Terror in the Trees! The Extraordinary Story of American Airlines 1572

I was the controller being relieved on that night in the TRACON. Our usual routine was to have a "late guy" who works alone from about 10 pm until midnight. That night was miserable, howling winds, sideways rain, multiple go-arounds and diverts. I recall thinking when I left the shift to the two "mid-shift" guys, that this is the type of nights accidents happen. Runway 15 at KBDL was a terrible runway to land on and the VOR approach wasn't much help to that runway; I have landed on that runway myself and I didn't like it. The next day, I went to the hangar where the airplane towed, and the aircraft was a mess! Every foot of both leading edges had damage and there was a tree limb sticking out of one of the engines. Both of the main landing gears had trees wrapped in them. I am surprised they made it to the runway. I forgot to mention they hit the RW 33 ILS antennas on the approach end and those parts were stuck to the aircraft. Quite a night, they even closed the tower due to the high winds.

I was one of the tree that was being clipped by the aircraft. I remember me and my family was just having a respiration party, waiting for the sunlight to come back to start photosynthesis. My uncle was the first one impacted and was immediately cut into pieces. I only survived due to the heroic action of the pilot who stopped the descend right at the end, otherwise I would have ended up as a firewood or log. Terrible, terrible night altogether. Thank you Petter for giving such a clear and full eulogy for my family. We will never stop removing CO2 and providing Oxygen for you my man.

I was the National Transportation Safety Board investigator-in-charge of the government work on this one. Thank you for an extremely clear summary. Our final report criticized the pilots and also commended them for landing successfully. A bit of a rarity. I and the other pilots on my NTSB team wondered if we could have done as well as this AAL crew did in a similar situation. As an aside, I was told that the AAL union pilots awarded the captain with a tree fragment from his landing gear well. I thought that was pretty cool.

A bird strike is bad enough for the engine. The whole nest and tree is another level.

Living life as an ILS antenna is hazardous.😂

Dear Petter! Please cover Alrosa Flight 514. It's a true miracle. Please like so that Petter will see it. UPD. Many English-language sources describing the event completely miss the key point what made this landing possible: after the airstrip was closed in the beginning of 2000th, it was used only as a helipad. However, the airport warden, Sergey Sotnikov, on his own initiative was himself cleaning the runway (!) and maintaining it in a good condition for 13 years despite the airport to be long closed without any hope of revival. When asked "why", he basically said that it was painful for him to see the runway in a bad shape. He was later awarded by then russian president Medvedev.

I had posted elsewhere here but as a TRACON controller who was there that night, I just wanted to say that I listened to this with a very critical ear and you my friend get an A+ for accuracy, as well as the overall presentation! Thank you...

I must be honest, a teardrop fell of my eyes when the FO called "god bless you we made it". What an incredible history, thanks Peter for sharing with us!

I see mentour pilot. I click. Simple life,

One Swiss cheese slice away from a BBQ.

The first officer seems like a great friend to have

20:56: I like how the leftmost guy in the control tower has a coffee cup balanced on his wrist and he's looking at it like a watch. "What time is it son?" "It's exactly coffee o'clock sir!"

I love the ones with good airmanship and happy endings

Anytime there’s an elaborate description of anything that seems benign, I anxiously await to hear the words “Remember that” spoken with a slight nod and cryptic look in the eyes… when it happens, it’s like Christmas

I love that the first officer was helping without taking over - and starting a ‘fight for control’ - reasonable suggestions, questions and encouragement.

I’m a tv news photographer and was at the airport after the incident. Soaking wet passengers in their socks in the terminal. We got to go to the tarmac to see the plane and it looked like someone walked down the leading edge of the wings hitting them with a baseball bat. No doubt a few inches lower would have caused a crash. My favorite sound bite was someone upset that the pilots didn’t make an announcement after the impact inform them of the problem.

I was a cabin crew member of a USair flight that landed just prior to the American. It was a nerve wracking approach - weather was terrible with many strong gusts, shifts and high potential for windshear. (I kept hoping the pilots would divert). Strong turbulence at low altitude and I wasn't really surprised when I heard the morning news about this incident.

I loved that CRM and cockpit work by the flight crew specially the FO. Sometimes, a little encouragement and help goes a long, long way. But also how ingenious was the captain's idea with the flaps, even if to an extent, they played a role into this incident happening, I'd still gladly fly with a crew like them on my plane.

Love Petter saying, "Things were not great,...... but they were about to get a LOT worse"

I'm disappointed you're continuing to associate with Better Help, even after they have been caught lying about selling customer data