
Air Disasters
Season 20
202330 episodes
History's most terrifying air disasters, and the investigations that followed, are revisited and reexamined.
Episodes
E1Headline News
2023-07-30 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Three crashes that made front-page news around the world, and how intense media pressure shaped the investigations that followed.
E2Rookie Errors
2023-08-06 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents, including LAPA Flight 3142, American Airlines Flight 587, and Colgan Air Flight 3407: Even highly trained crews can fall prey to the most basic mistakes — with devastating results.
E3Collision Course
2023-08-13 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Mid-air and on-course collisions, and the systems built to keep aircraft — and vessels — safely apart.
E4Engines Out
2023-08-20 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: When an aircraft loses all engine power, training and airmanship become the last line of defense.
E5Fuel Trouble
2023-08-27 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Flights brought down not by their machinery but by the fuel meant to keep them flying — from mismanagement to mechanical failure.
E6Perilous Payload
2023-09-03 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Aircraft fatally out of balance from misloaded or unsecured cargo — a risk that's entirely preventable, yet keeps recurring.
E7Runway in Sight
2023-09-10 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Crashes that happened with the airport already in view, when the final moments of flight proved the most dangerous.
E8Deadly Confusion
2023-09-17 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Cockpits overwhelmed by conflicting information, where confusion in critical seconds turned recoverable situations into disasters.
E9Radio Silence
2023-09-24 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Flights that stopped responding to the outside world, and the race to understand what was happening on board.
E10Design Flaws
2023-10-01 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Hidden weaknesses engineered into aircraft long before takeoff, and the crashes that finally exposed them.
E11Heat of the Moment
2024-01-07 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Crews forced to make split-second decisions under extreme pressure — some heroic, some catastrophic.
E12Instrument Confusion
2024-01-14 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: When the instruments pilots depend on begin feeding them lies, crews must decide what — and whether — to believe.
E13VIP on Board
2024-01-21 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Crashes that claimed prominent figures, and the extraordinary scrutiny those investigations drew.
E14Lapse in Security
2024-01-28 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Disasters that began on the ground, when security measures meant to protect passengers failed.
E15Mountain Impact
2024-02-04 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Aircraft brought down by terrain, and the technology developed to keep crews from flying into mountains they never saw.
E16Survivors
2024-02-11 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Passengers and crew who lived through the unthinkable, and what their stories reveal about surviving a crash.
E17Death from Above
2024-02-18 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Disasters that reached beyond the aircraft, when falling planes and debris brought tragedy to those below.
E18Courage in the Cockpit
2024-02-25 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Crews who faced impossible circumstances and, through skill and nerve, gave their passengers a fighting chance.
E19Maintenance Mistakes
2024-06-23 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Small errors in hangars and workshops that grew into catastrophes at altitude.
E20Take Off Tragedies
2024-06-30 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: The most critical seconds of any flight — and the crashes that happened before aircraft ever truly left the ground.
E21Dead of Night
2024-07-07 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Darkness strips pilots of the horizon and hides danger — these crashes show how quickly night flying can turn deadly.
E22Engine Gone
2024-07-14 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Engines that failed catastrophically — or tore away entirely — and the crews left to fly what remained.
E23Lethal Choices
2024-07-21 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Decisions made in cockpits and operations rooms that sealed a flight's fate long before the moment of impact.
E24Risky Runways
2024-07-28 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: The world's most demanding airports, where terrain, weather, and short pavement leave crews little margin for error.
E25Landings Gone Wrong
2024-08-04 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Approaches and touchdowns that unraveled in the final seconds, when nearly home proved not close enough.
E26Frozen Wings
2024-08-11 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Ice — nearly invisible and ruthlessly effective — and the flights it brought down before its dangers were fully understood.
E27Runway Collisions
2024-08-18 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Disasters that happened entirely on the ground, when two aircraft ended up on the same strip of pavement.
E28Cockpit Breakdown
2024-08-25 · 45m
Special — Multiple incidents: When teamwork in the cockpit collapses — through conflict, hierarchy, or silence — the aircraft pays the price.
E29Splash Down
2024-09-01 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Flights that ended in the water, from controlled ditchings to high-speed impacts, and what determined who survived.
E30Northern Extremes
2024-09-08 · 44m
Special — Multiple incidents: Aviation at the edge of the map, where cold, isolation, and unforgiving conditions magnify every mistake.
