The airline industry and aircraft manufacturers can learn from these tragedies only when the National Transportation Safety Board unlocks the puzzles. It is vital that investigators do so in the case of Flight 990. Unfortunately, this decade has been marked by airline crashes that have not provided many clues or easy conclusions. The murky waters off the coast of Nantucket may not yield materials that will help the investigators. Yet the results of this probe will affect future air safety.
Air transportation remains among the safest forms of travel.
Compare the few deaths in airline crashes to the estimated 44,000 people who die in U.S. vehicle wrecks every year. But those figures bring little solace when a crash as devastating and perplexing as Flight 990 occurs. This site is best viewed using Netscape 4.0 or IE 4.0.