TWA Flight 800 (1964)
Trans World Airlines Boeing 707-331 · Thrust reverser malfunction followed by runway excursion
From Charles B. Wheeler Downtown Airport (MKC) to Cairo International Airport (CAI)
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
- 49 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- Unknown
- Occupants
- 73
- Survivors
- 24
- 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
- 20
- 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
Boeing 707-331
- Aircraft type
- Boeing 707
- 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
- N769TW
- Operator
- Trans World Airlines
- Onboard fatalities
- 49
- Route
- From Charles B. Wheeler Downtown Airport (MKC)To Cairo International Airport (CAI)
- 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 international 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
- Takeoff · rejected takeoff
- 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
- Ground-water loop-swerve
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Miscellaneous acts, conditions › Thrust reversal-asymmetrical
- Powerplant › Other
Approximate · Coordinates from the Wikipedia article; not checked against an investigation report.
From the Wikipedia article
Trans World Airlines Flight 800 was an international scheduled passenger service from Kansas City, Missouri, to Cairo, Egypt via Chicago, New York City, Paris, Milan, Rome, and Athens. The Boeing 707 caught fire following a rejected takeoff on runway 25 at Leonardo da Vinci–Fiumicino Airport, Rome, at 13:09 GMT on a flight to Athens International Airport, Greece, on November 23, 1964, killing 49 of the 73 people on board.
Incident
At the time of the accident, maintenance work was being carried out at the end of runway 25, with the last 2,000 feet of the runway closed. As the aircraft reached 80 knots during its takeoff roll, the instruments for engine number 4 indicated zero thrust. The flight crew assumed that this engine had failed. Seconds later, the Reverser Unlock light for engine number 2 illuminated. Since the aircraft was below its V1, the safest course of action was to abort the takeoff, which was done when the aircraft was around 800 m along the runway. This was accomplished by ordering full reverse thrust on all engines, as well as deploying their thrust reversers. The aircraft began to slow down, but not as quickly as expected; Captain Lowell also had great difficulty maintaining directional control.
The 707 overran the declared end of the runway and struck a compactor crossing the runway, damaging the number 4 engine and starting a fire on the right wing. The aircraft eventually stopped a further 260 m down the runway, and an evacuation began. Only seconds after coming to a stop, the center fuel tank exploded. The evacuation was greatly impeded by smoke and flames blocking most of the passenger exits. More explosions followed, including that of the number 1 fuel tank. Only 24 out of the 73 people on board survived. Captain Lowell and Second Officer Churchill were among the survivors. A prominent fatality was passenger the Most Reverend Edward Celestin Daly, OP, Bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Des Moines, Iowa, who had just participated in Vatican Council II.
One passenger died of her injuries over a month after the accident. The final report listed her injuries as serious.
Investigation and cause
Cause
The root cause of the accident was determined to be an inoperative number 2 engine reverse thrust system, even though cockpit instruments showed that the reverser had deployed. This was caused by the disconnection of a duct, resulting in a lack of pressure in the pneumatic clamshell door actuating mechanism. This malfunction allowed the development of considerable forward thrust by number 2 engine, even though the thrust levers for all four engines were in the "reverse" position, which both increased the plane's stopping distance as well as giving it a tendency to steer to the right.
The amount of available runway was judged safe as required by the Boeing 707 for takeoff, rejected takeoff or landing. But no allowances were made for an aircraft that was not functioning normally, as in the case of Flight 800. Thus the thrust asymmetry resulted in aircraft being unable to stop before the end of the declared runway available and avoid the compactor.
Despite the crew following proper procedures for a rejected takeoff (powering down engines and hydraulic systems) after the aircraft halted, fuel leaking from the wing tanks connected to the damaged pylon caught fire, likely due to exposed and sparking electrical wiring caused by the damage. After being informed of the fire. the crew activated the engine fire-suppression systems, but this had no effect, as the fuel and flames had already spread to the point that they hindered evacuation efforts. Eventually the fire reached the fuselage fuel tanks, which were mostly empty except for volatile fuel vapors that ignited and exploded, destroying the aircraft.
Captain Lowell would go on to become a passionate advocate for improved safety in the aviation industry following this accident, and in 1967 wrote a book, Airline Safety is a Myth, in which he detailed the accident. Many of his suggestions were subsequently implemented.
Text from the Wikipedia article “TWA Flight 800 (1964)” (revision 1363087461, 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
INVEST AND REPT BY ITALIAN GOVT.ACFT STRUCK STEAMROLLER.NO.2 ENG NOT IN REV.LITE IND ENG IN REVERS
NTSB's remark from its 1962–1981 archive, as recorded (abbreviated, at most 98 characters): the archive has no narrative
Sources
Wikipedia article: TWA Flight 800 (1964)
- Article
- TWA Flight 800 (1964)
- Revision
- 1363087461 · 2026-07-07 · retrieved 2026-09-18
- Wikidata
- Q4016245
- 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
- 19641123P000248
- Case number
- Unknown
- Dataset
- historical-pre1982
- Source SHA-256
- abe1a933b4b73583d61684309f7f0610c281e3c1de3537c6471bf2a98ba6481d
Where each value comes from
- Record
- Wikipedia article "TWA Flight 800 (1964)" (page 26196049, revision 1363087461); merged with NTSB case NTSB19641123P000248 (PRE1982 tblFirstHalf (one row per aircraft, grouped by date, place and time))
- Date
- Wikipedia infobox: date
- Place and country
- Wikipedia infobox: site
- Map position
- Wikipedia: Wikipedia article coordinates
- Aircraft, operator and route
- Wikipedia infobox: aircraft type, registration, operator, origin and destination; route airports from the linked airport articles' Wikidata codes (OurAirports); gaps and aircraft details from NTSB record NTSB19641123P000248
- Operation
- flight number in the article title
- Fatalities
- Wikipedia: Wikipedia infobox: aircraft fatalities
- Ground fatalities
- Wikipedia: not stated in the Wikipedia infobox
- Summary
- Wikipedia infobox: summary
Source notes (5)
- One occurrence in two sources, merged: the Wikipedia article "TWA Flight 800 (1964)" and NTSB case NTSB19641123P000248, matched by the same aircraft registration and date. For this event outside the United States Wikipedia's values are used where the two differ; each value names its source.
- The NTSB record (NTSB19641123P000248) gives 48 fatalities and the Wikipedia article 49; Wikipedia's figure is shown, as the NTSB only took part in this foreign investigation.
- 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.