The true story of Netflix’s Flight 3054 documentary: What precipitated considered one of South America’s worst airline crashes?

• A Tragedy Foretold: Flight 5034 unpacks the 2007 airplane crash that left almost 200 useless in São Paulo, Brazil.
• A number of elements contributed to the crash, together with a brief, slippery runway and an overcrowded location.
• All three episodes of the sequence are at the moment streaming on Netflix.

If studying the information doesn't have you ever anxious about air journey, Netflix's A Tragedy Foretold: Flight 3054 may do the trick.

Directed by Angelo Defanti, the three-part documentary unpacks the chilling story of Flight 3054's 2007 crash at Brazil's infamous Congonhas Airport. The accident, probably the most horrific (and preventable) aviation disasters in South American historical past, resulted in almost 200 deaths. The sequence explores not simply the crash itself, however frames it towards the aviation disaster that gripped Brazil throughout this era.

"This airport has all the time been a difficult airport for pilots to navigate," says a pilot of Congonhas within the beneath teaser. "Its popularity has all the time been unhealthy. And it was getting even worse, some individuals would say."

The documentary arrives in a yr that's already seen a succession of tales about airline crashes and mishaps, elevating issues about airline security. Max's second season of Nathan Fielder's The Rehearsal, which premiered this previous Sunday, can also be centered across the matter. Actually, there's one thing within the air.

Preserve scrolling to study extra concerning the real-life occasions that impressed the Flight 5034 documentary.

What occurred to TAM Airways Flight 3054?

On the night of July 17, 2007, a TAM Airways' home passenger flight from Porto Alegre resulted in tragedy when the aircraft crashed whereas touching down at São Paulo's Congonhas Airport. The Airbus A320-233 plane skidded off the runway, careened over a close-by freeway, and crashed right into a TAM warehouse that neighbored a petroleum station, leading to an explosion.

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All 187 passengers and crew members onboard Flight 3054 died, as did an extra 12 individuals on the bottom. It's among the many deadliest aviation accidents in South American historical past.

What precipitated Flight 3054's crash?

Flight 3054's crash was an ideal storm of things, together with ignored issues of safety, underfunding, overcrowding, climate, coaching deficiencies, and infrastructural issues, amongst others.

Many of those elements are cited within the official investigation outcomes from Brazil's Aeronautical Accidents Investigation and Prevention Middle (CENIPA), whereas others have been voiced by these acquainted with the airport and its unhealthy popularity.

Under is extra about a number of, however not all, of the principle elements within the crash.

A brief, slippery runway

Whereas there's little within the official investigation report concerning the size of the runway, it was routinely talked about in information beats and interviews on the time of the crash, in addition to within the teaser for Netflix's upcoming sequence.

Because the L.A. Times famous on the time, Congonhas' runway measured 6,362 toes, making it almost 700 toes shorter than the runway at LaGuardia Airport in New York. Per the outlet, pilots likened it to touchdown on an plane provider, and have been instructed to "take off once more and fly round in the event that they overshoot the primary 1,000 toes of runway."

In reality, an early speculation concerned the pilot doing this very factor.

"What seems to have occurred is that he [the pilot] didn't handle to land and he tried to take off once more," a fireplace division spokesman instructed CNN on the time.

Moreover, the runway was missing grooves to slough off rainwater. The runway had been just lately resurfaced, however the grooves had not but been put in.

"The principle runway of Congonhas offered, throughout a very long time, a low coefficient of friction and irregularities on its floor which favored the buildup of water," reads the CENIPA report.

The day earlier than the crash, a number of pilots reported poor braking situations and an ATR 42-300 plane was broken after hydroplaning, per native reviews. Regardless of wet situations on the day of the crash, the runway remained open.

An overcrowded location

One other criticism of Congonhas Airport was that it was tucked in the course of a dense cityscape, making its brief runway that rather more harmful.

"Congonhas has no escape space," a voice explains within the sequence' teaser. "The runway ends and there’s nowhere to go — both you fall down beneath, or off to at least one facet or the opposite."

This sentiment was additionally expressed by a Occasions of London reporter to CNN again in 2007.

Flying into Congonhas, he stated, "is like you might be actually flying previous individuals's residing rooms in condo blocks. Then you definately land on the runway. It’s utterly surrounded by the central a part of Sao Paulo metropolis. This isn’t an airport out on the sting of town. That is proper within the metropolis."

A girl's voice within the teaser echoes this, saying, "They fly by my window. I might wave to the captain if I wished to."

Poor coaching and communication

The CENIPA investigation additionally discovered the monitoring of the flight by floor management to be "not acceptable, for the reason that crew didn’t have notion of what was occurring within the moments that preceded the impression." It provides, "This lack of situational consciousness hindered the adoption of an environment friendly and well timed corrective motion."

It additionally signifies that the interactive programs mandated throughout flight coaching might have been extra in-depth.

"There was a notion among the many crews interviewed that the coaching by means of the years and on account of the excessive demand ensuing from the corporate’s progress was being abbreviated," the report reads.

The place can I watch A Tragedy Foretold: Flight 3054?

All three episodes of A Tragedy Foretold: Flight 3054 are at the moment streaming on Netflix.

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