made public Sunday on the Web. log in. crash probe ever. "The investigation of the crash of T.W.A. investigators who suspect that volatile vapors collecting in From ancient times, history has been pockmarked withsudden, unexpected tragedy that rips apart the lives of ordinary people. Weatherby, Thomas, 13, of Stevenson, Ala. (son of Glenda Privette). Remains of TWA Flight 800 will be scrapped after 25 years in storage | Federal News Network Few events have affected the National Transportation Safety Board as much as TWA Flight 800. The probes that measure fuel quantity were recovered from the bottom of the ocean during the salvage effort. experts and the board of inquiry headed by Hall. It was one of the two or three most complex accidents I was involved with during my 17 years doing that kind of workin fact, it may have been the most complicated, he says. Sunday on CD-ROM. Twice a week we compile our most fascinating features and deliver them straight to you. . crash, revealed some additional information about the July Its still raw, he said. It was due to return to Auckland later that night. United Airlines flight 93 was one of four commercial planes hijacked by al-Qaeda terrorists on September 11, 2001. Theywere traveling to Paris with five adult chaperones. It was surreal.. On August 22nd-23rd, 2000, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) met in Washington, D.C. to consider its final report on the crash of TWA Flight 800, off the coast of Long Island, on . The garden, which is based on one of Jills designs as a budding landscape architect, features wind chimes a favorite of Jills and a fountain designed to replicate thesunflower, another of Jill's favorites. the plane landed in the Atlantic Ocean. Coiner, Ana Duarte, 12, of Binghamton, N.Y. Cox, Monica, of Montoursville, Pa., student, Crandell, Pamela, 28, of Anne Arundel County, Md., a first-grade teacher. Youre talking about kids who affected almost every aspect of the school, from drama to academics to athletics. At the end, there is an abrupt, tenth-of-a-second noise that trails off into silence, possibly the sound of the center fuel tank exploding. It took the FBI more than a year and interviews with 755 witnesses to. Carol Ziemkiewicz says she draws comfort from a garden in Lyndhurst, New Jersey that was built in Jills memory. It happened more than four decades ago, but the Tenerife airport disaster in Spain is still the deadliest plane crash of all time. MORE: Advocates call on 'secretaries, janitors, students' to sign-up for 9/11 compensation Which leaves us with many more questions than answers. Some people say time heals all wounds. ``I for one dont see how every ignition source can ever be eliminated, Hall said, adding that a more attainable goal would be ``to try to eliminate explosive vapors in fuel tanks.. This is it baby! he said. The animated simulations are based on the best guesses of the In the cases of another 28 victims, the NTSB was On July 7, 2021, 25 years following the crash, the NTSB will decommission the wreckage, which will be destroyed by the end of 2022. F***!". TWA 800 (747 N93119) departed New York John F Kennedy International airport on the evening of 17 July 1996, bound for Paris. Flight 800. National Transportation Safety Board Chairman James Hall warned victims relatives attending the hearings that they might want to leave the room before another exhibit _ a videotape simulation that chronicled the disaster second by second, picking up where the cockpit voice recorder left off. For the next nine minutes the pilots remained calm as they tried to control the plane. For years, the cause of the crash the worst in Air Frances history remained a mystery. There was no conversation on the boat.. I made two visits to the mockup the NTSB assembled from the wreckage in a hangar on Long Island at the time, he says. After finishing her TWA training in the spring of 1996, Jill worked a few domestic flights. There's little to suggest that there was a bomb onboard, but there is ample evidence that a missile of some sort detonated in the air very close to the plane and brought it down. If they do, it's usually because they've been shot down or bombed. And there's this: During the investigation, the FBI periodically required everyone to leave the hangar due to "national security issues." quest to solve the mysterious crash of TWA Flight 800 was All times AEDT (GMT +11). into next year. At 8:31 p.m., the Boeing 747-100 exploded over East Moriches, New . Here is a complete list of the 230 people, including four cockpit crew members and 14 flight attendants, aboard TWA Flight 800: -A- Aikens-Bellamy, Sandra, 49, of St. Albans, N.Y., off-duty. Ralph Kevorkian, six minutes before the explosion, appeared intriguing and a little eerie. Thirty-seven seconds later, it blew up. Investigators cautioned that the transcript can be misleading if parts are taken out of context. 2023 A&E Television Networks, LLC. Luevano, Elias, 42, of Albuquerque, N.M., off-duty TWA employee, Lychner, Katie, 8, of Houston (daughter of Pam Lychner). Analysis revealed that the severity of injury and anatomic injury pattern did not generally correlate with seating position or structural damage. Theories that Flight 800 may have been destroyed by a bomb, missile or meteor have nonetheless lingered. It was on a heavily traveled departure path and was trailed by airliners also headed for an Atlantic crossing. "Stephanie turned to her sister, Lisa, and said, 'I'm afraid the plane will break apart,'" said Edward Morgan, a family friend who also lives in Las Vegas. Two seconds later, the plane crashed into the Atlantic Ocean, off the coast of Brazil, at 200km/h. Sometimes it seems like its yesterday. Cruise staffer fired after shock bathroom act, Passengers injured as turbulence rocks plane, when the plane lost two engines and crashed into a residential area, revealed contents of the cockpit voice recordings. Among the dead were 18 crew members and 212 passengers, including 16 students and five chaperones from Pennsylvania's Montoursville Area High School French Club. It shows the explosion, the nose of the plane shearing off, while the fuselage continues to rise. Air travel safety, in general, has steadily improved since the beginning of the widespread use of jet aircraft in 1958, he says. One thing has flourished in the 20 years since TWA Flight 800 crashed into the inky Atlantic Ocean off Long Island, N.Y.: The various conspiracy theories over what caused the inferno-like fireball . BACKGROUND On July 17, 1996, TWA Flight 800, a Boeing 747-131 with 230 passengers and crew on board, exploded mid-air shortly after takeoff. "I had walked into a restaurant, and I overheard him talking to a few friends about starting a business, and then we got to talking, and we've been friends ever since.". Their goal, they figured, was to rescue survivors. However, I think the most compelling reason to say it was not shot down is that no one has ever claimed responsibility for any act against the plane. ``Climb thrust, Kevorkian said before quickly adding, ``Climb to one five thousand.. Edwards, Daryl, 41, of Jersey City, N.J., off-duty TWA service supervisor. Why is there an angel statue in the middle of the town? Bedison said. Was it a terrorist attack a precursor to 9/11, as has been widely suggested or a U.S. military training exercise gone wrong? Flight 800 is a seminal moment in aviation safety history, the safety boards managing director said in a 2021 statement. It was 8:30:35 p.m. Those were the last words from the plane. Contribute to chinapedia/wikipedia.en development by creating an account on GitHub. plane. It crashed into the Atlantic Ocean near East Moriches, New York. Was it a meteor? On March 27, 1977, two Boeing 747s one operated by Dutch carrier KLM, the other by now-defunct Pan American collided on the runway, causing a catastrophic fire that killed 583 people on both aircraft. The data, released on the eve of public hearings on the The investigation of the crash of T.W.A. "The peole at TWA are doing a great job," Morgan said. TWA 800 was flying in the establish (charted) flight corridor called, "Betty," and, it has been claimed by some TWA pilots, that TWA 800 was low, slow and late on departure from JFK. We were born to be best friends.. Cashman, an electrician, jumped on his fathers fishing boat,The Rogue, on the night that TWA Flight 800 blew apart and crashed into the Atlantic. That added some time to the investigation.. The last TWA flight to lose passengers before Flight 800 was in 1974. She pulled out a card. Research and experimentation to date has not found what led to the explosion of the fuel/air mixture in the aircraft's center wing tank. Story, William R., of California, president and chief executive officer of National American Insurance Co. Tofani, Mauro, 46, of Prato, Italy, cloth merchant, Torche, Melinda, 47, Irvine, TWA Flight 800 crew, Uzupis, Larissa, of Montoursville, Pa., student, Verhaeghe, Rick L., 48, of Goldsboro, N.C., off-duty TWA flight officer, Warren, Lani, 48, of Sherman Oaks, off-duty TWA flight service manager, Watson, Jacqueline, of Montoursville, Pa., student, Watson, Jill, 32, of Pittsburgh, Pa., architect, daughter of ThermoKing president James F. Watson (father was not on the flight). Then another. According to commercial aviation historian Shea Oakley, NTSB investigations are almost never short-term affairs. It later turned out that the passenger had been on board the whole time. I say it was. Getty Images. of the 747 fuel tank, will simulate the tank explosion and Following the NTSB's ruling, the plane was used in training plane crash investigators and families of the victims were allowed to visit it, although it was never opened to the public. The material's The NTSB was never able to pin-point the precise cause, but it was clear that it was from within the tank.. The aircraft was a Boeing 747-100. There's hardly an airline pilot among the hundreds I know who buys the official explanation that it was a fuel-tank explosion offered by the National Transportation Safety Board some four years later. Flight 93 crashed in an empty field in Pennsylvania. Remember, airplanes just don't blow up in-flight. WHAT goes through a pilot's mind the moment they realise their plane is doomed? After all of that, the FAA issued a recommendation that pilots turn off the center tank fuel pumps before the tank runs completely dry, to avoid a similar "malfunction. Baltimore. Technology Artificial Intelligence Ask the CIO Automation Big Data Conveniently, lengths of wire where the cracks were imagined to exist were supposedly among the 16 miles of wire that weren't recovered. TWA Flight 800, reassembled after it blew . "It was such a wonderful time. Less than 15 minutes after departure, the plane exploded just off East Moriches on Long Island. MONTOURSVILLE, Pa. As Michele Jez and her sister stood inside the General John Burrows Historical Society's Flight 800 memorial room in Montoursville, they . The TWA 747, similar to the one seen in this photo, was 25 years old at the time of the crash, which isnt that old for aircraft used by major airlines. In 1979 Air New Zealand Flight 901 was en route for a sightseeing trip of Antarctica. For Montoursville, a 4-square-mile speck of a town in central Pennsylvania with just 4,600 residents, the loss of 21 residents was a shock to the system. Was this an act of terrorism, perhaps the kind of suitcase bomb that brought down Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988? This fabled orchid breeder loves to chat just not about Trader Joes orchids, Newsom, IRS give Californians until October to file tax returns, Yosemite breaks decades-old snowfall record, closing national park indefinitely, Jaguars, narcos, illegal loggers: One mans battle to save a jungle and Maya ruins, Has wildflower shaming gone too far? of the documents prepared for the hearing were also released Twelve minutes after takeoff, the 747 exploded south of Moriches Inlet. Martin, Betty Ruth, 69, of Belleville, Ill. Mazzola, Salvator, 36, of Palermo, Italy, unemployed factory worker, McPherson, Pamela, 45, of Atlanta, Ga., off-duty TWA employee, Meade, Sandra, 42, of Camano Island, Wash., TWA Flight 800 crew, Melotin, Grace, 48, of Corona, N.Y., TWA Flight 800 crew, Mercurio, Giuseppe, of Palo del Colle, Italy, produce-stand worker and part-owner of jewelry store in Bari, Italy (married to Anna dAlessandro), Miller, Amy, 29, of Andreas, Pa., Was taking trip to Paris to celebrate fifth wedding anniversary (married to Kyle Miller), Miller, Elizabeth, in her 50s, of Tenafly, N.J. (married to Robert Miller), Miller, Gideon, 57, of Sarasota, Fla., off-duty TWA pilot, Miller, Kyle, 29, of Andreas, Pa., a hardware store owner, Miller, Robert, 62, of Tenafly, N.J., Tenafly borough administrator, Nibert, Cheryl, of Montoursville, Pa., student, OHara, Caitlin, 13, of Irvington, N.Y. (daughter of Janet and Jack OHara), OHara, Janet, 39, of Irvington, N.Y. (wife of John OHara), OHara, John, 39, of Irvington, N.Y., executive producer at ABC Sports, Olsen, Rebecca Jane, 20, of Macon, Ga., junior history major at University of Georgia, Omiccioli, Monica, 23, of Fano, Italy, seamstress (married to Mirko Buttaroni), Unnamed passenger flying with Elsie Ostachiewicz, Penzer, Judy, 49, of Pittsburg, artist and muralist, Price, Dennis, of Englewood, Colo., investment manager (married to Peggy Price), Price, Peggy, of Englewood, Colo., United Airline flight attendant, Privette, Glenda (or Brenda), of Stevenson, Ala. (mother of Thomas Weatherby), Puhlmann, Rico, 61, of New York City, fashion photograher. Steve Snyder and Richard Campbell began flying for Trans World Airlines only a few years apart in the 1960's. When their lives ended together on Flight 800, one of the Connecticut pilots was . ``Its bleeding off airspeed, Capt. Delange, Sylvain, of Tourcoing, France, painter and art professor, Delouvrier, Judith Connelly, 47, of Manhattan and Paris, a philanthropist who was a trustee of her familys Philadelphia-based Connelly Foundation, Dickey, Deborah, of Montoursville, Pa., a French teacher (married to Douglas Dickey). The salvage effort and investigation took four years, with painstaking study of every recovered piece of evidence, no matter how small. Register, Join the conversation, you are commenting as Logout. Captain Marc Dubois spoke last. Trans World Airlines Flight 800 was carrying 230 people, including four cockpit crew members and 14 flight attendants. "The crash just wiped out the entire Siebert line.". Airplanes undergo continuous inspections and maintenance as approved by government regulators, and can be kept safe and airworthy for a great many years. status changed two weeks ago when the FBI announced it had plane were well above explosive levels even before takeoff. External sites are not endorsed by CNN Interactive. Plus, investigators applied extra diligence to accommodate a huge amount of pressure applied from many quarters to make absolutely sure this was not the result of a terrorist operation, or an errant missile fired by our, or some other nations, military.. Seconds later, the captain is heard again. Engines can fail; they can catch fire. HISTORY reviews and updates its content regularly to ensure it is complete and accurate. Steven Snyder responded, implying that the minor increase in speed was not a problem. The Flight 800 aircraft had arrived at JFK a few hours earlier from Athens, Greece. The last words from a member of crew were: Down. Alfred Dickinson, the NTSB chief investigator, testified that it is not unusual for the indicator to fluctuate. I havent., Follow Mike Kelly on Twitter:@mikekellycolumn, Sesame Street to Ridley Jones: TV shows are teaching kids about LGBTQ issues, diversity, 'He is growing it's just really slow': Decades-long quest to beat Fragile X fueled by persistence, science and relentless optimism, TWA Flight 800: Reflecting on the tragedy 25 years later. The weeklong hearings are intended to gather facts, and a probable cause will not be determined until late next year. That finding would seem to bolster the conclusion of federal But whats happening? first officer David Robert yelled out as rookie co-pilot Pierre-Cedric Bonin struggled to control the plane. I firmly believe that this plane was shot down. According to my colleague who worked for TWA, the mechanics and their representatives were denied access, in the early going, to the hangar where all of the recovered material was stored and being re-assembled. I spent a fair amount of time examining the wreckage, looking for signs of missile/projectile entry. One major change that resulted from the planes downing was that airlines now are required by federal law to set up a toll-free hotline for victims relatives to obtain information after a crash and to assign groups such as the Red Cross to care for those relatives. Wolters, Bonnie, 44, of New York City, a bond trader engaged to be married to a judge who was not on the flight but had planned to join her in France next week. TWA Flight 800 did not take off until around 8:30 p.m. Just after 5 p.m., Jill phoned her mother. All Rights Reserved. They couldn't be reached late Tuesday, but Morgan said the family is satisfied with TWA's efforts to find and identify the remains of those who died and to comfort family members. Its such an overwhelming tragedy, Whitman said in a recent interview. Mychal Judge, who comforted the grieving. TWA flight 800 checked almost all the boxes that would make a flight special, in the classical sense: it was a prestigious route from New York to Paris, operated by one of America's oldest. unable to determine whether they might have lived for a short The 9/11 Commission concluded the hijackers crashed the plane to stop passengers and crew taking back control. Gabor, Daniel, 27, of Walnut Creek, ran middle-distances for University of Arkansas in Fayetteville, Ark. J. Conrad Williams Jr./Newsday RM via Getty Images. In Moriches, New York, Matthew Cashman also feels that need to remember the history of TWA Flight 800. plane. Survivor Mohammad Zubair told reporters the last thing he heard before the crash was the pilot telling passengers over the intercom they were experiencing engine trouble and the landing would be troublesome. Airlines were given years to put in a simple and inexpensive system that automatically shut down the fuel pumps when the tanks ran dry. America watched on the night of July 17, 1996,as orange flames from the downed airliner streaked the Atlantics choppy surface, just a few miles off the coast of Fire Island. With todays very sophisticated weather radar and stringent rules for avoiding potentially dangerous weather this virtually never occurs, Oakley says. F**k, were going to crash! Such basic policy changes, however, mean little to the families of those who lost mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, grandchildren and friends. Cockpit recordings would later reveal chaos in the cockpit as technical problems with the A330 were compounded by the fact the experienced pilot was asleep, leaving a rookie in charge as problems emerged with the tools that measure the planes airspeed and altitude. killed instantly by the explosion that felled the plane. Some of them were recording the ceremony, their cameras trained on the wedding party with the ocean and sky in the background. The sources said the captain, who was flying the plane, asked the first officer to check the planes handbook for checklists for abnormal events. Investigators determined there was a crack in the insulation, which allowed high voltage from the lighting circuitry to create a spark that ignited the vapors in the empty tank. Babb, David, 13, of Volant, Pa. (nephew of Clara and Namik Ersoz), Baszczewski, Daniel, of Montoursville, Pa., student. "They've just bent over backwards to help us.". The transcript chronicled more than 31 minutes of conversation, beginning when a gate agent at Kennedy International Airport told the cockpit crew that everyone was seated for the flight to Paris. This animated re-enactment, created by the Central Intelligence Agency, shows the disintegration of Paris-bound TWA Flight 800 as it explodes off the coast of Long Island on July 17, 1996.. From ancient times, history has been pockmarked with sudden, unexpected tragedy that rips apart the . Its not often the world hears a persons final words before death but on a plane about to crash, those haunting last moments are often captured forever. The probe wiring is bundled at points with some lighting circuit wires. Ersoz, Clara, 59, of Pittsburgh, anesthesiologist (married to Namik Ersoz, aunt of David Babb). Feb. 25, 2021 Twenty-five years ago, a Boeing 747 flying from New York City to Paris exploded in midair and broke apart just off the coast of Long Island. Despite the safety boards official findings, over the last two decades, conspiracy theorists, bolstered by eyewitness accounts reporting a missile strike, continue to charge that a terrorist attack, bombing or even friendly fire took down Flight 800. 152 Twa Flight 800 Memorial Premium High Res Photos Browse 152 twa flight 800 memorial stock photos and images available, or start a new search to explore more stock photos and images. His grave in Totowa, New Jersey, is now a shrine for those who want him proclaimed a Roman Catholic saint. She wasnt going to Versailles, Ziemkiewicz now reasons. Get updates on the coronavirus pandemic and other news as it happens with our free breaking news email alerts. taken to prevent an accident like this from recurring in the Pacific Southwest Airlines Flight 182 collided with a private light aircraft in 1978 killingall 135 people aboardand seven people on the ground including two children. The last service, Flight TW220, operated from Kansas City International (MCI) to Lambert St. Louis Airport (STL). All Tue Aug 20 1996 - 01:00. After a two-hour meeting, he said most of the families had accepted the FBIs findings, but a few thought the FBI was holding something back. A lot of people have moved on, Ziemkiewicz said. Hogan, David, of Paris, a Virginia-born composer who studied at the Peabody Institute in Baltimore. Lychner, Pam, 37, of Houston, prominent Texas crime victims rights advocate. The accident was officially attributed to the explosion of fuel vapors in an empty center fuel tank, probably ignited by a spark from a faulty fuel quantity probe inside the tank. Lucien, Dalila, 17 (niece of saxophone player Wayne Shorter, who was not on the flight). found no evidence that a bomb or missile brought down the Does this new robot-staffed chocolate emporium signal a themed restaurant comeback? Hundreds of victims' families, journalists and lawyers are DiLuccio, Debra Collins, 47, of Agropoli, Italy, formerly of Athens, Ga., TWA Flight 800 crew. At the time of the accident the aircraft was 25 years old, by no means a spring chicken but not old compared to the. The crash of Air New Zealand flight 901 in Antarctica in November 1979 remains New Zealands deadliest peacetime disaster. Below is a list of those on board, according to family, friends or officials . The official government investigation blamed mechanical failure, but now a group of former investigators . TWA Flight 800 was en route from New York to Paris when it exploded over Long Island Sound minutes after takeoff. Only 10 days after TWA 800 blew up, an alleged anti-abortion activist set off a bomb at the Olympic Games in Atlanta. During the investigation, holes were discovered in parts of the aircraft skin that penetrated from outside in evidence that an object, most likely a missile had struck the plane. Rogers, Kimberly, of Montoursville, Pa., student, Rose, Katrina M., 26, of Cleveland Heights, Ohio, (dauhter of Sandra Hazelton), Rupert, Judith, of Montoursville, Pa., high school secretary, Schuldt, Mike, 51, of Safety Harbor, Fla., TWA Flight 800 Crew, Scott, Barbara, of Stevenson, Ala. (married to Michael Scott), Scott, Joseph, 13, of Stevenson, Ala. (son of Michael and Barbara Scott), Shorter, Anna Maria, of Los Angeles (wife of saxophone player Wayne Shorter, who was not on the flight, and aunt of Dalila Lucien, who was), Siebert, Brenna, 25, of Holts Summit, Mo., veterinary clinic worker in Jefferson City, Mo. And as you will see, it makes for haunting reading. Matthew McConaugheys wife was among the passengers on board a Lufthansa flight struck by severe turbulence and has described the chaos. Since the first American jetliner entered into service in 1958 some 38 years before the loss of of TWA Flight 800 airliners were flying around with empty or near-empty fuel tanks. Seventeen years ago, TWA Flight 800 crashed off Long Island, killing all 230 people aboard. "From that investigation. I also believe my friend when he says the FBI imposed limits on what investigators could and couldn't analyze. Select from premium Twa Flight 800 of the highest quality. You might be shocked to learn the actual age of the airplane on which you're flying. Donald, of Mill Valley, off-duty TWA pilot, Graham, Steven, 38, of Napa, a marketing director for the long-distance phone company Ameritel. The pilots that day reported a few minor problems, which were addressed before the plane left JFK bound for for Paris. NTSBs Hall told the hearing that such theories as lightning, bird strikes, a bullet and a laser beam were eliminated, and the investigation was focusing on the explosion of the center fuel tank. Coughlin has said. The Sieberts, both Kansas City teachers, had boarded the flight to accompany the Gaetkes, also teachers, on a month-long trip to Europe. The crash claimed 230 lives on July 17, 1996. First, the time it took to isolate the circumstances that caused a very rare eventthe center fuel tank explosion, which, he adds, had never occurred with a 747. The TWA 800 aircraft was a 747-100 model, built and delivered in 1971. The very final words were in Arabic: Give it to me was said eight times before the phrase Allah is the greatest was repeated over and over before the crash. color illustration of airplane with words "Safety in the Sky." The side of the Boeing 747, from TWA Flight 800, on which the center fuel tank ruptured, killing 230 people off Long Island, is shown on . But if you see something that doesn't look right, click here to contact us! Carol Ziemkiewicz still has the Bell Atlantic telephone bill that lists the call. Cashman drew comfort by helping to build a monument to the TWA 800 victims atop a sand dune overlooking the beach at Long Islands Smith Point State Park. She fell silent, her eyes reading the now-familiar sentiments of a poem, with this haunting stanza: Like a comet blazing cross the evening sky, gone too soon., Losing Jill was like everything inside me was gone, Ziemkiewicz said. There were 135 people killed on the Pacific Southwest plane, two on the Cessna and seven on the ground. The pilot of doomed TWA Flight 800 was found still strapped in his seat before a major section of his cockpit - a mangled mess of switches, instruments and seats - was raised from the ocean. Vladivostok Air Flight 352 lost control on its approach to Irkutsk airport in Russia in 2001. How to find the best blooms without the drama, Nature-curious? You move on. All of the recovered pieces were reassembled back into an airplane like a giant jigsaw puzzle. Following its final report on the crash, the National Transportation Safety Board issued several safety recommendations including regular maintenance programs and design standards for fuel tanks. The final report indicated that faulty wiring ignited the flammable fuel/air mixture, causing the explosion 12 minutes after takeoff. Ziemkiewicz opened a photo album, pausing at a snapshot of her and Jill sitting on the lap of a Macys Santa Claus when mother and daughter spent a day in Manhattan. A photograph of the right side of the large three-dimensional reconstruction of TWA Flight 800 with the support scaffolding visible. . Literally, it was the shock., Jill Ziemkiewicz had just turned 23 in 1996 when she suspended her dream to be a landscape designer and signed up to become a TWA flight attendant after noticing an ad in a newspaper. BALTIMORE (AP) _ The captain of TWA Flight 800 wondered about a ``crazy fluctuating fuel gauge and noticed how the jet was climbing faster than normal, like a ``homesick angel, in the final minutes before it exploded and crashed into the sea. A picture of her daughter Jill sat on a nearby table a friendly smile with wide, inviting eyes. The 54-page transcript released Monday during the opening of federal hearings into the July 17, 1996, disaster was described by investigators as routine conversation, revealing nothing unusual leading up to the blast aboard the Paris-bound flight that killed all 230 people aboard. Sir, mayday, mayday, mayday Pakistan 8303. Then transmission ended. On the transcript, a comment from TWA Capt. Dadi, Marcel, 46, French musician who helped spread Chet Atkins style of guitar-playing across Europe and was returning home after being honored at Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville, Tenn. D Alessandro, Anna, 25, of Palo del Colle, Italy (married to Giuseppe Mercurio). Luggage and wiring and food and seats and fuel and pillows and blankets and peeled-off sections of the fuselage were scattered for miles on the ocean surface and across its sandy floor. What once might have seemed distant and limited to people far away has now become far more personal. After all, so many boaters thought they saw streaks of light in the summer sky.