Let’s remember when a newly-restored Boeing Stratoliner crashed into Elliott Bay, on this day in 2002 (March 28)
Boeing has been in the news a lot lately, with all of the problems with the 737 MAX having to make a lot of emergency landings and, in some cases, crashing, so this story felt timely.
On March 28, 2002, the last surviving Boeing 307 Stratoliner ditches into Elliott Bay at 1:15 p.m. after running out of fuel on a flight from Boeing Field to Everett. The 307 first flew in December 1938 and was the world’s first pressurized airliner. The Clipper Flying Cloud is the sole survivor of only 10 Stratoliners built before World War II and had been painstakingly restored over six years by Boeing engineers and volunteers for the Smithsonian. The crew was later faulted by the National Transportation Safety Board for failing to manually check fuel levels.
MyNorthwest added a little more context:
On the afternoon of Thursday, March 28, 2002, Boeing pilots “Buzz” Nelson and Mike Carriker were at the controls of the last remaining Stratoliner. The plane was scheduled to be flown later to, and put on permanent display at, the Smithsonian’s sprawling Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly, Virginia.
This particular Stratoliner had been originally christened “Clipper Flying Cloud” and was delivered by Boeing to Pan American Airlines on March 20, 1940. After serving Pan Am passengers and then the US Military during World War II, the plane ultimately ended up as part of the Haitian Air Force. Then, it came home to Seattle, where it was lovingly and painstakingly restored to original condition with help from Boeing and some very skilled volunteers.
They also add that there’s some reason for optimism, even if the reason for the crash was embarrassing:
Unlike the 1939 Stratoliner crash, nobody was hurt or killed in the 2002 ditching, and the plane was not destroyed. And, the argument could be made that it took some mighty fine piloting skills to bring the aircraft down with no loss of life and only minor damage to the rare plane. Still, it was something of an embarrassment when the reason for the ditching was revealed: the Stratoliner had run out of gas.
The National Transportation Safety Board report is very clear. The 2002 Stratoliner ditching in Elliott Bay happened because of “loss of all engine power due to fuel exhaustion that resulted from the flight crew’s failure to accurately determine onboard fuel during the pre-flight inspection. A factor contributing to the accident was a lack of adequate crew communication regarding the fuel status.”
For further reading:
