List of fictional aviation accidents and incidents

This is a list of fictional aviation accidents and incidents.

In literature

• The 1972 short story "Hijack" by Robert L. Fish describes an airline hijacking that has some similarity to the D. B. Cooper case.

On television

• Oceanic Airlines Flight 815 - This fictional Boeing 777 airliner is the ill-fated flight that set the stage for the television series Lost. Flight 815 is bound from Sydney, Australia to Los Angeles, California on September 22, 2004 when it mysteriously flies 1000 miles off course over the South Pacific. Due to an unknown phenomenon, the plane violently breaks into several pieces in mid-air, some of them landing on or near a mysterious island which would become the primary setting for the series. Of the 342 passengers and crew, there are only 71 initial survivors, some of whom would make up the majority of the series' main cast of characters.
• Wayfarer Flight 515 - In Season 2 finale of the TV show Breaking Bad (episode "ABQ"), Wayfarer Flight 515, a Boeing 737, and a chartered airplane collide over Walter White's house. The accident was caused by an air traffic controller who was so distraught by his daughter's death that he accidentally gets two plane names mixed up and puts Wayfarer 515 and the charter on a collision course. The planes collide, nose-to-nose, and a clean-up crew is set to gather debris from Walt's yard. A burnt pink teddy bear was found in the pool.
• Falcon Crest: The 1983-1984 season-ending episode, "Ashes to Ashes" (aired May 18, 1984), saw several of the main characters as passengers aboard a charter plane, whose engines stall in mid-air. The plane goes into a nosedive and, with the pilots desperately trying to maintain control of the plane, the passengers begin to panic. The 1984-1985 season opener, "Requiem" (aired September 28, 1984) begins with the plane having crashed and a search beginning for survivors.
• "The Adventures of Letterman," an animated segment of the 1970s television series The Electric Company, has an episode where the antagonist, the Spellbinder, observes a plane full of elementary school-aged children, their parents, chaperones and school administrators flying high above en route to a school trip. The Spellbinder decides it would be funny to change the "e" in "plane" to "t," turning the plane into "plant," causing the plant, along with its passengers, to plummet toward the earth. The segment's protagonist, Letterman, arrives in time to change the "t" back into an "e," and the plane safely resumes its travels as though nothing had happened.

In films

• In the film Air Force One, the Air Force One crashes into the Caspian Sea and breaks up after it run out of fuel and all engines flameout.
• A fictional crash in the film, The Day After Tomorrow based on Avianca Flight 52 which mentioned that the plane crashed due to extreme turbulence.
• Episode 51 of Tales of the Unexpected portrays the hijacking of an airliner; the script is based on the 1972 short story "Hijack" by Robert L. Fish.
• In the film Escape from New York Air Force one crashes, after being hijacked by a terrorist disguised as a stewardess, into the island of Manhattan that has been converted into a giant maximum security prison.
• In the film No Highway in the Sky, the first fatal accident involving passengers was on 2 May 1953, when a BOAC Comet 1 (G-ALYV) crashed in a severe tropical storm six minutes after taking off from Calcutta/Dum Dum (now Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose International Airport).
• BOAC Flight 781 - In the film No Highway in the Sky, the next Comet crashed off the Italian island of Elba on 10 January 1954 with the loss of everyone on board. The fleet of Comets was grounded during this investigation. The Royal Navy conducted recovery operations, including the first use of underwater television cameras.
• In the film No Highway in the Sky, on 8 April 1954, a Comet on charter to South African Airways, was on a leg from Rome to Cairo (of a longer flight from London to Johannesburg), when it crashed near Naples. The fleet was immediately grounded once again and a large investigation board was formed under the direction of the Royal Aircraft Establishment (RAE). Winston Churchill tasked the Royal Navy with helping find and retrieve the wreckage so that the cause of the accident could be found.
• Privately owned Boeing 747, Stevens' Flight 23 - a private Boeing 747 in the 1977 film Airport '77 is hijacked. But everything goes wrong for the hijackers when the 747 crashes in the Bermuda triangle. It settles to the ocean floor largely intact (less four engines and support pylons).
• In the film The Concorde ... Airport '79, Kevin Harrison (Robert Wagner), an arms dealer, attempts to destroy an American-owned Concorde supersonic transport on its maiden flight after one of the passengers Maggie Whelan (Susan Blakely) learns of his weapons sales to communist countries during the Cold War. After the Concorde manages to escape destruction by remotely controlled missiles and rogue fighter aircraft, Harrison attempts to de-pressurize the aircraft at altitude, forcing it to crash in the Alps.
• Canada World Airways Flight 174 - In the film Falling from the Sky: Flight 174, an accident of flight 174 (Boeing 767) was based on Air Canada Flight 143.
• In the film Five Came Back, nine passengers board a commercial flight to Panama City. During the flight, a fierce storm buffets the airplane. A gas cylinder gets loose and is thrown against the door, forcing it open; one passenger falls out to his death. The plane is blown far south of where rescuers search and crash-lands in the dense Amazonian jungle.
• In the 2007 film Flight of the Living Dead: Outbreak on a Plane on a routine flight from Los Angeles to Paris, The 747 jumbo jet encounters massive thunderstorms, and the turbulence releases the scientist from the cargo hold, which is a fellow scientist infected with a deadly genetically engineered virus which reanimates the dead. While the 747 crosses a violent thunderstorm, the instability of the aircraft allows the corpse to get out of its container. The flesh-eating zombie quickly starts to spread the virus, infecting many of the passengers which now will have to fight for their lives stranded in the air with no way out. The film ends with all the zombies is blowed out from the plane through the hole on the plane cause by the missile. All the zombies are apparently sucked out. Frank and Burrows try to control the plane, but hit a mountain and crash land near Las Vegas.
• In the 1965 film The Flight of the Phoenix, an aircraft is forced down in the Sahara Desert. The pilot and co-pilot (played by James Stewart and Richard Attenborough) eventually give in to an insistent toy airplane designer (Hardy Krüger) and, with the help of the passengers, rebuild the damaged aircraft around the one working engine.
• In the 2004 remake of the 1965 film, Flight of the Phoenix, when an Amacor oil rig in the Gobi Desert of Mongolia proves unproductive, Captain Frank Towns (Quaid) and copilot "A.J." (Gibson) are sent to shut the operation down. However, on their way to Beijing, a major dust storm forces them to ditch their C-119 Flying Boxcar in an uncharted area of the desert.
• Columbia Airlines Flight 409 - a red-eye Boeing 747-100 en route from Washington Dulles to Los Angeles in the film Airport 1975. A 747 in flight collides with a small plane, and is rendered pilotless. The first stewardess is forced to take the controls until the Air Force sends someone to land the plane safely. At the end, the plane lands safely at Salt Lake City Airport.
• The 1958 film Crash Landing revolves around the occupants of a passenger plane that must ditch in the Atlantic Ocean. The water landing goes without a hitch and a US Naval ship is right there to save them.
• FedEx Flight 88 - McDonnell Douglas MD-11 cargo flight - in the 2000 film Cast Away includes a detailed depiction of a FedEx cargo flight flying through a thunderstorm somewhere over the southern Pacific Ocean, the FedEx jet decompresses, forcing them to ditch in the ocean. The plane crashes into the night time sea in flames. Saved by an inflatable life-raft, Chuck floats helplessly on the ocean until he is brought to a deserted island, leaving the protagonist as the only survivor.
• KC-10 Extender - As a McDonnell Douglas DC-10 tanker in the film Air Force One, it refuel the Air Force One. But it explodes after the terrorists can't hold the plane intact with a flying boom.
• In the film Millennium, the film begins in the cockpit of a U.S. passenger airliner, shortly before they are impacted from above by another airliner on a landing approach. The pilot handles the airplane as well as he can while the co-pilot goes back to check on the passenger cabin. He comes back in the cockpit screaming, “They’re all dead and burned!” Then the two jumbo jets collided with each other, both of which crashed.
• In the film Die Hard 2 terrorists manipulate an airport's instrument landing system to cause the crash of a fully laden DC-8 killing all on board.
• Paradise Airlines Flight 243 - The Boeing 737-200 in the film Miracle Landing was flying from Hilo, Hawaii to Honolulu, Hawaii, when it experienced rapid decompression when a section of the fuselage was torn away. With one person blown from the cabin and dozens injured, the aircraft was able to make a successful emergency landing at Kahului Airport, on Maui. The film was based on an in-flight accident aboard Aloha Airlines Flight 243.
• South Pacific Air Flight 121 - a Boeing 747-400 in the film Snakes on a Plane, on which will be flying from Honolulu to LAX in Los Angeles. An FBI agent takes on a plane full of deadly and poisonous snakes, placing in the cargo hold of the plane, deliberately released to kill a witness being flown from Honolulu to Los Angeles to testify against a mob boss. The crate opens midway through the flight, and the snakes make their way throughout the cabin. In the end, snakes is blow out from the plane through the window. After a nearly unsuccessful emergency landing, Flight 121 safely lands.
• In the film Starflight: The Plane That Couldn't Land, the fictional story of the first "hypersonic" commercial passenger plane, which can make the flight from New York to London in a mere four hours. On the maiden flight of this plane, a minor disaster occurs resulting in the plane actually leaving the Earth's atmosphere and orbiting around the globe. A lack of heat-resistant tiling prevents the plane from simply re-entering the atmosphere. With oxygen (and therefore time) running out, the crew of the plane and the crew on the ground must figure out a way to return the plane and its passengers to safety.
• TOA Flight 502 - is a fictional Boeing 747 in the film Murder on Flight 502. After a flight takes off from New York City to London, a mysterious note turns up at the airport stating that passengers aboard the flight will be killed before the plane lands. At first the note is brushed off as a prank, but the plot thickens considerably once passengers do begin turning up murdered. The murderer is finally unmasked and subdued, and the plane lands safety.
• Trans-Orient-Pacific (TOPAC) Flight 420 - A Douglas DC-4 airliner in the 1954 film The High and the Mighty revolves around the occupants that the plane must ditch in the Pacific after a catastrophic prop failure and engine fire.
• Volée Airlines Flight 180 - A Boeing 747-200B aircraft in the film Final Destination flying from New York City to Paris during a thunderstorm. While at cruising altitude, the plane shakes violently and soon enough, everyone is forced to put oxygen masks on. Suddenly, an oxygen panel starts to spark and break apart. A shower of sparks raining down from the malfunctioning panel sets some of the cabin's carpeting on fire. Without any warning, part of the left side fuselage tears off, sucking three students out of the plane. Soon, fire erupts out of Engine #1. Moments later, the nose starts pointing down at a steep angle as the plane starts to fall, and in the process, a radio falls and hits Tod's head. Engine #1 of the plane then violently explodes, sending a shrapnel into the cabin that causes an enormous blood splatter to splash onto a cabin wall. A wall of fire roars into the cabin, incinerating Alex and the other passengers. The doomed flight also appears in Final Destination 5, when Sam and Molly board the plane to Paris. They were assigned to sit in Seat 23, hinting the Route 23 pile-up from Final Destination 2. After just witnessing a commontion and notknowing what the huge commotion was about, they ignore it and take their seat before the plane leaves. While at cruising altitude, the fasten your seat belt sign above them flickers. Sam overhears a conversation about the commotion. Shortly after the conversation ends, Engine #1 erupts into flames. The lights in the cabin start flickering. Soon enough, the front right side of Engine #1 explodes, sending three shrapnels flying towards the left side fuslage, damaging the fuselage. Inside the cabin, the oxygen masks drop due to partial loss of cabin pressure. The plane starts turning right. Suddenly, part of the left rear fuselage closest to the back of the cabin tears off, sucking two passengers out of the plane, including Molly, who is then bisected by the tailplane. The plane finally explodes, separating the front of the plane from the rest. A huge fire roars into the plane's interior, incinerating Sam and everyone else. As the 747 burns, the left wing separates from the fuselage. The burning plane explodes a last time and sends a fiery piece of the landing gear to the city, where it then crashes through the roof of the Cocktails bar and crushes Nathan to pieces. The accident is based on the real life crash of Trans World Airlines Flight 800, a Boeing 747-131 that exploded in mid-air, which causes a fire to burn the fuselage, eventually causing the nose to fall off. The rest of the plane then soared upward to 4,600 meters before rolling right and finally, falling to the Atlantic Ocean.
• In the 2005 film version of The War of the Worlds, a Boeing 747 crashes in the house where Ray (Tom Cruise) and his daughter (Dakota Fanning) and son (Justin Chatwin) are spending the night, presumably taken down by a tripod.
• In the movie Passengers, the Boeing 737-800 which the protagonists are taking suffers an engine failure after take-off. The plane's engine then explodes, causing a rapid decompression and creating a hole in the fuselage. The plane crashes on a beach with no survivors.
• SouthJetAir Flight 227- In the film Flight, a MD-88 with winglets experiences a jackscrew failure when approaching Atlanta. The plane first goes into a steep dive and then the captain inverts the plane to maintain altitude. Then, the engines go out and catch on fire because of low oil pressure. The plane glides to a churchyard and crashes.
• In the movie Knowing, an Airbus A320 crashes.
• In the 1947 film Seven Were Saved, the plot revolves around the crew and passengers of an airplane that crashes in the Pacific ocean, and the efforts of those attempting to rescue them.
• In the 2015 film Project Almanac, a high school student uses a time machine invented by his father and inadvertently causes an airplane crash. It is piloted by a classmate's father and 72 people die. He goes back in time again and prevents the accident.
• In the 2014 film Big Game, Air Force One is shot down by terrorists and crashes in a forest of Finland. A 13-year-old boy named Oskari living there takes care of U.S. President William Allan Moore.

In anime and manga

• Nobita Airlines Flight 02 - What appeared to be "a fictional 22nd century playground three-wheels plane (Doraemon's gadget) in Doraemon Vol. 28, which can fly like a real airplane" was hijacked by a child later identified to be Takeshi "Gian" Goda. He coerced the pilot, Nobita Nobi, to fly to Hong Kong International Airport. The pilot was not able to hold the plane anymore because he also can't hold his urine from coming out. The plane crashed into nearby Mt. Takai (a parody of Mt. Takao) with Nobita and Gian both surviving and escaping with minor injuries.
• Sky Japan Flight 865 - A Boeing 747 aircraft in the Case Closed: Magician of the Silver Sky. The flight can't reach its destination and running out of fuel; the plane made an emergency landing at the harbour. All passengers survive, except who is murder by poisoning.