He Had To Land A Passenger Jet On A Highway | Southern Airways 242

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This is the story of southern airways flight 242, on the 4th of april 1977 a southern airways DC 9 was on the way from northwest alabama regional airport to the hartsfield atlanta international airport with a stopover in huntsville madison county. Flight 242 made it to huntsville with no issues whatsoever and landed at about 3:44 pm. The hop on over to atlanta would be a short and simple one. Taking just 25 minutes the pilots of flight 242 just had to fly towards the rome VOR and then just make their way to runway 26 of atlanta. The 85 people onboard expected a quick flight. They should be on the ground in no time at all. With all of the departure information sorted out the pilots of flight 242 took the DC 9 into the skies of alabama. ONce in the in the air the pilots were in contact with departure control. They cleared the pilots to take the plane upto 17000 feet and to make a bee line for the rome VOR. But things wouldnt be as simple as going in a straight line the controllers and the planes weather radar had some bad news for the pilot. The controllers let the pilots know that they had some heavy precipitation in their way at a range of about 5 nautical miles. Looking at the weather radar the captain remarked “Well the radar is full of it, take your pick” then responding to the controllers the captain said “Okay were in the rain right now it doesnt look much heavier than what were in right now, does it?” , the controller said that according to his instruments the rain would get a bit worse as they went into the cloud mass. The first officer was now looking at the weather radar trying to make sense of what he was seeing on the radar. He said “I cant read that it just looks like rain bill, what do you think theres a hole” the first officer might have found their ticket out of the storm system, a break in the weather. They were quite close to it and they should be able to push through riding out the storm. The captain agreed,” Theres a hole right there thats all i see, then coming over we had pretty good radar. I believe right straight ahead, there the next few miles is about the best way to go”. So the pilots of flight 242 were going to thread the needle. The needle being a massive weather system that had boxed them in from both sides. The controller than came on and he did not have good news for the pilots of flight 242 he said “ Youre in what appears to be the heaviest part of it now. What are your flight conditions. The captain replied with “were getting a little light turbulence and Id say moderate rain” With that flight 242 was handed off to the memphis center. Then the captain turned to the first officer and said “ As long as it doesnt get any heavier, well be alright” and the first officer just said “yeah this is good”. At 3:58 pm memphis control informed the pilots about a SIGMET that was active for the vicinity of tennessee, south eastern louisiana, mississippi north and western alabama. For those of you that dont know a SIGMET stands for a significant meteorological information and its only sent out when things things are relatively bad. Like tornadoes, thunderstorms, hail extreme turbuclence. You get the idea, if theres some weather phenomenon that could impinge on the safety of a flight a SIGMET was sent out and these guys were in the middle of one. As the plane was put into coatct with atlanta center the jet was rocked by some heavy turbulence. The captain exclaimed “ Here we go hold em cowboy”. As the pilots talked to the controllers about how to get the plane on the ground other planes in the air like TWA 584 were being re routed around the storm. In the cockpit the sound of the rain intensified, As the rain picked up the pilots slowed down. They were now engrossed in their weather radar, they were in a weather maze and they had to find a way through. The captain didnt like what he saw he said “ Looks heavy nothings getting through that” the first officer looked for a way through and he said “ thats a hole isnt it?” They then decided to hand fly the jet though the hole at a speed of about 285 knots. As all of this was happening Atlanta control was trying to get other planes through the weather. As