The Science of a Plane Crash

The Science of a Plane Crash — page 1 — Published in the United States of America by Cherry Lake Publishing Ann Arbor Michigan www cherrylakepublishing com Consultants Jeffrey C Price Associate Professor Department of Aviation Aerospace Science Metropolitan State University of Denver Marla Conn ReadAbility Inc Editorial direction Red Line Editorial Book design and illustration Design Lab Photo Credits Marcio Jose Sanchez AP Images cover 1 8 Anatoliy Lukich Shutterstock Images 5 Jeff Chiu AP Images 7 Evan Vucci AP Images 11 US Air Force 13 Dorling Kindersley Thinkstock 15 20 Frank May dpa Corbis 18 Jason DeCrow AP Images 22 Brazil’s Air Force AP Images 25 Mark Lennihan AP Images 28 Copyright 2015 by Cherry Lake Publishing All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means without written permission from the publisher Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Surges Carol S author The science of a plane crash by Carol S Surges pages cm Disaster science Audience Age 11 Audience Grades 4 to 6 Includes bibliographical references and index ISBN 978-1-63137-626-9 hardcover ISBN 978-1-63137-671-9 pbk ISBN 978-1-63137-716-7 pdf ebook ISBN 978-1-63137-761-7 hosted ebook 1 Aircraft accidents Investigation Juvenile literature 2 Aeronautics Juvenile literature I Title TL553 5 S755 2015 363 12’465 dc23 2014004032 Cherry Lake Publishing would like to acknowledge the work of The Partnership for 21st Century Skills Please visit www p21 org for more information Printed in the United States of America Corporate Graphics Inc July 2014 ABOUT THE AUTHOR At one time Carol S Surges took the Federal Aviation Administration test to be an air trafﬁc controller She made it all the way to the physical where her poor depth perception changed her plans Instead she returned to working in a school library teaching science and ﬂying whenever she gets the chance

The Science of a Plane Crash — page 2 — TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER 1 Asiana Airlines Flight 214 4 CHAPTER 2 Forces Add Up 10 CHAPTER 3 How Planes Crash 16 CHAPTER 4 Stopping the Accident Chain 24 TOP FIVE WORST PLANE CRASHES 30 LEARN MORE 31 GLOSSARY 32 INDEX 32

The Science of a Plane Crash — page 3 — 21st century skills library 4 Asiana Airlines Flight 214 chapter 1 July 6 2013 was a beautiful summer day at San Francisco International Airport The sun was shining and there was a light breeze Visibility looked good for Asiana Airlines Flight 214 which had ﬂown from South Korea The control tower had given the pilots clearance to land the huge Boeing 777 passenger jet The ﬂight’s 291 passengers and 12 ﬂight attendants were buckled in their seats The ten-hour nonstop ﬂight was ﬁnally coming to an end

The Science of a Plane Crash — page 4 — disaster science 5 Inside the cockpit things were not looking as good When the pilots dropped below 200 feet 60 m they likely noticed the plane was going too slowly and their altitude was falling too quickly The plane was heading into a stall a situation in which an aircraft is going so slowly it cannot be controlled In order to avoid this the Boeing 777s had an excellent safety record

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