Hawthorne Nevada Airlines Flight 708

Hawthorne Nevada Airlines Flight 708

Accident summary
Date	February 18, 1969
Summary	Controlled flight into terrain, pilot error
Site	Mount Whitney, Inyo County, near Lone Pine, California, USA
Passengers	32
Crew	3
Injuries (non-fatal)	0
Fatalities	35 (all)
Survivors	0
Aircraft type	Douglas DC-3
Operator	Hawthorne Nevada Airlines
Registration	N15570

Hawthorne Nevada Airlines Flight 708 was a domestic non-scheduled passenger flight between Hawthorne Industrial Airport, Nevada (HTH) and Hollywood-Burbank Airport, California (BUR/KBUR), that crashed into the tallest mountain in the contiguous United States, Mount Whitney, near Lone Pine, on February 18, 1969, killing all 35 passengers and crew on board.

History of flight

The aircraft, a Douglas DC-3, was operating on a visual flight rules plan. It departed at 3:50 A.M. PST and last contact was made at 4:06 A.M. when the flight spoke with the Tonopah Flight Service Station. One hour later, at 5:10 A.M., the plane hit a sheer cliff face on the east side of Mount Whitney at 11,770 feet (3,558 m). The main body of the wreckage then slid down the cliff and stopped some 500 feet (152 m) back from the cliff, where it caught fire. All 32 passengers and all three crew members were killed.

Search and rescue operation

Extensive searches from air and ground were launched after the aircraft went missing, but snow, low clouds, and mountainous terrain hampered the search. The aircraft was finally located on August 8, 1969. It is not thought that the delay had any impact on the lack of survivors as it is thought that all on board died on impact.

Investigation

The National Transportation Safety Board launched an extensive investigation upon the location of the wreckage. Its conclusions were as follows:

The accident was caused by the deviation from the prescribed route of flight, as authorized in the company's FAA-approved operations specifications, resulting in the aircraft being operated under IFR weather conditions, in high mountainous terrain, in an area where there was a lack of radio navigation aids. The weather was also a contributing factor.

References

• Accident description at the Aviation Safety Network
• NTSB Report (PDF), archive.org   (alternate link, airdisaster.com)
• NTSB Summary

External links

• Transcribed AP and UPI news articles from 1969 gendisasters.com - includes names of those on board
• Brief history of Hawthorne Nevada Airlines zoggavia.com - (later Nevada Airlines)