Destination Disaster: From the Tri-Motor to the DC-10 - The Risk of Flying

While it has been more than twenty years since I first read this book I have not stopped recommending it to my aviation-minded friends as the best of the breed. Encompassingly researched it sets its story amid the changing histories of the companies racing to be the first to bring a jumbo trijet to market. It meticulously details the engineering and, more critically, the marketing decisions that caused the DC-10 to be built with a fatal weakness that would be expressed so catastrophically (but not for the first time) in the skies near Paris. While satisfyingly replete with technical details it also is remarkably well written, referring for example, to a 747 taking off as "a cathedral in motion." It is an exciting book to read, one that had me knowingly shaking my head when a DC-10 expressed its heritage once again,losing an engine on take-off from Chicago.

First published in 1976, and out of print fairly soon after (accidents fade quickly from public memory) this book is an exceptionally comprehensive and researched work focusing on the Turkish Airlines DC-10 crash of May 1974.How did 346 people die such a tragic and somewhat brutal death in a forest just outside of Paris? This book not only answers that question specifically in terms of the structural failure of the airliner, but perhaps just as importantly discusses the events leading up to the crash, and why and how it could and should have been avoided.I must give full credit to the (British) Sunday Times Insight team for producing what I consider one of the most exceptional works of Journalism of the 20th century.Most Engineering Students and indeed Engineers will find this book absolutely fascinating. Students of ethics might find it of considerable interest as well, as should the general reader.

*Destination Disaster* is a remarkable book of the politics in the (wide-body) commercial-aviation industry, and an accounting of the political warfare between McDonald Douglas and Lockheed Aircraft to gain acceptance of their designs during the early competition for wide-body commercial aircraft. One company, McDonald, pushed hard in Washington to prevent the technically more-advanced L1011 from being accepted in the commercial airline industry, only to see its candidate, the DC-10, later prove to be a safety nightmare. It is a spell-binding account of the troubles that ensued. In the end, Douglas' effort helped prevent acceptance of the L1011 for large-scale orders, and the plane ended production far too soon due to lowered order rate.This out-of-print book is a must-read chronical of what happens behind the scenes in the highly competitive airline industry. It is well researched and written.

Though it has been some twenty years since I read this book I have found it impossible to forget, a book that changed what I know. It would be, I imagine of interest to students of engineering and flight as well as a cautionary business tale. Though it is a nonfictional account of the jumbo trijet race is often reads like a whodunit and occassionally rises to the heights of great literature,e.g. describing a 747's take-off roll as " a cathedral in motion."