1965 Carmel mid-air collision
Eastern Air Lines Lockheed L1049C and Trans World Airlines Boeing 707 131B · Mid-air collision due to optical illusion and pilot error
Event
- Event typeAccident: someone killed or seriously injured, or the aircraft substantially damaged (NTSB definition). Incident: an occurrence that affected or could have affected safety, short of that. Glossary
- Accident
- InvestigationHow far the investigation had got when the record was published: preliminary, ongoing, final or completed. Unknown where the source does not say. Glossary
- Unknown
- Event fatalities
- 4 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 0
- Occupants
- 112
- Survivors
- 108
- InjuriesFatal: death within 30 days. Serious: over 48 hours in hospital within a week, most broken bones, severe bleeding, nerve or organ damage, or serious burns. Minor: anything less. Glossary
- 50
- OperationWhat kind of flying it was, grouped by the rules it flew under: airline (US Part 121), air taxi and commuter (Part 135), general aviation (Part 91 and similar), military or government. Glossary
- Airline
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Visual Meteorological Cond
Aircraft 1 · Lockheed L1049C
- Flight
- EA853
- Aircraft type
- Lockheed L1049
- Category
- Airplane
- RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
- N6218C
- Operator
- Eastern Air Lines
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Occupants
- 54
- Survivors
- 50
- InjuriesFatal: death within 30 days. Serious: over 48 hours in hospital within a week, most broken bones, severe bleeding, nerve or organ damage, or serious burns. Minor: anything less. Glossary
- 49
- Route
- From Boston Logan International Airport (BOS)To Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR)
- Aircraft age
- Not recorded
- Flight rulesThe regulations the flight operated under: in the US, Part 91 (general aviation), Part 121 (airlines), Part 135 (air taxi and commuter) and others; for flights abroad, the NTSB's coarser commercial or non-commercial code. Glossary
- Part 121: Air carrier (scheduled domestic passenger service)
- Phase of flightThe stage of the flight when things started to go wrong: standing, taxi, takeoff, initial climb, en route, maneuvering, approach or landing. Glossary
- En route · cruise
- Defining eventThe single coded event the NTSB judges best describes what happened (records from 2008 on). Older records name the first occurrence in the sequence instead. Glossary
- Collision with aircraft - both in flight
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Destroyed
Aircraft 2 · Boeing 707 131B
- Flight
- TW
- Aircraft type
- Boeing 707 131
- Category
- Airplane
- RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
- N748TW
- Operator
- Trans World Airlines
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Occupants
- 58
- Survivors
- 58
- InjuriesFatal: death within 30 days. Serious: over 48 hours in hospital within a week, most broken bones, severe bleeding, nerve or organ damage, or serious burns. Minor: anything less. Glossary
- 1
- Route
- From San Francisco International Airport (SFO)To John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK)
- Aircraft age
- Not recorded
- Flight rulesThe regulations the flight operated under: in the US, Part 91 (general aviation), Part 121 (airlines), Part 135 (air taxi and commuter) and others; for flights abroad, the NTSB's coarser commercial or non-commercial code. Glossary
- Part 121: Air carrier (scheduled domestic passenger service)
- Phase of flightThe stage of the flight when things started to go wrong: standing, taxi, takeoff, initial climb, en route, maneuvering, approach or landing. Glossary
- En route · cruise
- Defining eventThe single coded event the NTSB judges best describes what happened (records from 2008 on). Older records name the first occurrence in the sequence instead. Glossary
- Collision with aircraft - both in flight
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Personnel › Pilot of other aircraft
- Pilot in command › Spatial disorientation
Approximate · Coordinates from the Wikipedia article; not checked against an investigation report.
From the Wikipedia article
On December 4, 1965, Trans World Airlines Flight 42, a Boeing 707 en route from San Francisco International Airport to John F. Kennedy International Airport, collided in mid-air with Eastern Air Lines Flight 853, a Lockheed Super Constellation en route from Boston Logan International Airport to Newark International Airport, New Jersey, over Carmel, New York.
TWA Flight 42 made an emergency landing at John F. Kennedy International Airport, while Eastern Air Lines Flight 853 made a crash landing on Hunt Mountain in North Salem, New York. Three passengers died, plus the Constellation's pilot, Captain Charles J. White, who had returned to the aircraft's cabin to help the last passenger evacuate.
Accident
TWA Flight 42 and Eastern Air Lines Flight 853 approached the Carmel VORTAC at the same time, with the Boeing 707 flying at 11,000 feet and the Super Constellation flying at 10,000 feet. Due to an optical illusion, the first officer of the Super Constellation believed it was on the same altitude as the Boeing 707. The Super Constellation's crew immediately began climbing to escape what they thought was an imminent collision. Their climb however, put them on a legitimate path to collide with the other aircraft.
As the Constellation emerged from a cloud puff, First Officer Roger I. Holt Jr. saw the Boeing in his right side window at the 2 o'clock position. The aircraft appeared to be converging rapidly at the same altitude. Holt shouted, "Look out," placed his hands on the control wheel, and made a rapid application of up elevator simultaneously with Captain White, causing crew members and passengers to be forced down into their seats.
Investigation and cause
Conclusions
Misjudgment of altitude separation by the crew of EA 853 because of an optical illusion created by the up-slope effect of cloud tops resulted in an evasive maneuver and a reactive evasive maneuver by the TWA 42 crew.
Text from the Wikipedia article “1965 Carmel mid-air collision” (revision 1371471759, retrieved 2026-09-18) by its authors, under CC BY-SA 4.0. Extracted as plain text: references, tables, images and some sections are left out. Read the article
NTSB remarks
PLT MISJUDGED ALT.SEPARATION DUE OPTICAL ILLUSION CREATED BY UP-SLOPE EFFECT OF CLOUD TOPS.
PLT N6218C MISJUDGED ALT.SEPARATION DUE OPTICAL ILLUSION CREATED BY UP-SLOPE EFFECT OF CLOUD TOPS.
NTSB's remark from its 1962–1981 archive, as recorded (abbreviated, at most 98 characters): the archive has no narrative
Sources
Wikipedia article: 1965 Carmel mid-air collision
- Revision
- 1371471759 · 2026-08-26 · retrieved 2026-09-18
- Wikidata
- Q4571879
- Licence
- Text CC BY-SA 4.0, by the article's authors; Wikidata CC0; town positions GeoNames (CC BY 4.0)
NTSB record
- Event ID
- 19651204P005487
- Case number
- Unknown
- Dataset
- historical-pre1982
- Source SHA-256
- abe1a933b4b73583d61684309f7f0610c281e3c1de3537c6471bf2a98ba6481d
Where each value comes from
- Record
- Wikipedia article "1965 Carmel mid-air collision" (page 21256704, revision 1371471759); merged with NTSB case NTSB19651204P005487 (PRE1982 tblFirstHalf (one row per aircraft, grouped by date, place and time))
- Date
- NTSB record NTSB19651204P005487: PRE1982 DATE_OCCURRENCE
- Place and country
- Wikipedia infobox: site; country from NTSB record NTSB19651204P005487
- Map position
- Wikipedia: Wikipedia article coordinates
- Aircraft, operator and route
- NTSB record NTSB19651204P005487: PRE1982 REGIST_NO, ACFT_MAKE, ACFT_MODEL; gaps from Wikipedia infobox: aircraft type, registration, operator, origin and destination; route airports from the linked airport articles' Wikidata codes (OurAirports)
- Operation
- NTSB record NTSB19651204P005487: operated under Part 121: Air carrier (scheduled domestic passg.svc)
- Fatalities
- NTSB record NTSB19651204P005487: PRE1982 TOTAL_ABRD_FATAL of each aircraft, plus people on the ground and others outside the aircraft
- Ground fatalities
- NTSB record NTSB19651204P005487: events.inj_f_grnd
- Summary
- Wikipedia infobox: summary
Source notes (4)
- One occurrence in two sources, merged: the Wikipedia article "1965 Carmel mid-air collision" and NTSB case NTSB19651204P005487, matched by the same aircraft registration and date. For this US event the NTSB's values are used where the two differ; each value names its source.
- From NTSB's 1962-1981 archive (PRE1982), which holds at most a short remark (98 characters, abbreviated) instead of a narrative; the accident type, phase of flight, causes and conditions are NTSB's codes, decoded as the archive defines them.
- Reviewed means this record passed the site's consistency check, not that it was checked against a narrative or report - there is none to check against.
- The operation category is mapped from the archive's operator and operation codes and has not been reviewed.