Pacific Southwest Airlines flight 182 departed Sacramento on its way to San
Diego on the morning of September 25, 1978, during a sunny and clear day.
After an uneventful trip, the Boeing 727-214 jet entered San Diego airspace and prepared to land.
Because of the excellent weather, the plane was flying under visual flight rules,
in which a pilot must operate with visual reference to the ground and avoid any obstruction.
Still, ground control warned them that a small Cessna 172 was heading in their direction.
The crew of the 182 then spotted the light airplane and reported it,
but within a matter of seconds, the Captain lost sight of it.
A Sunny Morning
On a clear September morning in 1978,
Pacific Southwest Airlines flight 182 departed from Sacramento and stopped in
Los Angeles as scheduled. The airliner then took off en route to San Diego at 8:34 am.
As the PSA Boeing 727-214, call sign N533PS,
entered the city’s airspace off Encinitas, Command pilot Captain James E. McFeron
reported to ground control at NAS Miramar and requested guidance for the final approach.
However, it was the First Officer, Robert E. Fox, who was flying the aircraft.
The flight engineer and an off-duty captain were also in the cockpit, traveling on the jump seat.
Because the weather was sunny and clear, with 10 miles of visibility,
the crew was given instructions to switch to visual flight rules, or VFR,
using ground landmarks as navigational references and visually avoiding obstructions.
At 8:59 am, Flight 182 was alerted by the approach
controller that a light Cessna 172 Skyhawk was heading towards them.
The Skyhawk was flown by two pilots. Martin Kazy Jr. was a certified instrument flight
instructor who had flown over 5,000 hours and was training US Marine Corps
Sergeant David Boswell, an experienced pilot pursuing his instrument rating.
Boswell was wearing a hood that limited his field of vision,
a standard protocol for IFR training, and they were also navigating under visual flight rules,
so there was no requirement to file a flight plan. The Cessna remained in communication with
San Diego approach control as they departed from Montgomery Field through Runway 9, heading east.
San Diego approach control then reached to the airliner crew: (QUOTE)
“PSA one eighty-two, additional traffic's ah, twelve o'clock, three miles just north of the
field, northeast-bound, a Cessna one seventy-two climbing VFR out of one thousand four hundred.”
Seconds later, the warning continued: (QUOTE) “Maintain VFR conditions at or
below three thousand five hundred, fly heading zero seven zero, vector final approach course.”
By 9:00 am, First Officer Fox exclaimed: (QUOTE) “Got ‘em,”
while the Captain added: (QUOTE) “Traffic in sight.”
The Boeing jet would now initiate its descent. As it reached 4,000 feet above Mission Bay,
Miramar could be heard saying: (QUOTE) “Okay, sir, maintain visual separation,
contact Lindbergh Tower one three three point three, have a nice day now.”
The next 30 seconds were decisive. The Captain asked the First Officer: (QUOTE)
“Is that the one (we're) looking at?” To which the First Officer responded: (QUOTE)
“Yeah, but I don't see him now.” The Captain proceeded
to inform Lindbergh Tower that they had spotted the Cessna a minute ago.
A crucial communication error then occurred. The Captain told Lindbergh Tower: (QUOTE)
“I think he's pass(ed) off to our right,” but due to static,
the message received by the tower was: (QUOTE) "He's passing off to our right."
This conveyed that they could see the Cessna and were keeping visual separation.
The Crash
Even though the pilots reported seeing the Cessna,
they had lost sight of it and speculated about its position.
The jet was then given permission to land, and the Captain and his First
Officer believed they were now clear of the Cessna. The Captain added: (QUOTE) “Oh yeah,
before we turned downwind, I saw him at about one o'clock, probably behind us now.”
However, the Cessna was directly in front and below them.
The jet kept descending rapidly in a nose-up deck approach, and for unknown reasons,
the Cessna changed course and took a right turn to the east, deviating from its expected trajectory.
Now both aircraft were roughly on a 090 heading, going east.
While at 2,600 feet, the airliner overtook the Cessna,
and the impact sound was recorded at 9:01:47 am.
The Boeing’s system turned off for less than a second and went back up with a tone.
The Captain then asked: (QUOTE) “What have we got here?” to which the First
Officer responded: (QUOTE) “It’s bad. We're hit man, we are hit.”
A loud metallic noise alerted the people on the ground.
Then came the explosion and the fire. The airliner’s right wing was smashed
and rendered the airplane uncontrollable. Seconds later, the fuel tank ruptured and
set the jet alight, while the Cessna’s vertical stabilizer was bent and torn from the fuselage.
Both aircraft immediately went down.
The Footage
San Diego County Public Relations Office Photographer Hans Wendt
and cameraman Steve Howell, from local TV channel 39,
were attending an outdoor press event when the incident happened a few blocks away.
And they were both able to capture photographs and video of the post-collision.
The photographs show the 727 falling steeply with its right wing burning.
And in the video, the Cessna is seen plummeting to the ground.
The video also recorded the impact sound and the mushroom cloud that followed.
According to seismographic readings at 9:02 am, the jet struck a house in the
North Park residential area and impacted the driveway. The Cessna’s largest piece
touched ground six blocks away, 3,500 feet from where the 727 went down.
Even though the damaged area was relatively small due to the steep angle at which the aircraft fell,
the smoke could be seen from miles away.
The San Diego Fire Department then rushed to the scene of
what would become the most lethal air disaster in California history.
Contributing Factors
An automated conflict alert tipped off ground control about 19 seconds before the impact.
However, they ignored the warning and did not relay the information to the
aircraft because it was common even when no conflict existed.
A report by the National Transportation Safety Board, or NTSB, released in 1979, stated that the
accident’s probable cause was the failure of the PSA flight crew to follow proper ATC procedures.
They claimed that the crew lost sight of the light plane and
violated explicit instructions to: (QUOTE) "Keep visual separation from that traffic."
However, it was also reported that the yellow Cessna was difficult to
spot amidst the mostly yellow houses below. Furthermore,
its apparent motion was minimized because both airplanes were flying on the same course.
Another possible factor was the difficulty to discern the Cessna,
as it probably looked distorted at plain sight and optically smaller due to the perspective.
Besides, the wing’s white surface could have been shining due to the morning sunlight.
In addition, the 182’s crew never explicitly alerted the tower that it had lost visual
contact with the Cessna, and more precise communication could have prevented the crash.
If the Cessna had maintained its course at 70 degrees as assigned by ATC,
it is estimated that the aircraft would have missed each other by 1,000 feet.
In the aftermath of this collision and other accidents, the Traffic Collision Alert and
Avoidance System, or TCAS, was installed in all commercial passenger airplanes and most cargo
ones. The system clearly alerts pilots when coming too close to other objects.
The 1978 accident in California is still used in modern flight training.
Given the conclusion that it happened due to a pilot error, it is used as a reference
in Human Factors classes, as well as Airspace or Visual Separation Rules.
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