Nows and Forevers

Yesterday’s crash of a United Parcel Service MD-11 cargo jet brought back memories of a crash more than four decades ago.

American Airlines Flight 191 was a DC-10 taking off from Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport bound for Los Angeles when it lost its left engine as it went airborne, and crashed not too far off the runway. All 273 people aboard were killed on May 25, 1979.

It’s way too early to speculate on the causes of the crash, and I’m not qualified in any way to do that. But it shocked me a bit that the UPS flight lost its left engine, the same as AA 191. Even stranger was the fact that the UPS jet was an MD-11, an updated version of the DC-10.

Dad and I flew into Chicago O’Hare about a week after the crash in early June 1979, and I remember looking down and seeing where it had happened. It was quite obvious, and scary. I also remember flying back from that trip, seeing a lot of DC-10s parked because the FAA had grounded them during the investigation.