Pacific Southwest Airlines Flight 1771

Template:Short description Template:Use mdy dates Template:Use American English Template:Infobox aircraft occurrence Pacific Southwest Airlines Flight 1771 was a scheduled domestic passenger flight from Los Angeles to San Francisco. On December 7, 1987, the British Aerospace 146-200A, registration N350PS, was intentionally crashed in San Luis Obispo County near Cayucos,<ref name=srapcjc>Template:Cite news</ref><ref name=ffdivpc>Template:Cite news</ref> after being hijacked by a passenger.

All 43 passengers and crew aboard the plane died, five of whom, including the two pilots, were presumably shot dead before the plane crashed. The perpetrator, David Burke, was a disgruntled former employee of USAir, the parent company of Pacific Southwest Airlines.<ref name=fwntebf>Template:Cite news</ref> The crash was the second-worst mass murder in Californian history, after the similar crash of Pacific Air Lines Flight 773 in 1964. It was the second fatal crash of PSA, after Pacific Southwest Airlines Flight 182. The motive for the hijacking and resulting mass murder-suicide was anger towards Burke’s former boss, Ray Thompson, who had refused to reinstate Burke after he had been fired for theft. Thompson was on Flight 1771 and was the first victim.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Aircraft and crew

The aircraft involved was a British Aerospace 146-200A. The aircraft was powered by four Lycoming ALF502R-3 turbofan engines.<ref name="ASN">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

The flight crew consisted of Captain Gregg Lindamood (43) and First Officer James Howard Nunn (48), who had been working for the airline since 1973 and March 1987 respectively. Captain Lindamood had 11,000 flight hours, with 1,500 of them on the BAE-146. First Officer Nunn had 12,000 flight hours, but only 300 of them were on the BAE-146.<ref name="victim identification">Template:Cite news</ref> There were three flight attendants on board: Debbie Nissen Neil (37), Debra Watterson Vuylsteke (32), and Julie Gottesman (20), employed by the airline in 1970, 1977, and 1987 respectively.<ref name="victim identification" />

Incident

Template:More citations needed section USAir, which had recently purchased Pacific Southwest Airlines (PSA), fired ticketing agent David A. Burke<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> for petty theft of $69 from in-flight cocktail receipts. Burke had also been suspected of involvement with a narcotics ring.<ref name="Kin" /> After meeting with his manager Ray Thompson in an unsuccessful attempt at reinstatement, Burke purchased a ticket for PSA Flight 1771, a daily route from Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) to San Francisco International Airport (SFO). Thompson was a passenger on the flight, which he regularly took for his daily commute from his workplace at LAX to his home in the San Francisco Bay Area.<ref name="Braun">Template:Cite news</ref> Flight 1771 departed from LAX at 15:31 PST, scheduled to arrive in San Francisco at 16:43.<ref name="Pollack">Template:Cite news</ref>

Using USAir employee credentials that he had not yet surrendered, Burke, armed with a Smith & Wesson Model 29 .44 Magnum revolver that he had borrowed from a coworker, bypassed the passenger security checkpoint at LAX.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> He gained access to the plane using a locked crew door with its access code scratched above the lock. After boarding the plane, Burke wrote a message on an airsickness bag, but whether he delivered the message to Thompson before shooting him is unknown. The note read:

Hi Ray. I think it's sort of ironical that we end up like this. I asked for some leniency for my family. Remember? Well, I got none and you'll get none.<ref name="Kin"/><ref name="latimes 1987-12-11">Template:Cite news</ref><ref name="latimes 1987-12-12">Template:Cite news</ref>

The exact sequence of events is unknown, although some details were determined based on information from the aircraft's cockpit voice recorder (CVR). Because of the poor quality of the recording, it was not possible to decipher everything spoken in the cockpit, nor was it possible to positively attribute words to specific individuals.<ref name="FBI">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>Template:Reference page

First, the sound of the lavatory door opening was heard. It has been speculated that this was Burke loading the gun and giving Thompson time to read the note. As the aircraft, a four-engined British Aerospace BAe 146-200, cruised at Template:Convert over the central California coast, the CVR recorded either Captain Lindamood or First Officer Nunn asking air-traffic control about reports of turbulence. During the controller's reply, the CVR picked up two "high-level gunshot-like sound[s]".<ref name="FBI" />Template:Rp Burke had likely shot Thompson at this time.<ref name="latimes 1987-12-11" /> One of the pilots reported twice to the center controller that there had been gunshots fired aboard the aircraft. As the controller asked the pilots whether they wished to divert to Monterey, the sound of the cockpit door opening could be heard, followed by the sound of a female voice, believed to be that of flight attendant Debbie Neil. The only word that could be discerned from this voice on the recording was the word "captain".<ref name="FBI" />Template:Reference page This was followed one second later by a male voice saying something that was mostly unintelligible on the recording but ended with the word "problem." The FBI's transcript notes that this may have been Burke's voice. Although sources such as the Mayday episode about Flight 1771 have stated that the complete phrase was "I'm the problem," this does not appear in the official FBI report. Immediately following this exchange, two more gunshot sounds were heard, followed by another gunshot six seconds later.<ref name="FBI" />Template:Reference page

Burke shot Neil, Lindamood and Nunn, incapacitating and possibly killing them. Fifteen seconds later, the CVR recorded the sound of the cockpit door opening or closing, as well as increasing windscreen noise as the airplane pitched down and accelerated, indicating either that Burke pushed the control column down and forced the plane into a dive or that the captain or first officer was slumped against it. Thirty-two seconds after the sounds made by the cockpit door, a sixth and final gunshot was heard.<ref name="FBI" />Template:Reference page All that could be determined was that this shot occurred in the passenger cabin. Some speculation arose that Burke shot himself, though this seems unlikely because a fragment of Burke's fingertip was lodged in the trigger when the investigators found the revolver. This indicated that he was alive and was holding the gun until the moment of impact.<ref name="Mayday TV Series">Template:Cite episode</ref> The most probable victim was off-duty PSA pilot Douglas Arthur, who was likely trying to enter the cockpit to recover the plane from its dive. For the remainder of the recording, the sound of windscreen noise and "distant voices" could be heard.<ref name="FBI" />Template:Reference page

At 4:16 p.m., the plane crashed into a hillside on the Santa Rita cattle ranch<ref name="King">Template:Cite news</ref> in the Santa Lucia Mountains between Paso Robles<ref name="badge">Template:Cite news</ref> and Cayucos. The plane was estimated to have crashed at a speed slightly faster than that of sound, around Template:Convert, disintegrating instantly. Based on the deformation of the titanium flight-data recorder case, the aircraft experienced a deceleration of Template:Convert when it hit the ground. It was traveling around a 70° angle toward the south. The plane struck a rocky hillside, leaving a crater less than Template:Convert deep and Template:Convert across. Only 11 of the passengers were ever identified.<ref name="Wrigley">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Investigators from the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) determined that Burke was responsible for the crash based on the discovery of parts of a handgun containing six spent cartridge cases and a note written by Burke on an airsickness bag.<ref name="check6">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Other evidence connected Burke to the flight, such as an answering machine message that he had left for his estranged girlfriend.<ref name="check6" />

David A. Burke

File:David A. Burke.png

David Burke

David Augustus Burke (18 May 1952 – 7 December 1987) was born in Croydon, Surrey, England to Jamaican parents. Burke later emigrated to the United States with his parents. He had previously worked for USAir in Rochester, New York, where he was a suspect in a drug-smuggling ring that was bringing cocaine from Jamaica to Rochester via the airline. Never officially charged, he reportedly relocated to Los Angeles to avoid future suspicions.<ref name="Kin">Template:Cite news</ref><ref name="check6"/> Some former girlfriends and neighbours, and even law enforcement officials, described him as a violent man.<ref name="Violent side">Template:Cite news</ref> He had seven children by four women,<ref name="Magnuson">Template:Cite magazine</ref> but never married.<ref name="Kin"/>

Aftermath

Several federal laws were passed after the crash, including a law that requires "immediate seizure of all airline and airport employee credentials" after an employee's termination, resignation, or retirement from an airline or airport position.<ref name="Pescador">Template:Cite book</ref> A policy was also implemented stipulating that all airline flight crew and airport employees are subject to the same security measures as are airline passengers.<ref name="Malnic">Template:Cite news</ref>

The crash (unintentionally by Burke) killed the president of Chevron USA, James Sylla, along with three of the company's public-affairs executives.<ref name="Fisher">Template:Cite news</ref> Also killed were three officials of Pacific Bell, prompting many large corporations to create policies to forbid travel by multiple executives on the same flight.<ref name="Lapidos">Template:Cite magazine</ref>

In the "Garden of Hope" section of the Los Osos Valley Memorial Park, a granite and bronze marker honours the 42 victims of Flight 1771, and several of the passengers and crew are buried in the cemetery.<ref name="memorial">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Dramatization

An episode of the Canadian documentary TV series Mayday titled "I'm the Problem" ("Murder on Board" for UK broadcasts) chronicled the events of Flight 1771 and its ensuing investigation.<ref name="Mayday TV Series" />

The incident and aftermath were featured in Episode 113 of the Rooster Teeth podcast Black Box Down.<ref name="Black Box Down episode 113">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

See also

• Aviation safety
• Pacific Air Lines Flight 773 was a similar mass-murder/suicide in 1964.
• United Airlines Flight 93, an attempted hijack to fly into the U.S. Capitol, part of the September 11 attacks.
• Samuel Byck attempted to hijack an airliner to fly into the White House in 1974.
• List of accidents and incidents involving commercial aircraft
• List of aviation incidents involving terrorism
• List of Mayday episodes
• List of homicides in California
• Template:Section link

External links

• Official NTSB Summary
• PSA Flight 182 & 1771 Memorial Page at The PSA History Museum (Archive)
• Aviation Safety Network criminal occurrence description