blocks from my house. I was in Highschool and 1st period had just begun when we felt the explosion. We ran outside of class and could see the smoke in the sky in the direction of our neighborhood. We took off and witnessed the aftermath. I'll never forget the sights and sounds of that day
I was impacted by this tragedy in two ways. I was a 19y/o college student, at Southwestern College. It’s about 25 miles from the impact zone. I recall standing on a low wall, about 3 to 3-1/2 feet high. Also the wall was on a slight berm. This allowed me to sort of gaze over the single story classroom building. It was around 9am, on a warm, sunny morning. I was enjoying the sun on my shoulders, as the class I had come out of was very cold. The A/C was on, when it was not warm enough yet. A thermostat malfunction. I was waiting for my next class to start. Waiting for the prof to show up. They were running late. I was looking sort of North/West, when suddenly there was a very large, black, mushroom cloud rising up. But, I did not know where. In fact, it was coming from the area of San Diego known as North Park. Judging from the size of the black column I knew it was not good, whatever it was. I said a quick prayer that asked for wellness and protection for anyone involved. After that class I was waiting for, I learned it was an airliner down in San Diego. This was jarring for me, but, facts would be slow coming for me as I went sbout the rest of my school day. About two years later, I was a Reserve Police Officer, in Chula Vista, Ca. . Same city as the college I was attending. My very first field training officer, FTO, was the husband of one of the flight attendants aboard Flight 182. He was settling up his personal affairs, selling the house they shared. He retired earlier than he planned. But, he felt he had to leave the area. Just being there was destroying his life, he told me. Those two things have stayed vivid in my mind, some 45 years later.
You should be a writer, your attention to detail made that a fun read. THe fact that you had these experiences is sad and amazing. Thanks for that post.
@cw2gtc WOW. You're 4 or so years older than I am. I was on the other side of the country. Deerfield Beach, Florida. However, this has been stuck to me for decades. I'm 61 now. Soon be 62 if allowed to. One thing always gripping me.....the TERRIBLE horror those people endured. Especially, those on the starboard side who saw it and then the flames. Maybe felt the heat? That wasn't any amusement park roller coaster ride.....it was a totally preventable dive to a horrific loss of so many people.
I live 2.5 blocks from the impact site in North Park. There is a curb area that is still messed up. The explosion of the crash seemed to have bounced over the two closest houses and landed on the houses past that. Whenever I hear a low plane over my house I run outside to check on what is going on. Every anniversary I go to the site and say a prayer.
We lived across the freeway from you (37th). My wife heard the midair collision, looked out to see the airliner in flames, got on the ground with the dog and heard the almost endless explosions. Very sad day.
I lived in mission beach at the time, did time everywhere around from OB to PB LJ and so forth and own a triplex in clairemont now but all this time I’ve been doing 17yrs as ground control for delta AA virgin America and Alaska at SAN so I’m very familiar and know the airspace and airport well. It’s a tight spot and airfield.
In the 70s, I was an air traffic controller in the army. I remember this extremely well. it said chills through me and the horror did not go unnoted (in ATC school 1976)
I will never forget that day. I lived in the county and my paternal aunt lived in the North Park neighborhood where the plane crashed. She saw it coming towards her house and thought she was done for. She and her home survived. A few years later a plane went down in the Metairie Louisiana neighborhood where a second maternal aunt lived. She had a similar experience seeing the plane hurtling toward her. She too survived. May all those who perished rest in peace.
I was at the Crashing location 15 minutes before , I was looking for a rental at the corner where the plane crashed. Our apartment was located at Hawthorne and 30th street. In my way to work, I stop to look at the house for rent, It was to small for us so , I continue my way to my office , when I arrived my boss asked me; Do you live in North Park ? I answered yes, well a plane crashed occurred 15 minutes ago… The rest is History . I still keep the original newspaper from that day. I still remember this event as it would it happened yesterday.
@@rc70ys I agree with you 100%. As a business owner, when you do things with many employees at the same time, there is a lot of "kids-Play" in my experience. I think that the video showed this going on in the back, which I could imagine it going on in the cockpit also. What do you think. Sad story for all, but mostly the ones on the ground. I thought I might try to nose down into a street, so I didn't take out so many innocent people and property on the ground, if possible ???
My husband was on a training flight over Balboa park when the accident happened. He said he had been listening to the communications and realized PSA was coming into Lindbergh. He looked up and saw PSA coming down in flames. It felt so close they took evasive action. He keyed the mike and told the controller who told him they had everything under control. He flew back to SEE and canceled the rest of his flights for the day as he was not feeling well after witnessing the crash. A few hours later he got a phone call from the FAA.
I'll never forget this, We lived in the area and our home was destroyed. Lucky none of us were home. My father was a pilot in the navy at the time, Mom was at work.
yep, i was 18, and had arrived after a 3 day drive from detroit. I was so tired i just slept in the car, when I woke up to the radio saying a plane just crashed, I looked out and saw the column of smoke about 5 or 6 miles from where i was! Can't believe it was 46 years ago! yikes!
I used to live about 1/4 mile west of the PSA jet crash site, just off Dwight street. Sometimes I would walk by the site and there were still broken pieces of concrete missing from the sidewalk and curbs where the jet hit.
I just started college and was renting a house only a few miles from where the PSA jet crashed in North Park. I remember it was a beautiful, clear end of summer day. I didn't have classes until later that day and I was at the kitchen sink washing some dishes in front of a window facing the direction of the crash. I heard a loud, bass/deep boom. About 20 minutes later I was heading out to go class and I saw a thick, black cloud of smoke from the direction of the boom. I soon found out about the crash. It was such a horrific and needless loss of life.
NTSB investigator Wally Funk was one of the Mercury 13, the women tested to become NASA astronauts, and finally made it into space at age 82 in 2021 aboard Blue Origin's suborbital flight.
I still remember when this happened. It was shortly before I reported to Navy RTC. Being from Sacramento, I actually flown that route to San Diego more than a few times. It’s bad enough flying into Lindbergh Field; but the old barracks used to be right below the glide path. Every other minute was a jet landing. That photo was the most iconic and chilling of that year; if I recall correctly, the Pilot said that they were going down, and the response was simply “We’ll send the Equipment”.😢
I was in the 11th grade attending San Diego High School which is located in downtown San Diego. We were between classes when we saw the plane coming down. Very surreal, I will never forget this day
My youngest son just graduated from SDHS 2 years ago😊 I've never heard of this crash. I'm amazed this happened. First it was the McDonalds massacre now this. SD has some dirty secrets it appears🤔🤷🏾♀️
Everyone in San Diego old enough to remember that accident will never forget it. The smoke could be seen well over 20 miles away. TV and radio programming with a news reporter stopped their programming and covered this. Everything stopped in San Diego.
I was working for Pacific Southwest Airlines’ Frequent Flyer department when the airline’s second tragedy occurred: an armed, irate ex-employee caused the flight he was on to crash near San Luis Obispo, with the loss of everyone aboard. My supervisor volunteered to be on the team that notified relatives of the people who died, something I always respected her for. PSA was sold to U.S. Air - now itself just a memory - not long afterwards, and those famous smiles on the planes were subsequently painted-over. For my time there, it was a great place to work.
This is really dark so trigger warning, but your comment just made me realize it would take for osama bin Laden shooting up a school for us to have safety at the schools we send our children to.
I lived very near Templeton at that time, and my parents were volunteer firefighters who went to the scene. They were in shock coming home. They said it was the worst thing they had ever seen. Nothing but tiny bits left of all the passengers and crew.
i was 6 yrs old on that day when that jet liner crashed into part of my school, and the neighborhood it was in .... i can still remember the impact i heard when that cesna hit the psa jet. i remember watching the jet liner on fire at that point dropping out of the sky towards me and the other children also at school that day
Do you know if they restricted any small planes in the airspace that day or if any PSA flights would have been cancelled following the accident? I'm sure a lot of their employees were in no condition to work that day. 😥 Did you know what happened before you landed in SD?
@@DannyGoldingTV I do not know if small plane traffic was restricted. I knew about the crash before leaving Reno. The flight I took in the afternoon was very somber, no one spoke during the entire flight except for expressions of sorrow and condolences to the PSA crew. I was supposed to be on a morning flight but booked a later flight since I overslept that morning. I did not call my parents, so they did not know if I was on flight 182. I was not able to call them until I arrived in San Diego (no cell phones in those days), so they were pretty freaked out.
@aragonmrk Thanks for the reply. I was born in 97 but seeing the old PSA commercials and their old photos, they seemed like a cool airline to fly. Provably a similar vibe to Southwest now a days!
I was working in a travel agency in 1978. We sold a ticket to a business traveler for this flight. Long before cell phones, when the plane landed in LAX he got off to use a pay phone to re-confirm the meeting in San Diego. The secretary said that the guy he was scheduled to meet had to make an unexpected trip to Orange County, down the coast from LAX and would continue up to LAX to meet him there. Fortunately for our customer he didn't get back on the plane to San Diego.
Wow that's crazy! Did you ever talk to the customer after the accident? I would be interested in knowing the story of when he realized what happened to the flight he was just on!
@@DannyGoldingTV He called us to let us know he hadn't gotten back on the plane at LAX. He sounded quite matter-of-fact about it, but he was probably quite shaken up. Back then we didn't have computers so we didn't yet know about the crash or if we had any passengers on that flight. A few years before I went to work there the agency had lost two passengers on an Ozark Airlines flight.
@Cary-pc4rm I saw someone leave a comment on a different vid of PSA 182 and they said they were also on the first leg of the flight from Sacramento to LAX. I feel like flying between LAX and San Diego was probably more common than since it would have been really cheap!
My Mother and Aunt were supposed to be on that plane but they decided to take a later flight that day. We lived in Bonita. I remember it well. We were freaked out thinking Mom and Connie were on the flight. They finely contacted us. I still have PTSD when I hear this story. I mourned for everyone affected by this terrible tragedy.
I have never forgot this accident as my wife and I were heading that morning to the navy base to start her paperwork to check out of the Navy. My sister lived in the area and thought her neighborhood was hit but that wasn’t the case. My heart went out to all that was involved.
My sister in law was a stewardess. They were in Sacramento and one of the stewards asked to switch flights as he was to get home. She was with the entire crew night before. We all knew she could be on that plane, she called home to let family know she’s alive.
The sad thing was that a group of flight attendants were on the 727 and coming into San Diego...all were lost in the collision mishap. At the airport, many PSA flight attendant ladies who were friends and cried together in the terminal as they heard the bad news. I saw the ladies and I wanted to comfort them in their anguish and heart ache. Yet, I did not know what to say nor what to do. Such a sad time.
I was a young sailor based across the bay at NAS North Island. I was waiting outside the base exchange with a group of about 20 people waiting for it to open at 0900. One of the guys shouted, "Look" as the collision occurred. We all just stood in horror as the jet fell almost vertical into the city.😢
46 Years later as a native San Diegan and there are details about this disaster that I never heard until now! The only thing most people heard was there was a communication issue between the tower and one of the planes.
A photographer I knew had driven over from Helix HS that day, and taken pictures of the scene. He told us a little of what he saw, but would never show us any of the prints of what he took.
@kurtkensson2059 Many of my coworkers at the Zoo lived in that neighborhood. Those who did had major emotional trauma over what they saw when they bailed from the Zoo and drove home to check on their loved ones and homes. Fortunately, having occurred a little after 9 AM, many people who lived in the destroyed homes, were at work. None of my coworkers lost anyone or their home, but they described what horrors they witnessed that morning.
@@denisegillen1845 About 10 years later, I worked at Dean's Photo with a woman who'd been a PSA flight attendant at that time. (Probably still called "stewardesses" back then!) Being San Diego-based, she knew most of the crew and employees who'd been on that flight. She told me it was a very difficult time for the company, as close-knit as they all were.
because of this accident the only place instructors can fly now is out in east county over alpine and pine valley near my house. they fly for hours on end going around in mindless circles. on the weekends they fly out on the fuel they rip off from their students.
In my college English class here in San Diego county, one of my classmates wrote a paper of witnessing the crash from his high school. It was two years out from the crash. Haunting and so tragic.
In 1984 I flew a Cessna 150 with my instructor from Riverside to Lindberg and it was quite hectic landing in between two big jets, taxi back for take of and taking off avoiding wake turbulance etc.
try doing touch n go's in clients' planes (i was a propeller airman) that youre not familiar with- especially multi-engine stuff. they would give me a brief in-service after i installed their prop(s) and we were off to the races. scariest was a rockwell aero commander AC690C and the owner's 13-year-old son gave me a briefing beforehand. i had that thing upside down over gillespie field- taking off in it was like being in a dragster.
Hi Stephen, Can you please tell me? Wouldnt the Instructor be at fault too because he was training the student pilot? Or did the student change course quickly and it was too late to correct? Thank you
I was driving home from school on Int.5 taking Sea World Drive exit,when we seen the PSA fall out of the sky in flames,when I watched the news I was devistaded.That image haunts me all the time!
I watched the collision from my apartment on Florida St. September 30,1978, 9am. When the 727 hit the ground, the impact felt like a bomb going off, followed by a black mushroom cloud. Ran to the scene but there was no one help. Human life is fragile, cherish it...
As a lay person i just find it strange to allow training flights across commercial paths and more so if they're letting student pilots fly blind in training
They don’t anymore since that dreadful day! The paths may be close but at different altitudes now where THIS kind of crash will hopefully never happen again.
I was flying from CVR to CRQ that day. Seal Beach v23 Oceanside and had just entered downwind for RNY 24 at Palomar. It was a gorgeous San Diego day with unlimited visibility. We asked tower if they knew about or saw the black smoke to the south? They had not. We landed and the rest is history 👨✈️🙏🏻
I lived 6 blocks from the crash site. I slept through it. A friend was a first responder. He was making a service call right in the area. He was a veteran of Viet Nam. A medic. But he said he had never seen anything like it. He couldn’t take it and left the site He said there was no one to save.
I feel they shouldn't have allowed training flight Cessna into the busy routes. Probably, this is the main reason for collision. Traning flight and passenger jet shouldn't be allowed on the same zone.
Was a different 'world' aviation wise back then. Today, and for a long time, I'm certain prop planes don't use Lindbergh, as its commercial jet activity has grown so much.
Agreed! It’s mind blogging that they would allow a small Cessna with a training flight no less to share the same airspace as commercial planes. That sounds insane. I’m surprised there haven’t been more accidents… well there was a similar accident a few years later at LAX where sadly a plane crashed into the city of Cerritos, CA and all perished.
They did mention at the end of the video that because of this accident, they now divert small plane traffic away from this area, which they should have been doing anyway since it is such a busy area.
As a result of this accident the NTSB recommended the airspace requirements around San Diego Lindbergh field be changed. Since that time the Airspace has evolved into Class B. An plane must receive a Clearance to fly into the airspace. If the controller cannot work you safely into the Class B airspace they will instruct you to "Remain Clear of Class B". However, there are times when areas of Class B are not busy and it is safe for smaller aircraft to transit the area. Some may choose to land at San Diego Lindbergh, but it is typically more convenient to use one of the other airports.
Rare but they will change take off and landing directions and landing strips at SAN. I’m 17yr airline employee there , here, at SAN. Delta AA Alaska and virgin America loved the job all those years 🤙
@@claudiametzger306 I don’t know, I’m male. And not a pilot. I don’t assume because of my gender that I can read the minds and actions and future behaviors of the opposite gender 😉😂
I lost my division officer on that flight. He had only reported aboard a couple of weeks prior and was on his way to San Diego for some supplimental training. We knew something was up when the training command reported that he never arrived and soon after our Corpsman received a request for his dental records.
I lived off El Cajon Blvd, a friend and I were outside talking , he saw the collision, I swear I heard screaming. We we drove over there to help. We guided people out of some smashed up houses, some people were in a daze just wandering, we sat them down, tried calm them. Some just sitting their car, we pulled one lady from a 2 floor apt building as it was beginning to burn. Everything burned so fast.
Donna - God bless you for your kind, generous and calm help at the crash site. It would seem you had the mental strength to be an EMT. I know I would likely have been a real basket case if I'd gone down there at that time! You are a real hero! Sincerely from one San Diegan to another, Meggie Ulrich 💔😥💔🙏✝️🙏❤🏅❤
A similar accident occurred in Indiana in 1969. A jet was descending to land at Indianapolis and collided with a single engine plane. This happened over a rural farming area, so there were no fatalities on the ground. But sadly there were no survivors from either plane.
Thank you again MayDay for explaining the unexplainable.... A great episode (although I prefer more technical episodes). Very sad. Hopefully advances in technology can prevent tragedies such as this one.
I live about 4 miles from the crash site in North Park. Last year, I was driving around that area, kind of lost, and I came to the exact intersection where the plane crashed. It was September 25, 2023, which was the 45th anniversary to the day. Freaked me out a little because I'd never been there before. Spirits calling me to visit?
I was in elementary and a rumor started about a fire. We were released for recess and saw the plum of black smoke from the playground. Later, understood it was an airplane. The terrain drop is certainly harrowing, listing Lindberg Field as one of the top 10 most dangerous air fields. The air traffic control exclaimed, ' its an aluminum shower.' It's horrible how so many PSA employees perished. RIP to all who died.
It's really disappointing to hear declarations like "the busiest single runway airport in the country. They always leave out Alaska! We have more per capital of almost anything & everything. Aviation is huge here because the distances are so great, and so little of the state is accessible by road. Bethel is the record holder for the most VFR operations on a daily basis. And the Special VFR ops are completely mind-blowing. Anchorage is the busiest airport in the world because it's at a cross roads for freighters to refuel. Plus it has a 14,000ft runway, 2 other large paved runways, a gravel strip, and two water lanes for floatplanes in the summer and ski planes in the winter.
At my high school, the teachers used to talk about how these planes collided over the school, but the wreckage crashed down elsewhere. The school was right under the flight path with airliners flying low overhead. One of my uncles was a firefighter who responded to the crash. Then my dad ended up on a cleanup crew to help clear the mess. The bad thing was it wasn't the first time my dad had ended up on a cleanup crew after a large plane had crashed as he had ended up on a cleanup crew for a no survivors military tanker plane accident when Vietnam was going on. And after he was somewhat involved once again when 9/11 happened as he was on a DMORT team assigned to 9/11 running their parts database. One of our half jokes was to not park on the top level of the parking structure right before the airport because we might come back to find skid marks on the roof of the car.
Nothing related to FLYING should ever involve joking . (That conduct affected the pilots in this scenario, big time too.) Timing, Synchronicity, and Just PLANE Luck? Everywhere we've lived, was near an airport; Funny how we ALL ASSUME they'll all be landing safely? You Tube placed this for me, so that we'd wake up on a Sunday Morning in 2024 to see it! The title DOES not state the "time" of the production, so some of us might have assumed it was current! Sadly, we all "assumed' that that device the tells a pilot what aircraft was flying nearby, wasn't invented yet. And sadly, the crew's SEATING wasn't adequate to grant them better VISION too. So Sad, So Preventable too? I'd bet 'Mentorpilot" has prepared a detailed video on this also? Who'd a thunk it that PILOTS' WINDOWS and SEATING height would ever have anything to do with neglecting to SEE a small plane flying outside your windows ? "Flyin in the Morning to the San Diego Shores." FredGold&LyndaFaye.
@ChaJ67 I was stationed in San Diego at th3 submarine base when that parking garage, multi-level decks, was built. I recall reading in the Union-Tribune, that they'd calculated that a full 747 on short approach would clear the top deck by 125 feet!!!!! Well, for me, that's kind of danger close.
Maintain visual separation? Are you kidding me? The speed the PSA is going at? You have a few seconds and if your eyes shifts away for one second, you could lose visual.
@@dos3622 it's a pretty common practice in aviation but I agree, at what sounds like a pretty complex approach, with two planes of vastly different size and speed, it seems like a recipe for a collision. I'm glad that collision avoidance technology has improved so much since this. Lessons were definitely learnt
What a horrible tragedy. Miscommunication can be deadly. I am glad many rules and extra training and new equipment has been discovered to prevent tragedies like this. I don't remember this one. Hi from Toronto Canada 🍁 ❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤
Wife and I lived appx 1/4 mile where it went in. Wife home and heard collision with 172, looked out window and saw airliner on fire. She got on ground with dog and heard it hit and ensuing explosions then turned on t.v. to get details. When she heard the 172 was from Montgomery field she immediately called me because I had been working on my instrument rating there. I had to call my instructor to make sure he was o.k. (he was) and assured me that we were still scheduled for the next day. I also knew and was friends with the Air Trafic Controller. Bad day all around. Condolences to all that lost people.
@@elizabethmurray3221 Hi. My flight instructor was John Naja. I used VA to pay 90% of Comercial Instrument, Flight Instructor, Instrument Instructor, and Multi. I taught for about 3 years freelance out of several flying clubs there. Thanks for contact. Did you fly/instruct at Gibbs?
Synchronicity, Timing and Just PLANE Luck? Everywhere we've lived, was near an airport; Funny how we ALL ASSUME they'll all be landing safely? , You Tube placed this for me, so that we'd wake up on a Sunday Morning in 2024 to see it! The title DOES not state the "time" of the production, so some of us might have assumed it was current! Sadly, we all "assumed' that that device the tells a pilot what aircraft was flying nearby, wasn't invented yet. And sadly, the crew's SEATING wasn't adequate to grant them better VISION too. So Sad, So Preventable too? I'd bet 'Mentorpilot" has prepared a detailed video on this also? Who'd a thunk it that PILOTS' WINDOWS and SEATING height would ever have anything to do with neglecting to SEE a small plane flying outside your windows ? "Flyin in the Morning to the San Diego Shores." FredGold&LyndaFaye.
@@elizabethmurray3221 Thanks Elizabeth. I miss flying, especially my younger days flying hang gliders, but at 78 years old and escalating aircraft rental costs plus every thing falling apart I'm now more afraid of falling out of bed..lol. Microsoft Flight Simulator helps.. I used to do a lot of instrument approaches at Palomar. Also instructed at Brown Field for a short time. Well thanks for the memories, one former student pumped gas at Palomar. Think his name was Chris Pederson. Take care.
I saw this happen. I was on Ship at 32nd Street San Diego. Was standing there talking to a friend drinking some coffee. We saw the two planes on a collision path and then hit and fall from the sky. Was sad for some time.
I was 11 years old when this happened. My dad was a motorcycle cop for SDPD and he was there. He never talked about it. He was also at the McDonald’s massacre in San Ysidro. Some things a young son just doesn’t bring up.
@@saigawesnovember Was he involved in the school shooting by Brenda Spencer at Cleveland Elem. School? The song "I hate Mondays" was a song about the shooting. I was planning to move to San Diego when I heard of the McDonald's shooting and wondered if I made the right choice.
Timing, Synchronicity, and Just PLANE Luck? Everywhere we've lived, was near an airport; Funny how we ALL ASSUME they'll all be landing safely? You Tube placed this for me, so that we'd wake up on a Sunday Morning in 2024 to see it! The title DOES not state the "time" of the production, so some of us might have assumed it was current! Sadly, we all "assumed' that that device the tells a pilot what aircraft was flying nearby, wasn't invented yet. And sadly, the crew's SEATING wasn't adequate to grant them better VISION too. So Sad, So Preventable too? I'd bet 'Mentorpilot" has prepared a detailed video on this also? Who'd a thunk it that PILOTS' WINDOWS and SEATING height would ever have anything to do with neglecting to SEE a small plane flying outside your windows ? "Flyin in the Morning to the San Diego Shores." FredGold&LyndaFaye.
Surely the controllers should not have had two planes flying in the same area and the same altitude and then just be depending on this visual separation.
I think it's not enough to depend on an airliner crew's ability, with certainty, to see and avoid a small plane, considering everything talked about here.
Without a doubt, the two BEST neighbors our late Mom EVER had, lived in the condominium right next door to her, in North Carolina. Karen, worked as a customer service representative for US Air - now US Airways. PSA merged with USAir way back. Prior to that, she was a flight attendant with PSA. She was scheduled that morning to work 182. One of her friends, also named Karen asked if she could take her place so she could work 182 to earn some extra money. Karen gave her place up to her friend, who was among the 135 people on the 727. Karen did mention to me a number of years ago, she doesn't like talking about it. Understandable.
My high school’s gym (St. Augustine High School) was used as a morgue for the bodies. Some of the students who witnessed the tragic accident said it looked like the plane falling towards the campus
I will never forget this day I was in high school .this day I didn't go to school I was so sick .I was looking out the window in the kitchen.i told my mom those plains are going to collate she said don't say that then I saw a ball of fire 🔥 I say to my mom those plains collided .I felt so guilty for many years. That I had cursed the plains to collide .😢
I was working building stairs at the Valencia Views subdivision and walked up to the second floor that had no framing yet. It was Monday at 9 am and heard an explosion above my head. Looked up and saw a white cloud of smoke with the PSA coming out of the smoke with it's wing on fire and something falling from it which was the Cessna. I watched the PSA go below the treeline and wanted to cover my eyes. The local radio made a mistake and announced the names of the flight crew right after it happened. One of the guys on the job site heard on the radio his wife's name which was a stewartist on board. We watched him get in his truck and speed away to the site. I think the PSA didn't see them because the Cessna came up from underneath them from the right.
Wow , I too had changed my mind at the last min. Took greyhound instead from L.A. I was to meet my ship for deployment over seas out of San Diego with in one hour upon arriving there. I was 20 then now I'm 67
It wasn’t until I was already an adult that my father happened to mention that he should have been on this plane. He decided the day before the flight that he would ride with one of his coworkers back home. This way he would help his friend drive the 12 hour trip from Salinas, Ca. to Calexico, Ca. He had never mentioned the horrible coincidence to my mother or any of his family so as not to upset us at the time. Something like that could really haunt you I would imagine.
I think your dad is lying to you. Salinas to Calexico CA is more like an 8 hour drive , not 12 hours.
@@Eddie_000 it may take about 8 hrs now but in 1978 it would have taken way longer because the roads and the fastest routes may have been different, and the car would also have been slower ig
@@Eddie_000 Speed Limit was only 55 back then, as well!!!
Why haunt you? You should feel blessed all your life and know that you live for a reason.
My younger brother attended St.Augustine HS down the street from the crash. He and some classmates were the first to arrive on scene. Their gymnasium was used as a temporary morgue that morning. He came home that day with his lower pants legs and shoes covered in dried blood. I never heard him talk about that day, not once.
Thanks for the "re-run" of these season 11 episodes from 2012!
In the noughties and 2010s, Mayday was one of the best shows on TV. It was educational and extremely well produced. Some of the younger viewers here seem to believe these are new episodes, which goes to show how well they stand the test of time.
Yeah I watched this episode for the first time when I was 16 in 2013. I was big into the show at that time and it's really cool to have them reuploaded!
I disagree. They give the wrong impressions, leave out details and often oversimplify the conditions. Bad education is not wise or helpful. The flying public still has no understanding of aviation or airlines.
Just fyi Canadians can’t watch them. I’m not young, @VNExperience
What a snide comment
There are some newer ones. I just watched one that was about Kobe Bryant's helicopter crash.
Crazy how TH-cam's algorithm shows me this the day after the D.C. American Airlines mid-air collision.
My father had a reservation on this flight. He decided at the last minute to drive instead because it was a nice day that day. My stepmom had to tell my mom my father had driven instead because my mom was freaking out about what was she gonna tell us. My dad cheated fate that day. He lived another eight years before dying from brain cancer when I was 18.
Sorry you lost your dad that young.
Very sorry for you loss. Happy you had the extra Time with him.
That happened to my father with a German flight he missed…
Wow! 🤯
Rip
This took place just blocks from my house. I was in Highschool and 1st period had just begun when we felt the explosion. We ran outside of class and could see the smoke in the sky in the direction of our neighborhood. We took off and witnessed the aftermath. I'll never forget the sights and sounds of that day
I was impacted by this tragedy in two ways.
I was a 19y/o college student, at Southwestern College. It’s about
25 miles from the impact zone.
I recall standing on a low wall, about 3 to 3-1/2 feet high. Also the wall was on a slight berm. This allowed me to sort of gaze over the single story classroom building. It was around 9am, on a warm, sunny morning. I was enjoying the sun on my shoulders, as the class I had come out of was very cold. The A/C was on, when it was not warm enough yet. A thermostat malfunction.
I was waiting for my next class to start. Waiting for the prof to show up. They were running late.
I was looking sort of North/West, when suddenly there was a very large, black, mushroom cloud rising up. But, I did not know where. In fact, it was coming from the area of San Diego known as North Park. Judging from the size of the black column I knew it was not good, whatever it was. I said a quick prayer that asked for wellness and protection for anyone involved. After that class I was waiting for, I learned it was an airliner down in San Diego. This was jarring for me, but, facts would be slow coming for me as I went sbout the rest of my school day.
About two years later, I was a Reserve Police Officer, in Chula Vista, Ca. . Same city as the college I was attending.
My very first field training officer, FTO, was the husband of
one of the flight attendants aboard Flight 182. He was settling up his personal affairs,
selling the house they shared.
He retired earlier than he planned. But, he felt he had to leave the area. Just being there
was destroying his life, he told me. Those two things have stayed vivid in my mind, some
45 years later.
You should be a writer, your attention to detail made that a fun read. THe fact that you had these experiences is sad and amazing. Thanks for that post.
How sad 😢
thanks for keeping it brief
@cw2gtc WOW. You're 4 or so years older than I am. I was on the other side of the country. Deerfield Beach, Florida. However, this has been stuck to me for decades. I'm 61 now. Soon be 62 if allowed to. One thing always gripping me.....the TERRIBLE horror those people endured. Especially, those on the starboard side who saw it and then the flames. Maybe felt the heat? That wasn't any amusement park roller coaster ride.....it was a totally preventable dive to a horrific loss of so many people.
@@tommurphy4307Yo welcome!! 🤗....🤣😂😅
I live 2.5 blocks from the impact site in North Park. There is a curb area that is still messed up. The explosion of the crash seemed to have bounced over the two closest houses and landed on the houses past that. Whenever I hear a low plane over my house I run outside to check on what is going on. Every anniversary I go to the site and say a prayer.
We lived across the freeway from you (37th). My wife heard the midair collision, looked out to see the airliner in flames, got on the ground with the dog and heard the almost endless explosions. Very sad day.
@@bobjay2272 Definitely a horrible scene to be a part of.
I lived in mission beach at the time, did time everywhere around from OB to PB LJ and so forth and own a triplex in clairemont now but all this time I’ve been doing 17yrs as ground control for delta AA virgin America and Alaska at SAN so I’m very familiar and know the airspace and airport well. It’s a tight spot and airfield.
Prayers work... why did God let this happen? Ah yes so you have to pray... that way he keeps you in his cult... it's never ending.
My friend lived a few blocks away and he told me that there have been many "ghosts" seen in that neighborhood after the crash.
In the 70s, I was an air traffic controller in the army. I remember this extremely well. it said chills through me and the horror did not go unnoted (in ATC school 1976)
I will never forget that day. I lived in the county and my paternal aunt lived in the North Park neighborhood where the plane crashed. She saw it coming towards her house and thought she was done for. She and her home survived. A few years later a plane went down in the Metairie Louisiana neighborhood where a second maternal aunt lived. She had a similar experience seeing the plane hurtling toward her. She too survived. May all those who perished rest in peace.
no GOD NO PEACE
@@Afriexfull Indeed, this Catholic RIP is nonsense and deceiving.
I was at the Crashing location 15 minutes before , I was looking for a rental at the corner where the plane crashed. Our apartment was located at Hawthorne and 30th street. In my way to work, I stop to look at the house for rent, It was to small for us so , I continue my way to my office , when I arrived my boss asked me; Do you live in North Park ? I answered yes, well a plane crashed occurred 15 minutes ago… The rest is History . I still keep the original newspaper from that day. I still remember this event as it would it happened yesterday.
STAY AWAY FROM YOUR AUNTS AND YOU SHOULD LIVE A LONG LIFE
Ya
"Mom, I love ya" This is one of the saddest words from I pilot i've ever heard...😥
got chills on that part too. even the way he said it, these guys were absolute pro's. RIP man.
Perhaps they should have taken their roles seriously and continued to monitor the Cessna instead of breaking protocol.
@@rc70ys I agree with you 100%. As a business owner, when you do things with many employees at the same time, there is a lot of "kids-Play" in my experience. I think that the video showed this going on in the back, which I could imagine it going on in the cockpit also. What do you think. Sad story for all, but mostly the ones on the ground. I thought I might try to nose down into a street, so I didn't take out so many innocent people and property on the ground, if possible ???
Could have been avoided is the most tragic thing
@@e2U It was a collision with another plane, I doubt the pilots had much control of their aircraft after that.
My husband was on a training flight over Balboa park when the accident happened. He said he had been listening to the communications and realized PSA was coming into Lindbergh. He looked up and saw PSA coming down in flames. It felt so close they took evasive action. He keyed the mike and told the controller who told him they had everything under control. He flew back to SEE and canceled the rest of his flights for the day as he was not feeling well after witnessing the crash. A few hours later he got a phone call from the FAA.
That's crazy!!
I don't fly on 0lanes. I feel good.
Oh wow. Thank God he was ok though.
WOW!
I used to live in a house where this happened way after. This is how I found out about it. It’s off university and 805.
I'll never forget this, We lived in the area and our home was destroyed. Lucky none of us were home. My father was a pilot in the navy at the time, Mom was at work.
North Park! I lived there for a while too.
My friend from college died on this flight. Ben Schwartz RIP.
Rip
@@chftn55 I was suppose to be on this flight but my mom made me change…
terrible indeed, rest in peace to your friend and all those whose lives were cut short that day
seriously thank you ever so much for uploading all these eps. -a true ACI/Mayday fan
yep, i was 18, and had arrived after a 3 day drive from detroit. I was so tired i just slept in the car, when I woke up to the radio saying a plane just crashed, I looked out and saw the column of smoke about 5 or 6 miles from where i was! Can't believe it was 46 years ago! yikes!
I used to live about 1/4 mile west of the PSA jet crash site, just off Dwight street. Sometimes I would walk by the site and there were still broken pieces of concrete missing from the sidewalk and curbs where the jet hit.
I just started college and was renting a house only a few miles from where the PSA jet crashed in North Park. I remember it was a beautiful, clear end of summer day. I didn't have classes until later that day and I was at the kitchen sink washing some dishes in front of a window facing the direction of the crash. I heard a loud, bass/deep boom. About 20 minutes later I was heading out to go class and I saw a thick, black cloud of smoke from the direction of the boom. I soon found out about the crash. It was such a horrific and needless loss of life.
Why am I sitting here watching this while waiting to board a flight??? I’ve even seen this episode multiple times. I really am addicted to this show.
I understand: I watch these with my 5 year old grand-son, he loves these shows!
I've also watched these in the airport lol.
😂😂😂😂😂😂
17yr airline employee ground control at SAN specifically! But I love to fly! Surfer here that’s lived in mission and PB and OB and LJ all of it!
same here I seem to watch these a lot before flying myself lol
NTSB investigator Wally Funk was one of the Mercury 13, the women tested to become NASA astronauts, and finally made it into space at age 82 in 2021 aboard Blue Origin's suborbital flight.
Waste of money and emissions...
@@JonathanEzor I seen that
Wow
Wow, thanks for the info, an impressive woman.
She always sounds like a bad odour, or a banging track.
Like William Shatner did!
I still remember when this happened. It was shortly before I reported to Navy RTC. Being from Sacramento, I actually flown that route to San Diego more than a few times.
It’s bad enough flying into Lindbergh Field; but the old barracks used to be right below the glide path. Every other minute was a jet landing.
That photo was the most iconic and chilling of that year; if I recall correctly, the Pilot said that they were going down, and the response was simply “We’ll send the Equipment”.😢
I got the same reaction when the tower said that they would send the equipment. 😢
Yeah. The Atc knew what happened and why they were going down.
I was in the 11th grade attending San Diego High School which is located in downtown San Diego. We were between classes when we saw the plane coming down. Very surreal, I will never forget this day
I graduated from San Diego High School in 1980!
Horrifying! 😢
@@jodyrichardson4140 I lived 10 miles away on a hill we saw tremendous black smoke mom turned on need
My youngest son just graduated from SDHS 2 years ago😊 I've never heard of this crash. I'm amazed this happened. First it was the McDonalds massacre now this. SD has some dirty secrets it appears🤔🤷🏾♀️
They commemorate crash every year and it's on all local news
Everyone in San Diego old enough to remember that accident will never forget it. The smoke could be seen well over 20 miles away. TV and radio programming with a news reporter stopped their programming and covered this. Everything stopped in San Diego.
18:58 @@richardkelsch3640 I live in San Diego this happened before I was born. I was born in 1980.
I was working for Pacific Southwest Airlines’ Frequent Flyer department when the airline’s second tragedy occurred: an armed, irate ex-employee caused the flight he was on to crash near San Luis Obispo, with the loss of everyone aboard. My supervisor volunteered to be on the team that notified relatives of the people who died, something I always respected her for.
PSA was sold to U.S. Air - now itself just a memory - not long afterwards, and those famous smiles on the planes were subsequently painted-over. For my time there, it was a great place to work.
Wow, that would have been a terrible job for your supervisor.
OMG
This is really dark so trigger warning, but your comment just made me realize it would take for osama bin Laden shooting up a school for us to have safety at the schools we send our children to.
Templeton? I remember that one. I was raised in Santa Barbara
I lived very near Templeton at that time, and my parents were volunteer firefighters who went to the scene. They were in shock coming home. They said it was the worst thing they had ever seen. Nothing but tiny bits left of all the passengers and crew.
i was 6 yrs old on that day when that jet liner crashed into part of my school, and the neighborhood it was in .... i can still remember the impact i heard when that cesna hit the psa jet. i remember watching the jet liner on fire at that point dropping out of the sky towards me and the other children also at school that day
wow
I had no idea about this crash until I watched this video. This crash occurred literally a block from where I live in North Park. That's insane.
Yeah, way to be aware of basic history in your area dude. Kids these days..
@@hbauer92 there is a plaque dedicated to flight 182 you should check it out
I flew into San Diego from Reno on a PSA flight that same afternoon. It was chilling witnessing the wreckage as we flew into Lindbergh field.
Do you know if they restricted any small planes in the airspace that day or if any PSA flights would have been cancelled following the accident? I'm sure a lot of their employees were in no condition to work that day. 😥 Did you know what happened before you landed in SD?
@@DannyGoldingTV I do not know if small plane traffic was restricted. I knew about the crash before leaving Reno. The flight I took in the afternoon was very somber, no one spoke during the entire flight except for expressions of sorrow and condolences to the PSA crew. I was supposed to be on a morning flight but booked a later flight since I overslept that morning. I did not call my parents, so they did not know if I was on flight 182. I was not able to call them until I arrived in San Diego (no cell phones in those days), so they were pretty freaked out.
@aragonmrk Thanks for the reply. I was born in 97 but seeing the old PSA commercials and their old photos, they seemed like a cool airline to fly. Provably a similar vibe to Southwest now a days!
My roommate's parents were on PSA 182. Man, this whole thing was a mess.
@@SirBarth 😢
I was working in a travel agency in 1978. We sold a ticket to a business traveler for this flight. Long before cell phones, when the plane landed in LAX he got off to use a pay phone to re-confirm the meeting in San Diego. The secretary said that the guy he was scheduled to meet had to make an unexpected trip to Orange County, down the coast from LAX and would continue up to LAX to meet him there. Fortunately for our customer he didn't get back on the plane to San Diego.
Wow that's crazy! Did you ever talk to the customer after the accident? I would be interested in knowing the story of when he realized what happened to the flight he was just on!
@@DannyGoldingTV He called us to let us know he hadn't gotten back on the plane at LAX. He sounded quite matter-of-fact about it, but he was probably quite shaken up. Back then we didn't have computers so we didn't yet know about the crash or if we had any passengers on that flight. A few years before I went to work there the agency had lost two passengers on an Ozark Airlines flight.
@Cary-pc4rm I saw someone leave a comment on a different vid of PSA 182 and they said they were also on the first leg of the flight from Sacramento to LAX. I feel like flying between LAX and San Diego was probably more common than since it would have been really cheap!
@@DannyGoldingTVhe searched all over the world,and found him! they talk every nigʻht!😊
@@Evil_Clown83God was with you that time!
My Mother and Aunt were supposed to be on that plane but they decided to take a later flight that day. We lived in Bonita. I remember it well. We were freaked out thinking Mom and Connie were on the flight. They finely contacted us. I still have PTSD when I hear this story. I mourned for everyone affected by this terrible tragedy.
I have never forgot this accident as my wife and I were heading that morning to the navy base to start her paperwork to check out of the Navy. My sister lived in the area and thought her neighborhood was hit but that wasn’t the case. My heart went out to all that was involved.
Holly! I watched this vid last night only to find out in the afternoon that the same accidents happen to American Airlines
Operated by "PSA Airlines" as a tribute to this historic PSA airline nonetheless... 😢
That “Mom, I love you” got me in the feels
I have watched lots of videos about this crash. This video does the best at explaining the entire incident and goes into the best in depth details!
My sister in law was a stewardess. They were in Sacramento and one of the stewards asked to switch flights as he was to get home. She was with the entire crew night before. We all knew she could be on that plane, she called home to let family know she’s alive.
The sad thing was that a group of flight attendants were on the 727 and coming into San Diego...all were lost in the collision mishap. At the airport, many PSA flight attendant ladies who were friends and cried together in the terminal as they heard the bad news.
I saw the ladies and I wanted to comfort them in their anguish and heart ache. Yet, I did not know what to say nor what to do. Such a sad time.
I was a young sailor based across the bay at NAS North Island. I was waiting outside the base exchange with a group of about 20 people waiting for it to open at 0900. One of the guys shouted, "Look" as the collision occurred. We all just stood in horror as the jet fell almost vertical into the city.😢
One of my chorus classmates had seen this on her way to school.
She was so shaken. She was in tears.
46 Years later as a native San Diegan and there are details about this disaster that I never heard until now! The only thing most people heard was there was a communication issue between the tower and one of the planes.
A photographer I knew had driven over from Helix HS that day, and taken pictures of the scene. He told us a little of what he saw, but would never show us any of the prints of what he took.
@sdnative2387 Same. It's interesting after all these years to hear the details of what probably happened.
@kurtkensson2059 Many of my coworkers at the Zoo lived in that neighborhood. Those who did had major emotional trauma over what they saw when they bailed from the Zoo and drove home to check on their loved ones and homes. Fortunately, having occurred a little after 9 AM, many people who lived in the destroyed homes, were at work. None of my coworkers lost anyone or their home, but they described what horrors they witnessed that morning.
@@denisegillen1845 About 10 years later, I worked at Dean's Photo with a woman who'd been a PSA flight attendant at that time. (Probably still called "stewardesses" back then!)
Being San Diego-based, she knew most of the crew and employees who'd been on that flight. She told me it was a very difficult time for the company, as close-knit as they all were.
because of this accident the only place instructors can fly now is out in east county over alpine and pine valley near my house. they fly for hours on end going around in mindless circles. on the weekends they fly out on the fuel they rip off from their students.
In my college English class here in San Diego county, one of my classmates wrote a paper of witnessing the crash from his high school. It was two years out from the crash. Haunting and so tragic.
My brother-in-law was on the PSA. He had told me that he hated to fly. He was doing an errand for his brother.
In 1984 I flew a Cessna 150 with my instructor from Riverside to Lindberg and it was quite hectic landing in between two big jets, taxi back for take of and taking off avoiding wake turbulance etc.
try doing touch n go's in clients' planes (i was a propeller airman) that youre not familiar with- especially multi-engine stuff. they would give me a brief in-service after i installed their prop(s) and we were off to the races. scariest was a rockwell aero commander AC690C and the owner's 13-year-old son gave me a briefing beforehand. i had that thing upside down over gillespie field- taking off in it was like being in a dragster.
Hi Stephen, Can you please tell me? Wouldnt the Instructor be at fault too because he was training the student pilot? Or did the student change course quickly and it was too late to correct? Thank you
I was driving home from school on Int.5 taking Sea World Drive exit,when we seen the PSA fall out of the sky in flames,when I watched the news I was devistaded.That image haunts me all the time!
It was my 18th birthday. I remember seeing the smoke from the crash. I have never forgotten where I was when this happened.
I recall this like yesterday. The photo wound up on the front page of the newspaper. Never forgot it.
In total irony to tonights discussion, PSA (Regional airline for AA) just had a midair collision in DCA.
yes RIP to all the people
Stop the car babe a new mayday episode just dropped
Lol
Cringiest, most overused comment ever
New?
😂
This is like 7 years old lol
I always like to read the comment section for videos about this flight. So many people commenting on how they witnessed it.
I remember that like it was yesterday. I loved PSA and the smiley face.
And now there was just a deadly mid air collison with a smaller jet with a military helicopter in Washington DC!
I watched the collision from my apartment on Florida St. September 30,1978, 9am. When the 727 hit the ground, the impact felt like a bomb going off, followed by a black mushroom cloud. Ran to the scene but there was no one help. Human life is fragile, cherish it...
Hi Michael!
Now we have another collision over Potomac 😢
As a lay person i just find it strange to allow training flights across commercial paths and more so if they're letting student pilots fly blind in training
They don’t anymore since that dreadful day! The paths may be close but at different altitudes now where THIS kind of crash will hopefully never happen again.
Not to mention the landing at that Airport, so intense, No room for error!
It's insane to me that both aircraft were recorded falling to the ground, at different times, by different people.
I was flying from CVR to CRQ that day. Seal Beach v23 Oceanside and had just entered downwind for RNY 24 at Palomar. It was a gorgeous San Diego day with unlimited visibility. We asked tower if they knew about or saw the black smoke to the south? They had not. We landed and the rest is history 👨✈️🙏🏻
I lived 6 blocks from the crash site. I slept through it. A friend was a first responder. He was making a service call right in the area. He was a veteran of Viet Nam. A medic. But he said he had never seen anything like it. He couldn’t take it and left the site He said there was no one to save.
I feel they shouldn't have allowed training flight Cessna into the busy routes. Probably, this is the main reason for collision. Traning flight and passenger jet shouldn't be allowed on the same zone.
Was a different 'world' aviation wise back then. Today, and for a long time, I'm certain prop planes don't use Lindbergh, as its commercial jet activity has grown so much.
That just may make way to much LOGICAL sense. Sadly: Like only allowing drivers ed classes to take place in key places during key times.
Agreed! It’s mind blogging that they would allow a small Cessna with a training flight no less to share the same airspace as commercial planes. That sounds insane. I’m surprised there haven’t been more accidents… well there was a similar accident a few years later at LAX where sadly a plane crashed into the city of Cerritos, CA and all perished.
They did mention at the end of the video that because of this accident, they now divert small plane traffic away from this area, which they should have been doing anyway since it is such a busy area.
As a result of this accident the NTSB recommended the airspace requirements around San Diego Lindbergh field be changed. Since that time the Airspace has evolved into Class B. An plane must receive a Clearance to fly into the airspace. If the controller cannot work you safely into the Class B airspace they will instruct you to "Remain Clear of Class B". However, there are times when areas of Class B are not busy and it is safe for smaller aircraft to transit the area. Some may choose to land at San Diego Lindbergh, but it is typically more convenient to use one of the other airports.
The dark smoke rose, and was carried toward the ocean by the Santa Ana winds that day. I remember seeing it from Grossmont College.
Rare but they will change take off and landing directions and landing strips at SAN. I’m 17yr airline employee there , here, at SAN. Delta AA Alaska and virgin America loved the job all those years 🤙
Because of the Santa Ana, I thought it was a brush fire in one of the many canyons in North Park.
@@claudiametzger306 airline employee here 17yrs at SAN, the planes take off in opposite direction on Santa Ana wind days. They have to for lift.
@@hoopslaa5235I know. Pilot here.
@@claudiametzger306 I don’t know, I’m male. And not a pilot. I don’t assume because of my gender that I can read the minds and actions and future behaviors of the opposite gender 😉😂
I lost my division officer on that flight. He had only reported aboard a couple of weeks prior and was on his way to San Diego for some supplimental training. We knew something was up when the training command reported that he never arrived and soon after our Corpsman received a request for his dental records.
I lived off El Cajon Blvd, a friend and I were outside talking , he saw the collision, I swear I heard screaming. We we drove over there to help. We guided people out of some smashed up houses, some people were in a daze just wandering, we sat them down, tried calm them. Some just sitting their car, we pulled one lady from a 2 floor apt building as it was beginning to burn. Everything burned so fast.
@@donnaackels5686 it's so easy to forget that other casualties happened after the flight, like buildings catching fire.
Donna - God bless you for your kind, generous and calm help at the crash site. It would seem you had the mental strength to be an EMT. I know I would likely have been a real basket case if I'd gone down there at that time! You are a real hero! Sincerely from one San Diegan to another, Meggie Ulrich
💔😥💔🙏✝️🙏❤🏅❤
A similar accident occurred in Indiana in 1969. A jet was descending to land at Indianapolis and collided with a single engine plane. This happened over a rural farming area, so there were no fatalities on the ground. But sadly there were no survivors from either plane.
When that bald guy said that his hair stood up really helps you understand the gravity of the situation
My mom knew that guy.
too funny
Thank you again MayDay for explaining the unexplainable.... A great episode (although I prefer more technical episodes). Very sad. Hopefully advances in technology can prevent tragedies such as this one.
mom i love you!😢 so heart breaking...
My gosh 😢
I live about 4 miles from the crash site in North Park. Last year, I was driving around that area, kind of lost, and I came to the exact intersection where the plane crashed. It was September 25, 2023, which was the 45th anniversary to the day. Freaked me out a little because I'd never been there before. Spirits calling me to visit?
If you had that crawly feeling? Yeah, probably. That place has to have a bunch of stuck souls hanging around.
@@rickbase833 were you born after the event?
Very interesting!
@biggils8894 No, my family moved to SD in 1978, and I was 11 when this happened.
@biggils8894 Curious, if she was what could be the relevance?
Almost all of the buyers in the retail company I worked for was on that flight. We took trains from then on to Los Angeles.
I was in elementary and a rumor started about a fire. We were released for recess and saw the plum of black smoke from the playground. Later, understood it was an airplane. The terrain drop is certainly harrowing, listing Lindberg Field as one of the top 10 most dangerous air fields. The air traffic control exclaimed, ' its an aluminum shower.' It's horrible how so many PSA employees perished. RIP to all who died.
Glad to have you back 🤞
I go by the site every year just to take it all in. Seems so unbelievable.
The kid bringing water..what a sweetheart
My friends roommate at SDSU was on that flight. You truly never know what life can bring 😞
It's really disappointing to hear declarations like "the busiest single runway airport in the country. They always leave out Alaska! We have more per capital of almost anything & everything. Aviation is huge here because the distances are so great, and so little of the state is accessible by road. Bethel is the record holder for the most VFR operations on a daily basis. And the Special VFR ops are completely mind-blowing. Anchorage is the busiest airport in the world because it's at a cross roads for freighters to refuel. Plus it has a 14,000ft runway, 2 other large paved runways, a gravel strip, and two water lanes for floatplanes in the summer and ski planes in the winter.
At my high school, the teachers used to talk about how these planes collided over the school, but the wreckage crashed down elsewhere. The school was right under the flight path with airliners flying low overhead. One of my uncles was a firefighter who responded to the crash. Then my dad ended up on a cleanup crew to help clear the mess. The bad thing was it wasn't the first time my dad had ended up on a cleanup crew after a large plane had crashed as he had ended up on a cleanup crew for a no survivors military tanker plane accident when Vietnam was going on. And after he was somewhat involved once again when 9/11 happened as he was on a DMORT team assigned to 9/11 running their parts database.
One of our half jokes was to not park on the top level of the parking structure right before the airport because we might come back to find skid marks on the roof of the car.
Nothing related to FLYING should ever involve joking . (That conduct affected the pilots in this scenario, big time too.)
Timing, Synchronicity, and Just PLANE Luck?
Everywhere we've lived, was near an airport; Funny how we ALL ASSUME they'll all be landing safely?
You Tube placed this for me, so that we'd wake up on a Sunday Morning in 2024 to see it! The title DOES not state the "time" of the production, so some of us might have assumed it was current! Sadly, we all "assumed' that that device the tells a pilot what aircraft was flying nearby, wasn't invented yet. And sadly, the crew's SEATING wasn't adequate to grant them better VISION too. So Sad, So Preventable too? I'd bet 'Mentorpilot" has prepared a detailed video on this also?
Who'd a thunk it that PILOTS' WINDOWS and SEATING height would ever have anything to do with neglecting to SEE a small plane flying outside your windows ?
"Flyin in the Morning to the San Diego Shores."
FredGold&LyndaFaye.
@ChaJ67 I was stationed in San Diego at th3 submarine base when that parking garage, multi-level decks, was built. I recall reading in the Union-Tribune, that they'd calculated that a full 747 on short approach would clear the top deck by 125 feet!!!!! Well, for me, that's kind of danger close.
@@robr2389 A B747 at 125 ft is so big that it looks like you can almost reach up and touch it.
@@ChaJ67 I would agree.
It just hurts that so many lives must be lost to get a system to work better. I wish it wasnot so.😢
Sad day for San Diego. My parents knew all the pilots involved.
Maintain visual separation? Are you kidding me? The speed the PSA is going at? You have a few seconds and if your eyes shifts away for one second, you could lose visual.
@@dos3622 it's a pretty common practice in aviation but I agree, at what sounds like a pretty complex approach, with two planes of vastly different size and speed, it seems like a recipe for a collision.
I'm glad that collision avoidance technology has improved so much since this. Lessons were definitely learnt
actually it is not uncommon to see a plane from between 50 and 80 miles away...
True. Hopefully, the advanced radar technologies of today and TCAS can prevent future tragedies in the future.
What a horrible tragedy. Miscommunication can be deadly. I am glad many rules and extra training and new equipment has been discovered to prevent tragedies like this. I don't remember this one. Hi from Toronto Canada 🍁 ❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤
Wife and I lived appx 1/4 mile where it went in. Wife home and heard collision with 172, looked out window and saw airliner on fire. She got on ground with dog and heard it hit and ensuing explosions then turned on t.v. to get details. When she heard the 172 was from Montgomery field she immediately called me because I had been working on my instrument rating there. I had to call my instructor to make sure he was o.k. (he was) and assured me that we were still scheduled for the next day. I also knew and was friends with the Air Trafic Controller. Bad day all around. Condolences to all that lost people.
Who was your flight instructor?
@@elizabethmurray3221 Hi. My flight instructor was John Naja. I used VA to pay 90% of Comercial Instrument, Flight Instructor, Instrument Instructor, and Multi. I taught for about 3 years freelance out of several flying clubs there. Thanks for contact. Did you fly/instruct at Gibbs?
@@bobjay2272 I had some flights out of Gibbs, but didn’t instruct there. I learned to fly at Airtime at Palomar. Good times.
Synchronicity, Timing and Just PLANE Luck?
Everywhere we've lived, was near an airport; Funny how we ALL ASSUME they'll all be landing safely?
, You Tube placed this for me, so that we'd wake up on a Sunday Morning in 2024 to see it! The title DOES not state the "time" of the production, so some of us might have assumed it was current! Sadly, we all "assumed' that that device the tells a pilot what aircraft was flying nearby, wasn't invented yet. And sadly, the crew's SEATING wasn't adequate to grant them better VISION too. So Sad, So Preventable too? I'd bet 'Mentorpilot" has prepared a detailed video on this also?
Who'd a thunk it that PILOTS' WINDOWS and SEATING height would ever have anything to do with neglecting to SEE a small plane flying outside your windows ?
"Flyin in the Morning to the San Diego Shores."
FredGold&LyndaFaye.
@@elizabethmurray3221 Thanks Elizabeth. I miss flying, especially my younger days flying hang gliders, but at 78 years old and escalating aircraft rental costs plus every thing falling apart I'm now more afraid of falling out of bed..lol. Microsoft Flight Simulator helps.. I used to do a lot of instrument approaches at Palomar. Also instructed at Brown Field for a short time. Well thanks for the memories, one former student pumped gas at Palomar. Think his name was Chris Pederson. Take care.
9:28 "My hair stood up on the back of my head" - bald man
maybe he had a full head of hair back then.
lol, the term is neck, not head I thought.
Damn, I wheezed so hard I woke up my (bald) partner, lmao🤣
Figure of speech
Probably not bald then. Scared the hair right off him.
Wow another one i haven’t seen, thanks! Canadians up here can’t watch these so we’re fortunate
I asked the person to put it up but this is made in canada we get it in ireland
Fortunate? 🙄
A fortunate to see a tragedy?🙄
My lord what a mess
I saw this happen. I was on Ship at 32nd Street San Diego. Was standing there talking to a friend drinking some coffee. We saw the two planes on a collision path and then hit and fall from the sky.
Was sad for some time.
So if thats true why didnt you say so at the time? theyve said nobody actually saw the collision…
This is an excellent presentation.
I was 11 years old when this happened. My dad was a motorcycle cop for SDPD and he was there. He never talked about it. He was also at the McDonald’s massacre in San Ysidro. Some things a young son just doesn’t bring up.
@@saigawesnovember Was he involved in the school shooting by Brenda Spencer at Cleveland Elem. School? The song "I hate Mondays" was a song about the shooting. I was planning to move to San Diego when I heard of the McDonald's shooting and wondered if I made the right choice.
Timing, Synchronicity, and Just PLANE Luck?
Everywhere we've lived, was near an airport; Funny how we ALL ASSUME they'll all be landing safely?
You Tube placed this for me, so that we'd wake up on a Sunday Morning in 2024 to see it! The title DOES not state the "time" of the production, so some of us might have assumed it was current! Sadly, we all "assumed' that that device the tells a pilot what aircraft was flying nearby, wasn't invented yet. And sadly, the crew's SEATING wasn't adequate to grant them better VISION too. So Sad, So Preventable too? I'd bet 'Mentorpilot" has prepared a detailed video on this also?
Who'd a thunk it that PILOTS' WINDOWS and SEATING height would ever have anything to do with neglecting to SEE a small plane flying outside your windows ?
"Flyin in the Morning to the San Diego Shores."
FredGold&LyndaFaye.
I lived and worked by that McDonald's. I heard the shots😢
@@susanborkenhagen58 no,I don’t think so.
So sad one word made a whole difference rest in peace, all the victims of this thing
I just don't understand why a tiny plane is allowed to train at an international airport.. does this still happen?
My friends father was on that flight. So sad.
I always love how they somehow always manage to sneak in a shot of a Philippine Airlines plane in these episodes
Surely the controllers should not have had two planes flying in the same area and the same altitude and then just be depending on this visual separation.
I think it's not enough to depend on an airliner crew's ability, with certainty, to see and avoid a small plane, considering everything talked about here.
Excellent report. Well produced.
No!!😮 ....it's too long .... makes me sleepy 😴
Without a doubt, the two BEST neighbors our late Mom EVER had, lived in the condominium right next door to her, in North Carolina. Karen, worked as a customer service representative for US Air - now US Airways. PSA merged with USAir way back. Prior to that, she was a flight attendant with PSA. She was scheduled that morning to work 182. One of her friends, also named Karen asked if she could take her place so she could work 182 to earn some extra money. Karen gave her place up to her friend, who was among the 135 people on the 727. Karen did mention to me a number of years ago, she doesn't like talking about it. Understandable.
I knew one of the passengers on the PSA flight. She was the sister of one of my roommates in San Francisco.
Horrific accident. It has saddened me to the core. RIP to all involved 🙏🙏
My high school’s gym (St. Augustine High School) was used as a morgue for the bodies. Some of the students who witnessed the tragic accident said it looked like the plane falling towards the campus
I will never forget this day I was in high school .this day I didn't go to school I was so sick .I was looking out the window in the kitchen.i told my mom those plains are going to collate she said don't say that then I saw a ball of fire 🔥 I say to my mom those plains collided .I felt so guilty for many years. That I had cursed the plains to collide .😢
I was working building stairs at the Valencia Views subdivision and walked up to the second floor that had no framing yet. It was Monday at 9 am and heard an explosion above my head. Looked up and saw a white cloud of smoke with the PSA coming out of the smoke with it's wing on fire and something falling from it which was the Cessna. I watched the PSA go below the treeline and wanted to cover my eyes. The local radio made a mistake and announced the names of the flight crew right after it happened. One of the guys on the job site heard on the radio his wife's name which was a stewartist on board. We watched him get in his truck and speed away to the site. I think the PSA didn't see them because the Cessna came up from underneath them from the right.
The greatest series is back!
Wow , I too had changed my mind at the last min. Took greyhound instead from L.A. I was to meet my ship for deployment over seas out of San Diego with in one hour upon arriving there. I was 20 then now I'm 67
I was stationed at NAS Miramar when this happened ('76-'80). It was a bad year for aircraft crashes during that timeframe.
I lived off of 32nd and Polk for two years and I’m just learning about this right now
@@daniebello One of the two worst days in San Diego history. I lived at 31321/2 Thorn St. in the early 1990s.