Deadly Departure: Why The Experts Failed To Prevent The TWA Flight 800 Disaster And How It Could Happen Again

By Christine Negroni

Book Overview

A CNN broadcast journalist presents a stunning expose of the aviation industry and the risks air travelers take, focusing on the devastating 1996 crash of TWA Flight 800. 16-page insert.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0060194774
• ISBN13: 9780060194772
• Release Date: March 2000
• Publisher: William Morrow
• Length: 256 Pages
• Weight: 1.23 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.1" x 0.9" x 6.1"

Customer Reviews

Book covers the official story and makes the case but leaves out very important details

I just finished this book. I came to it having followed the TWA800 disaster and having read Jack Cashill’s books, internet writings, and watched several documentaries. My belief is that a missile was involved, eyewitnesses were correct, and there was a coverup. But I wanted to look at something that makes the case for “mechanical failure” that was not an official release. Negroni writes a readable story that includes the actions and thinking of passengers and their families as well as those involved in the investigation. At various points, she makes the case primarily for mechanical failure by a few on the investigation teams as well some who had been pushing for a safer fuel system. This includes some who have a vested interest in selling such systems to the airlines and aircraft manufacturers. And there are some good points made. The conclusion is that because such disasters were rare, the manufacturers and airlines had made the decision not to fix the situation due to economics. Throughout the book, the eyewitness accounts of a missile are discounted. It’s as if she took the statements of the FBI, NTSB, and others as the full story and never interviewed the actual eyewitnesses. The idea that residues found on seats pointed to a missile was also discounted. She includes the problems with the FBI dominating the investigation over the NTSB, Airline Pilots group, and TWA. But she does not point to how this corrupted the investigation. She does not include the CIA or their animation video. NTSB investigators were not included in eyewitness interviews but she discounts this as a difference of opinion/memory. She quotes FBI Asst Dir Kallstrom as saying “they were invited to go on any interview, but they had no one to go.” She does not resolve this. In fact, it’s as if Negroni was telling Kallstrom’s story. The odd part is that she seems to throw him under a bus because he pushed the missile theory over mechanical failure. That one threw me because what I had read before said he did not from the beginning. I was confused about this until I heard one NTSB investigator Henry Hughes say that Kallstrom always pushed the missile theory. That is odd. Why did Kallstrom push the missile theory in private with the investigators but publicly say something else including having a reporter removed for asking why the NAVY was involved when they were a suspect? The only conclusion I could come up with was that Kallstrom was the point man for the coverup, gathering the info in the investigation to see what needed to be explained away or discarded only to tell the public that it was mechanical failure. The book does well to emphasize what a lot of these people went through from the victims, their families, the recovery teams, the staffs of TWA, NTSB, to others of the story. But the shortcomings only draw more questions. The book adds to the story but it leaves a lot out.

AirlineBiz.Com Book Review

Christine Negroni does a great job following the events of TWA 800. A must read!

EXCELLENT EXPOSE

THIS BOOK IS A QUICK READ. IT CATCHES YOUR INTEREST FROM THE START AND RAISES SERIOUS QUESTIONS ABOUT THE FAA AND BOEING AND TO A LESSER EXTENT THE AIRLINES AND HOW MUCH CONCERN THEY ACTUALLY HAVE FOR PASSENGER SAFETY. IT IS WELL WORTH BUYING AND READING.

Finally - a credible theory

Enough with the hype and the conspiracy theories on plane crashes - this author tells it like it is, that is, that maintenance and design of airplanes may be fundamentally unsafe, and our government agencies are too busy fighting with each other for turf to uncover and publicize the facts. All air travellers should read this book and think hard about whether our demands for frequent, low cost travel comes at the cost of predictable fatalities. A must read for the sophisticated traveller and the person who really wants to get at the truth.

Finally, some answers that make sense

I found the book really cut through all the conflicting stories about what happened to this plane. A well researched and intriguing mix of human drama and scientific detective work, and some of the characters the author discovered at the crash scene are too strange to be believed.