"There is no reply, but the silence is taken as a tacit, if not exactly proper, acknowledgment."

I spent a lot of years as a ground control intercept officer in the Air Force. Silence was never considered an acknowledgment of an instruction. An immediate "KLM do you read" would have followed and another non answer would have resulted in an order for an abort. Of course the aircraft I controlled were in the air and visible on my scope and I always had some idea of what was going on. On the ground, in the fog, without ground radar the tower controller was in a situation were things were getting hairy fast. In the end it seems that the KLM pilot had let impatience overrule his judgment.

I'd like to recommend a work of fiction by John Varley that refers to this accident early on. I've handed out many copies as recommended "airplane in-flight reading" over many years.

"Millennium" is the book. Forget the bad Hollywood movie of the same name made from it. Found at many used book dealers locally or online.

After you read this, you'll never see a 'flight attendant' aka 'stew' in the same way again, guaranteed.

I've read about this crash so many times, and was prepared for another turgid run-through, but your telling of the tale, especially incorporating the "unedited" comments of Bob Bragg, was first class.

Bravo!

As for Bragg playacting Zanten, you're right, there is irony there. But perhaps, with such long experience himself, Bragg is in fact perfectly placed to factor into his feelings the thousands of times in commercial aviation history that similar "We gaan!" decisions have been made that _didn't_ result in the loss of 583 lives.

All of us like to think that tired, annoyed, frustrated, we would still be perfect professionals.

And yet the numbers tell us that more people are killed driving home after work in their own neighborhoods than any other combination of place and time for us to hold on to that fantasy.

I don't think I'm "making light" of a tragedy to tell you that my takehome from Tenerife has always been: "Don't drive angry!"

I think it's fair to characterize the crash as the worst accident in aviation history, but it seems to me that the attacks on the Pentagon and World Trade Center would be the worst disaster.

Cool.

The closed I came to such a hero was taking a class -- "A Semi-Zen approach to the electric guitar" -- from Roger Miller.

Oh, and my band had it's picture taken with Bobby Orr once - a very long time ago.

:)

Please, is it so hard to check your facts?

The Canary Islands are, from West to East, Hierro, La Palma, Gomera, Teneriffe (Tenerife), GRAN CANARIA, Fuerteventura and Lanzarota plus several islets. There is not LAS PALMAS island, but GRAN CANARIA, and the capital city of LAS PALMAS DE GRAN CANARIA. Las Palmas is the eastern province comprising the islands of GRAN CANARIA, FUERTEVENTURA and LANZAROTE.

The airport is called nowadays GANDO-GRAN CANARIA (Gando being both a nearby village and a bay), your baggage will still don the LPA code, though, since it was called LAS PALMAS airport for a few years, though by the 70s the name had been changed. I guess Patrick's mistake comes from this.

I was at the GANDO airport went the bomb exploded, though being 3 at the time I don't remember much. Evacuation was fast and clean, so people did not even panic. And I'm happy to tell there is no much more to tell about this airport, except a failed air hijack attempt aborted by the crew and passengers a few months ago. But in my book no news are good news.

But aren't the rudder pedals used to steer aircraft on the ground?

At least that's the way it was forty years ago when I was flying a Cessna 150 in an abortive attempt to get a pilot's license.

Nitpicking aside, thanks for the inside scoop on this disastrous accident.

Great article, does anyone know if Smith has written any books other than Ask the Pilot? An Amazon search turned up 1,000+ books by authors with the same or similar names.

Recently, a Frontier passenger jet was landing when the pilot spotted a small Key Lime Air Metroliner right in his path on the runway. The Frontier pilot's quick reflexes saved what would have been a complete disaster. The two airplanes missed colliding by about 50 feet, officials said.

Later, an NTSB spokesman played a computer animation showing just how close a call it was, with the alert Frontier pilot pulling away at the very last second.

Denver International Airport is a sprawling facility on the prairie northeast of Denver. Weather moves in fast. Conditions on the tarmac can change in minutes from unlimited visibility to snow squalls to thunderstorm microbursts.

Some officials admit that the airport, built to handle air traffic for the 21st Century is already maxed out and operating at its limits of safety.

According to the Denver Business Journal, in the first two-and-a-half months of 2007, there were 163 runway incursions compared to 138 at the same period last year. The Denver near miss is considered one of the most serious in the country.

Thank you for the interesting column on the Tenerife accident. It is my understanding that this accident was the seminal event resulting in the establishment of Crew (Cockpit?) Resource Management (CRM) as a training / operating philosophy for commercial airlines. Has CRM been implemented by all commercial airlines? Is it practiced by smaller regional carriers (e.g., Comair)?

Jonathan Hoag:

Practically all piston-engine aircraft including the Cessna 150 use the rudder pedals to steer while on the ground.

However, for the 747 ground steering is limited while using the rudder pedals, about 7 degrees left or right. For anything above that up to 70 degrees steering, the captain uses a hand-operated tiller, like a sailboat, to steer.

Dave the Engineer,

Commercial pilot and

Certified Flight Instructor

Reading today's column, I was wondering if you were going to acknowledge the anniversary of April 6, 1994, when the Dassault Falcon 50 that was carrying Rwanda president Juvenal Habyarimana and Barundian president Cyprien Ntaryamira was shot down over the Rwandan capital of Kigali. The death of Habyarimana triggered the genocide that left more than 800,000 people dead within about three months.

Off the top of my head, I can't think of a plane crash that, directly or indirectly, resulted in more deaths than this one.