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BOAC Flight 781 was a scheduled
British Overseas Airways Corporation British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC) was the British state-owned airline created in 1939 by the merger of Imperial Airways and British Airways Ltd. It continued operating overseas services throughout World War II. After the passi ...
(BOAC) passenger flight from Singapore to London. On 10 January 1954, a
de Havilland Comet The de Havilland DH.106 Comet was the world's first commercial jet airliner. Developed and manufactured by de Havilland in the United Kingdom, the Comet 1 prototype first flew in 1949. It featured an aerodynamically clean design with four d ...
passenger jet operating the flight suffered an
explosive decompression Uncontrolled decompression is an unplanned drop in the pressure of a sealed system, such as an aircraft cabin or hyperbaric chamber, and typically results from human error, material fatigue, engineering failure, or impact, causing a pressure vesse ...
at altitude and crashed, killing all 35 people on board. The aircraft, registered had taken off shortly before from
Ciampino Airport Ciampino () is a city and ''comune'' in the Metropolitan City of Rome, Lazio, Italy. It was a ''frazione'' of Marino until 1974, when it became a ''comune''; it obtained the city ( it, città) status (being therefore officially known as Città ...
in Rome, en route to
Heathrow Airport Heathrow Airport (), called ''London Airport'' until 1966 and now known as London Heathrow , is a major international airport in London, England. It is the largest of the six international airports in the London airport system (the others be ...
in London, on the final leg of its flight from Singapore. After it exploded, the debris from the explosion fell into the sea near
Elba Island Elba ( it, isola d'Elba, ; la, Ilva) is a Mediterranean island in Tuscany, Italy, from the coastal town of Piombino on the Italian mainland, and the largest island of the Tuscan Archipelago. It is also part of the Arcipelago Toscano National ...
, off the Italian coast. G-ALYP was the third Comet built. Its loss marked the second in a series of three fatal accidents involving the Comet in less than twelve months, all caused by structural failures; it followed the crash of
BOAC Flight 783 On 2 May 1953, BOAC Flight 783, a de Havilland Comet jetliner registered G-ALYV and operated by British Overseas Airways Corporation, broke up mid-air and crashed after encountering a severe squall, shortly after taking off from Calcutta (now Ko ...
near
Calcutta Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , List of renamed places in India#West Bengal, the official name until 2001) is the Capital city, capital of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of West Bengal, on the eastern ba ...
, India, in May 1953, and was followed by the loss of
South African Airways Flight 201 South African Airways Flight 201 (SA201), a de Havilland Comet 1, took off at 18:32 UTC on 8 April 1954 from Ciampino Airport in Rome, Italy, en route to Cairo, Egypt, on the second stage of its flight from London, England to Johannesburg, Sou ...
in April 1954, which crashed in circumstances similar to BOAC 781 after departing from Ciampino Airport.


Crew and passengers

Flight 781 was commanded by Captain Alan Gibson DFC, age 31, one of BOAC's youngest pilots. He had joined BOAC in 1946, after flying in the
Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...
during
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
. He had considerable flying experience, having logged more than 6,500 flight hours. He had previously been involved in an accident in 1951, in which a
Hermes Hermes (; grc-gre, Ἑρμῆς) is an Olympian deity in ancient Greek religion and mythology. Hermes is considered the herald of the gods. He is also considered the protector of human heralds, travellers, thieves, merchants, and orato ...
aircraft was forced to make an emergency landing, and he was later praised for his flying conduct during this accident flight. The first officer on Flight 781 was William John Bury, age 33. He had flown a total of approximately 4,900 hours. The
engineer officer An engineering officer can be a Merchant Navy engineer or a commissioned officer with responsibility for military engineering, typically used in the British Armed Forces. In the Royal Navy, Engineering Officers are responsible for the materi ...
was Francis Charles Macdonald, age 27, and the
radio officer A two-way radio is a radio that can both transmit and receive radio waves (a transceiver), unlike a broadcast receiver which only receives content. It is an audio (sound) transceiver, a transmitter and receiver in one unit, used for bidirecti ...
was Luke Patrick McMahon, age 32. They had logged 720 flying hours and close to 3,600 flying hours, respectively. Ten of the twenty-nine passengers were children. Among the casualties were
Chester Wilmot Reginald William Winchester Wilmot (21 June 1911 – 10 January 1954) was an Australian war correspondent who reported for the BBC and the ABC during the Second World War. After the war he continued to work as a broadcast reporter, and wr ...
, a prominent Australian journalist and military historian working for the
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
, and
Dorothy Beecher Baker Dorothy Beecher Baker (December 21, 1898 - January 10, 1954) was an American teacher and prominent member of the Baháʼí Faith. She rose to leadership positions in a Local Spiritual Assembly and then was elected to the National Spiritual Assembl ...
, a
Hand of the Cause of God Hand of the Cause was a title given to prominent early members of the Baháʼí Faith, appointed for life by the religion's founders. Of the fifty individuals given the title, the last living was ʻAlí-Muhammad Varqá who died in 2007. Hands of ...
for the
Baháʼí Faith The Baháʼí Faith is a religion founded in the 19th century that teaches the Baháʼí Faith and the unity of religion, essential worth of all religions and Baháʼí Faith and the unity of humanity, the unity of all people. Established by ...
.


Flight and accident

Gerry Bull, a former BOAC engineer, said that when he performed a preflight inspection of the aircraft in Rome he looked for "incidental damage", and as he did not find any, he believed the Comet was fit for flight. Bull and the same team of engineers later examined South African Airways Flight 201 before its final flight."Comet Air Crash" ("Crash of the Comet"). '' Seconds From Disaster''. Flight 781 departed from Rome at 10:31 
CET CET or cet may refer to: Places * Cet, Albania * Cet, standard astronomical abbreviation for the constellation Cetus * Colchester Town railway station (National Rail code CET), in Colchester, England Arts, entertainment, and media * Comcast En ...
(09:31  UTC) on 10 January 1954, on the final stage of its flight to London. At about 10:50 CEST, a BOAC
Argonaut The Argonauts (; Ancient Greek: ) were a band of heroes in Greek mythology, who in the years before the Trojan War (around 1300 BC) accompanied Jason to Colchis in his quest to find the Golden Fleece. Their name comes from their ship, ''Argo'', ...
, registration G-ALHJ, piloted by Captain Johnson, which was flying the same route at a lower altitude, was in contact with Captain Gibson. During a radio communication about weather conditions, the conversation was abruptly cut off. The last words heard from Gibson were "George How Jig, from George Yoke Peter, did you get my—". Soon afterwards, witnesses saw wreckage falling into the sea. Heathrow Airport initially listed Flight 781 as being delayed, but it was removed from the arrivals board at around 1:30 pm.


Search and recovery

On 11 January 1954, ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' reported that "35 persons were almost certainly killed when a British Comet jet airliner crashed into the sea ... between the islands of Elba and Montecristo, off the Italian western coast." Bodies had been recovered late into the night, and although the search had continued in the freezing water, there was little hope of finding any survivors. The task of finding out what had happened to Flight 781 was difficult at first because the accident had occurred over water. In 1954, there were no
cockpit voice recorder A flight recorder is an electronic recording device placed in an aircraft for the purpose of facilitating the investigation of aviation accidents and incidents. The device may often be referred to as a "black box", an outdated name which has b ...
s or
flight data recorder A flight recorder is an electronic recording device placed in an aircraft for the purpose of facilitating the investigation of aviation accidents and incidents. The device may often be referred to as a "black box", an outdated name which has b ...
s (the so-called "black boxes") to assist crash investigators, and there existed no established protocol for aircraft accident investigation at the time. An extensive search for the aircraft was organised, which included the
Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against F ...
ships HMS ''Barhill'' and HMS ''Gambia'' as well as the Maltese civilian salvage vessel ''Sea Salvor''. The search effort involved the pioneering use of underwater TV cameras, developed by a team at the UK
Admiralty Research Laboratory The Admiralty Research Laboratory (ARL) was a research laboratory that supported the work of the UK Admiralty in Teddington, London, England from 1921 to 1977. History During the First World War, the Anti-Submarine Division of the Admiralty ha ...
led by George MacNeice, to help to locate and salvage the wreckage in deep water. Witnesses to the crash were a group of Italian fishermen who rushed to the scene to recover the bodies and to search for possible survivors, of whom there were none. The aircraft wreckage was eventually found on the sea floor; it was subsequently raised and transported to the
Royal Aircraft Establishment The Royal Aircraft Establishment (RAE) was a British research establishment, known by several different names during its history, that eventually came under the aegis of the Ministry of Defence (United Kingdom), UK Ministry of Defence (MoD), bef ...
(RAE) for investigation.


Initial findings and reaction

To find more evidence concerning the cause of the crash, the bodies were brought to the coroner for post-mortem. During the examination, pathologist Antonio Fornari found broken and damaged limbs, which had apparently occurred ''after death''. He also discovered in most of the victims a distinct pattern of injuries, consisting of fractured skulls and ruptured and otherwise damaged lungs, which he identified as the actual ''cause of death''. Fornari was confused by the pattern of injuries because he could find no evidence of an explosion. The ruptured lungs were a sure indicator that the air cabin had depressurised, because the sudden decrease in pressure would have caused the lungs to expand until they ruptured. To support this theory, and also to confirm the cause of the skull fractures, the crash was simulated at the RAE in Farnborough by reproducing the conditions of the actual plane prior to the crash. To make this possible, a model fuselage was constructed that was similar to that of the Comet. Dummies were seated within the fuselage to replicate the possible movements of the passengers during the crash. In order to simulate the crash, the investigators deliberately ruptured the model fuselage by increasing the air pressure inside until it exploded. The movement of the dummies within the air cabin revealed the cause of the skull fractures: at the moment that the fuselage exploded, they were thrown out of their seats and slammed head-first into the ceiling. Upon examination of the aircraft wreckage by the RAE, it became evident that the aircraft had broken up in mid-air, and there was initially some speculation that the aircraft might have been brought down by a bomb. Suspicion then shifted to the possibility of an engine
turbine A turbine ( or ) (from the Greek , ''tyrbē'', or Latin ''turbo'', meaning vortex) is a rotary mechanical device that extracts energy from a fluid flow and converts it into useful work. The work produced by a turbine can be used for generating e ...
explosion, and modifications were instigated in other Comets, where the turbine ring was encased with
armour Armour (British English) or armor (American English; see spelling differences) is a covering used to protect an object, individual, or vehicle from physical injury or damage, especially direct contact weapons or projectiles during combat, or fr ...
plate to contain a possible disintegration of the turbine disk. The possibility of failure of the pressure cabin was also considered, but this theory was discounted because the Comet's cabin had been designed to a considerably higher strength than was considered necessary at the time. In the meantime, all Comets were to be grounded until the turbine modifications had been carried out. ''The New York Times'' reported on 12 January that BOAC had temporarily withdrawn all of their de Havilland Comet jet airliners from service, as a result of the crash, and that the two French airlines that used the Comet—
Air France Air France (; formally ''Société Air France, S.A.''), stylised as AIRFRANCE, is the flag carrier of France headquartered in Tremblay-en-France. It is a subsidiary of the Air France–KLM Group and a founding member of the SkyTeam global air ...
and Union Aero Maritime des Transports—had also suspended their Comet services. BOAC had confirmed that their Comet routes would be flown with alternative aircraft to minimise the disruption to the service schedule. The airline emphasized that the planes had not been officially grounded by the British government, but that the action was being taken as "a measure of prudence to enable a minute and unhurried technical examination of every aircraft in the Comet fleet to be carried out at maintenance headquarters at London airport." While the official investigation efforts began, BOAC were determined to return their Comets to passenger service as soon as possible, and succeeded in doing so on 23 March, just ten weeks after the crash. BOAC's chairman commented on television, "We obviously wouldn't be flying the Comet with passengers if we weren't satisfied conditions were suitable." However, a second BOAC de Havilland Comet, registered G-ALYY, was lost on 8 April 1954: a charter flight, operating as
South African Airways Flight 201 South African Airways Flight 201 (SA201), a de Havilland Comet 1, took off at 18:32 UTC on 8 April 1954 from Ciampino Airport in Rome, Italy, en route to Cairo, Egypt, on the second stage of its flight from London, England to Johannesburg, Sou ...
, departed from Rome bound for Egypt with fourteen passengers and seven crew on board; thirty-three minutes into the flight the pilot reported on course flying at 10,000 metres, then all contact was lost. Sir Arnold Hall, a
Cambridge University , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...
scholar and scientist and then-head of the RAE, was appointed as the head accident investigator.


Original investigation

Initial examination and reconstruction of the wreckage of G-ALYP revealed several signs of inflight break-up: *Shreds of cabin carpet were found trapped in the remains of the Comet's tail section *The imprint of a coin was found on a fuselage panel from the rear of the aircraft *Smears and scoring on the rear fuselage were tested and found to be consistent to the paint applied to the passenger seats of the Comet With most of the wreckage recovered, investigators found that fractures started in the roof of the cabin, a window then smashed into the elevators, the rear fuselage then tore away, the outer wing structure fell, then the outer wing tips and finally the cockpit broke away and fuel from the wings set the debris on fire. To find out what caused the first failure, BOAC donated G-ALYU ("Yoke Uncle") for testing. The airframe was put in a large water tank, the tank was filled, and water was pumped into the plane to simulate flight conditions. The experiment was run 24 hours per day, 7 days per week. It could possibly have taken as long as five months. Official findings concerning BOAC Flight 781 and South African Airways Flight 201 were released jointly on 1 February 1955, in ''Civil Aircraft Accident: Report of the Court of Inquiry into the Accidents to Comet G-ALYP on 10 January 1954 and Comet G-ALYY on 8 April 1954''. After the equivalent of 3,000 flights simulated with G-ALYU, investigators at the RAE were able to conclude that the crash of G-ALYP had been due to failure of the pressure cabin at the forward ADF window in the roof. This window was one of two apertures for the aerials of an electronic navigation system in which opaque
fibreglass Fiberglass (American English) or fibreglass (Commonwealth English) is a common type of fiber-reinforced plastic using glass fiber. The fibers may be randomly arranged, flattened into a sheet called a chopped strand mat, or woven into glass clo ...
panels took the place of the window glass. The failure was a result of
metal fatigue In materials science, fatigue is the initiation and propagation of cracks in a material due to cyclic loading. Once a fatigue crack has initiated, it grows a small amount with each loading cycle, typically producing striations on some parts o ...
caused by the repeated pressurisation and de-pressurisation of the aircraft cabin. Another fact was that the supports around the windows were riveted, not glued, as the original specifications for the aircraft had called for. The problem was exacerbated by the punch rivet construction technique employed. Unlike drill riveting, the imperfect nature of the hole created by punch riveting caused manufacturing defect cracks, which may have caused fatigue cracks to start around the rivet. The investigators examined the final piece of wreckage with a microscope.


Effects of the disaster and findings

The Comet's pressure cabin had been designed to a safety factor comfortably in excess of that required by British Civil Airworthiness Requirements (BCAR)—the requirement was 1.33 times ''P'' with an ultimate load of 2 times ''P'' (where ''P'' is the cabin's "Proof" pressure), but the safety factor used in the Comet was 2.5 times ''P''—hence the accident led to revised estimates for the safe loading strength requirements of airliner pressure cabins. In addition, it was discovered that the stresses around pressure cabin apertures were considerably higher than had been anticipated, particularly around sharp-cornered cut-outs, such as
square In Euclidean geometry, a square is a regular quadrilateral, which means that it has four equal sides and four equal angles (90-degree angles, π/2 radian angles, or right angles). It can also be defined as a rectangle with two equal-length adj ...
windows. As a result, future
jet airliner A jet airliner or jetliner is an airliner powered by jet engines (passenger jet aircraft). Airliners usually have two or four jet engines; three-engined designs were popular in the 1970s but are less common today. Airliners are commonly cl ...
s would feature windows with rounded corners, the purpose of the curve being to eliminate a
stress concentration In solid mechanics, a stress concentration (also called a stress raiser or a stress riser) is a location in an object where the stress is significantly greater than the surrounding region. Stress concentrations occur when there are irregularitie ...
. This was a noticeable distinguishing feature of all later models of the Comet.


Memorial

There is a memorial in the cemetery of
Porto Azzurro Porto Azzurro is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Livorno in the Italian region Tuscany; it is on the island of Elba, located about southwest of Florence and about south of Livorno. It was formerly called Porto Longone, and in 155 ...
, where some of the victims are buried and a list of those (20) whose remains were never found.


In popular culture

This accident was featured on
National Geographic ''National Geographic'' (formerly the ''National Geographic Magazine'', sometimes branded as NAT GEO) is a popular American monthly magazine published by National Geographic Partners. Known for its photojournalism, it is one of the most widely ...
's '' Seconds from Disaster'', "Comet Air Crash".


See also

*
List of accidents and incidents involving commercial aircraft This list of accidents and incidents involving commercial aircraft includes notable events that have a corresponding Wikipedia article. Entries in this list involve passenger or cargo aircraft that are operating commercially and meet this list ...
* List of notable decompression accidents and incidents


References


Publications

* Official Report (1955)
''Report of the Public Inquiry into the causes and circumstances of the accident which occurred on the 10th January, 1954, to the Comet aircraft G‐ALYP''
* Stewart, Stanley (1986/89). ''Air Disasters''. Arrow Books (UK). .


Further reading



''
Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to ...
''. 1 November 1954. *
Comet Cover-Up Channel 4, 13 June 2002


No. 70, Embargoed until 00:01 Thursday 4 December 2003,
Broadcasting Standards Commission The Office of Communications, commonly known as Ofcom, is the government-approved regulatory and competition authority for the broadcasting, telecommunications and mail, postal industries of the United Kingdom. Ofcom has wide-ranging powers ...
, p. 4 (PDF p. 6 of 40).
Archive
at
The National Archives (United Kingdom) , type = Non-ministerial department , seal = , nativename = , logo = Logo_of_The_National_Archives_of_the_United_Kingdom.svg , logo_width = 150px , logo_caption = , formed = , preceding1 = , dissolved = , superseding = , juris ...
and at
Webcite WebCite was an on-demand archive site, designed to digitally preserve scientific and educationally important material on the web by taking snapshots of Internet contents as they existed at the time when a blogger or a scholar cited or quoted ...
.)


External links

* The official AI
"Report of the Public Inquiry into the causes and circumstances of the accident which occurred on the 10th January, 1954, to the Comet aircraft G-ALYP"

Archive
– Hosted on the
National Transportation Safety Board The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) is an independent U.S. government investigative agency responsible for civil transportation accident investigation. In this role, the NTSB investigates and reports on aviation accidents and incid ...
website – Begins on Page 6 of 169
"Piece reference BT 220/115"
–
The National Archives National archives are central archives maintained by countries. This article contains a list of national archives. Among its more important tasks are to ensure the accessibility and preservation of the information produced by governments, both ...

Flight 781
is in the US Federal Aviation Administration'
Lessons Learned From Transport Airplane Accidents
library.
Pre-crash pictures of G-ALYP


illustrated with a picture of G-ALYP some time before the crash
Photo of reconstructed wreckage of G-ALYP
{{Portal bar, Aviation, United Kingdom, Italy, 1950s Airliner accidents and incidents caused by design or manufacturing errors Airliner accidents and incidents caused by in-flight structural failure Airliner accidents and incidents involving in-flight depressurization Aviation accidents and incidents in Italy Aviation accidents and incidents in 1954 1954 in Italy Accidents and incidents involving the de Havilland Comet Flight 781