Customer Reviews

Air Disaster (Vol. 4: The Propeller Era)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The fourth installment in Macarthur Job's outstanding "Air Disaster" series of books focuses attention on "The Propeller Era" of commercial aviation accidents.

While not quite as intricately detailed as Volumes 1 through 3 in this series of aviation publications, Volume Four's 184 pages are still filled with many interesting-to-read accounts. There are 20 individual chapters here, covering a timespan of 1950 to 1971.

Prop plane accidents explored include two incidents on the very same day -- September 17, 1961 -- when a Northwest Airlines Lockheed L188 Electra went down in Chicago and a Transair Sweden DC-6 crashed in Northern Rhodesia.

Other air disasters that get a chapter in Volume 4 include the crash of an Eastern Airlines L188 Electra in Boston on October 4, 1960, a Northwest Orient Stratocruiser accident in Washington State on April 2, 1956, and another Stratocruiser accident suffered by Pan Am in October 1956.

Also included is a chapter covering the "Grand Canyon Collision" of June 30, 1956. This terrible accident took 128 lives as a TWA Super Constellation collided in mid-air with a United Airlines DC-7 above the Grand Canyon.

Featuring a wealth of vintage aircraft photographs from the pre-jet age of air travel, plus many excellent illustrations, charts, maps, and original artwork, Volume 4 of "Air Disaster", published in 2001, is yet another worthy addition to the library.

Although this volume is listed as the fourth in a series, the author admits it ought to have been the first, covering the period from 1950 to 71, before the total dominance of jets in aviation. Chapters here discuss the crashes of the Lockheed Electra, Boeing Stratocrusier and Vickers Vanguard among others. I found the chapter on the 1956 mid air collision between TWA and United to be especially interesting.

It will be clear to the reader very quickly here how much safer planes are today. The propeller craft suffered constant maintenance problems likely to put occupants at risk. In some accidents described, a 'runaway propeller' creates enough drag to bring down a four engined airplane. Apparently ocean ditchings on Pacific routes was common enough to require coast guard ships on stand-by! It would take a brave passenger these days to cross under those conditions.

In many ways this is a five star read. I have given it four due to my bias for major historic crashes. Job includes some of these, but also many of interest for other reasons. And the illustrations are not as good as in the earlier volumes, Matthew Tesch not doing the artwork. If you enjoyed any of the other books in this series, you should like this one.

I purchased this book because my uncle, Joseph J. Cieslak, was one of the 28 victims of the November 17, 1955, crash in Riverton, WA, described in Chapter 6. Because of this crash, I know my uncle only from photos and personal possessions. I felt compelled to know exactly what happened, and the detailed account given in this book gave me some answers. It also led me to a New York Times news article about the crash.

I'm really glad I found this book.

I love this entire series for its detailed technical descriptions. If you, like me, find the drama in the details of how it happened, this is the best series on plane crashes.

Job's other books in this series, on more recent crashes, often tell a story about a more optimized aeronautic system. In modern times, it often takes a complex series of interactions to bring a plane down. This volume, no. 4, goes back to an earlier, wilder time. Especially notable are the gripping accounts of damaged planes ditching in the middle of the Pacific.