A Face in the Clouds
1972 was the deadliest year in commercial aviation since World War II
Welcome to Family Ghosts! If you haven’t already, I’d recommend reading The Woman in the Teal Dress before proceeding. TW for the post below: high-level details of a plane crash, but no graphic descriptions or photos of the wreckage.
Eastern Airlines Flight 401 crashed so gently in the Florida Everglades on December 29, 1972 that 75 people survived. As I’ve read accounts of the accident, it’s the small details that tug at me: it was pitch-black, a moonless night. The first person on the scene was a man on an airboat schlepping 30 pounds of bullfrogs. A poodle survived. Despite the swampy vegetation, snakes, and alligators, there were issues with looters. Christmas carols wafted over the debris field, led by a surviving flight attendant as she waited for rescuers.
Ultimately, 101 souls perished less than 20 miles from their final destination, although some may have lingered a little longer than others.
The Plane Crash
Until about 11:30 pm Eastern time, the flight from New York’s John F. Kennedy Airport to Miami had been routine. Survivors recounted a peaceful, even joyful, flight to Florida as folks luxuriated in that vague slice of time between Christmas and New Years. One couple got engaged after takeoff, while many others were traveling to and from holiday visits with family and friends. By all accounts, the flight crew was experienced and highly qualified, while the flight attendants were close-knit and attentive.
The trouble began on the plane’s descent into Miami. The flight had received clearance to land when the flight crew noticed that a green indicator light connected to the landing gear failed to turn on. Captain Robert Loft began to troubleshoot the issue, first cycling through the landing gear deployment (still no green light), then taking apart the light board. Unable to resolve the issue, Second Officer Donald Repo entered the avionics bay to visually inspect the landing gear through a peephole. The avionics bay was unlit and Repo was unable to see the gear. A maintenance specialist who was technically off-duty but in the cockpit, Angelo Donadeo, joined Repo in the bay while Captain Loft and his First Officer, Bert Stockstill, tried to reinstall the jammed light board.
Distracted by their attempts to verify whether the landing gear was down, no one on the flight noticed that the auto-pilot setting had been toggled from an altitude hold at 2,000 feet to a downward-pitched steering mode. The result was four minutes of a sustained, but gentle, loss of altitude. Various warning indicators, including audio chimes, were missed as the crew focused on troubleshooting the landing gear. The NTSB Report details this final exchange between the First Officer and Captain:
First Officer Stockstill: “We did something to the altitude.”
Captain Loft: “What?”
First Officer Stockstill: “We're still at 2,000 feet, right?”
Captain Loft: “Hey—what's happening here?”
It was only in the last few seconds of the flight that they realized something had gone wrong. It turns out that the landing gear was working fine. The indicator lightbulb had just burned out.
Eastern Airlines Flight 401 was remarkable for several reasons. The number of survivors was unusually high, a finding which was attributed to the design of the airplane seats and the fact that the fuselage did not explode. Jumpseats now come equipped with flashlights, so no one has to venture down into an unlit avionics bay. Protocols were re-evaluated to ensure that Air Traffic Controllers can effectively flag and escalate deviations from altitude. Most notably, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) cites it as a catalyst for the development of Crew Resource Management (CRM), which is still used today. CRM ensures that crew members prioritize safety through clear lines of responsibility and communication.
The Ghost Story
The only survivor from the cockpit crew was Maintenance Specialist Angelo Donadeo. In an interview with The New York Times shortly after the crash, he described putting his eye up towards the peephole at the moment of impact. He was trapped in the wreckage with Second Officer Repo, who survived the initial impact but passed away days later.
Despite the accident, various parts of Eastern Airlines Flight 401 were still in usable condition once salvaged. Eastern Airlines allegedly decided to redeploy these parts on other aircraft in their fleet. Soon after, flight crews began reporting unusual things on those crafts.
Second Officer Donald Repo’s face, and occasionally his body, appeared to flight attendants in a mist in the clouds outside the plane or near the cockpit door. Sometimes he would appear in the cockpit, warning other crews about a faulty engine or errant wire. The story goes that when the crews investigated his warnings, they’d often find something wrong with the aircraft. Captain Robert Loft was also spotted in several first-class cabins and once, his voice came over the in-flight communication system as he welcomed passengers aboard. The sightings seemed to continue into 1974, then faded away.
The crash and the resulting ghost story entered the realm of pop culture. Eastern Airlines Flight 401 is mentioned in an episode of Supernatural, explored in several television shows and a made-for-TV movie, and memorialized in a song from 1979. Last month, when I was explaining the premise of this newsletter to my hairdresser, their colleague chimed in and said that she was familiar with this ghost story too.
I first read about this ghost story in elementary school and to this day, every time I fly, I look out the window thinking, Maybe this time I’ll see a face. The only thing that has changed is whose face I look for in the clouds.
Up Next: How do you feel about coincidences?
Strange Distractions
An occasional feature where I recommend something weird, spooky, or unusual.
Disembodied voices over airplane public address systems are not just lore from 50 years ago. In September 2022, a spate of unexplained moaning noises on several American Airlines flights made national news. I still haven’t seen a really detailed explanation of what happened, although Reddit is all over it.
The Story Continues:
Part 3: The Moment of Connection
Sources:
Aircraft Accident Report, Eastern Air Lines, Inc. L-1011, N310EA, Miami, Florida, December 29, 1972. (1973, June 14). National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB). https://www.ntsb.gov/investigations/AccidentReports/Reports/AAR7314.pdf
Crew Resource Management. (n.d.). SKYBrary. Retrieved August 26, 2023 from https://skybrary.aero/articles/crew-resource-management-crm
Currie, J. (1996). Echoes in the Air. Crécy Publishing Limited.
Crash. (n.d.) Official Eastern Air Lines Flight 401 - History, Photos, Survivors and Tribute. Retrieved August 26, 2023 from https://sites.google.com/site/eastern401/crash?authuser=0
Eastern Airlines Flight 401. (2023, July 18). In Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Eastern_Air_Lines_Flight_401&oldid=1166024618
Home. (n.d.) Official Eastern Air Lines Flight 401 - History, Photos, Survivors and Tribute. Retrieved August 26, 2023 from https://sites.google.com/site/eastern401/home?authuser=0
Investigation. (n.d.) Official Eastern Air Lines Flight 401 - History, Photos, Survivors and Tribute. Retrieved August 26, 2023 from https://sites.google.com/site/eastern401/investigation?authuser=0
Passengers. (n.d.) Official Eastern Air Lines Flight 401 - History, Photos, Survivors and Tribute. Retrieved August 26, 2023 from https://sites.google.com/site/eastern401/passenger-list?authuser=0
Plane crash held surprise to crew. (1973, January 12). The New York Times.
Rescue. (n.d.) Official Eastern Air Lines Flight 401 - History, Photos, Survivors and Tribute. Retrieved August 26, 2023 from https://sites.google.com/site/eastern401/rescue?authuser=0
United States Department of Transportation. (2022). Lockheed Model L-1011: Eastern Airlines Flight 401, N310EA. Federal Aviation Administration. https://www.faa.gov/lessons_learned/transport_airplane/accidents/N310EA
I just found your substack through Culture Study the other day and it’s crazy that the first post that shows up references this plane crash because my father’s cousin’s (so my first cousin once removed) wife was a flight attendant on the plane. I only met her a few times and didn’t know anything about the crash, but 10 years ago I was at a conference and a doctor presenting used the story of the crash as a metaphor for the point he was making (can’t remember the point now, but he focused on the burnt out lightbulb). He was very excited when I told him I had a peripheral family member who survived. She’s the one on the far left in this picture. https://www.aviationpros.com/aircraft/commercial-airline/news/21290849/were-down-flight-401-crashed-in-miami-50-years-ago-survivors-now-have-a-message