Air Canada Flight 797 8
Air Canada Flight 797 8 : (4) Aftermath: (2) Criticism and Controversy: Newspapers and other media criticized the actions taken by the crew and said that the pilots took too long to initiate an emergency descent; the initial NTSB report was especially critical of Cameron for not asking about the exact nature of the fire and not immediately initiating emergency descent when the fire was first reported. Cameron admitted in a press conference following the issuance of the NTSB report that he assumed the problem was a bin fire, a common cause of lavatory fires when smoking was still allowed on flights. Pilots and airline personnel throughout the industry petitioned the NTSB to revise its report. First Officer Claude Ouimet sent the NTSB a detailed defense of the crew's actions, including the decision to land in Cincinnati instead of Standiford Field Airport in Louisville, Kentucky, the airport closest to where the crew first notified Air Traffic Control in Indianapolis, Indiana that they needed to make an emergency landing. Ouimet stated that Louisville was too close to be able to descend from cruising altitude to an emergency landing safely, and even landing in Cincinnati was a questionable proposition given Cameron's difficulties in controlling the plane. After reviewing Ouimet's missive and re-evaluating the available data, the NTSB issued a revised version of the report which included Ouimet's explanation of the landing decision, though the report was still critical of Cameron's decision not to inquire about the fire itself. In an interview for the "Fire Flight" episode of Mayday, Cameron said of his actions that day, "All I know was that I did the best I could". The crew of Flight 797 later received a number of citations from Canadian aviation organizations for their heroic actions in getting the plane down (relatively) safely. (3) C-FTLU and N994Z: After this incident, Air Canada sold another of their DC-9 aircraft (tail number N994Z) to Ozark Air Lines. On December 20, 1983, that aircraft, operating as Ozark Air Lines Flight 650, hit a snow plow in Sioux Falls, killing the snow plow operator and separating the right wing from the aircraft. A wing from C-FTLU was used to replace the one separated on N994Z after the incident. The aircraft was later sold toRepublic Airlines, and acquired by Northwest Airlines after Republic merged with Northwest. As of 2012, N994Z was sold for scrap to Evergreen after being assigned to Delta Air Lines, which now owns Northwest Airlines
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