r/lastimages • u/JadedElevator8968 • Aug 02 '25
NEWS The flight crew of Japan Airlines Flight 123 which crashed on August 12th 1985 killing 520 of the 524 people on board - the worst single plane crash in history
From left to right: Captain Masami Takahama, First Officer Yutaka Sasaki training to become a 747 Captain and Flight Engineer Hiroshi Fukuda
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u/musicloverincal Aug 02 '25
RIP to all those who perished. To date, this was the largest single airplane crash. The flight was en route to Osaka from Tokyo.
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u/cbc7788 Aug 02 '25
The worse thing about this crash was that more could have survived if it wasn’t for the slow rescue response by the Japanese government.
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u/mutarjim Aug 02 '25
In what could be called a silver lining, Dennis E. Fitch, a check airman for United Airlines used his access to a simulator to study this crash for a considerable amount of time, running numerous sims to recreate the accident in an attempt to save the plane. His curiosity and experience may be the single biggest factor in why flight United 232 was able to make it to the ground as well as it did when a nearly identical incident happened and that plane lost all of its hydraulics some four years later. 184 of the planes 296 passengers survived, 13 completely unharmed. To this day, United 232 is called The Impossible Landing.
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u/HaatOrAnNuhune Aug 02 '25
Yes! You’re 100% right! During the investigation into UA232 the NTSB ran tests to see if UA232’s pilots could have done anything differently that could have saved more lives. They put experienced test pilots in simulators facing the same conditions UA232 had and none of them were able to reproduce a survivable landing. Captain Fitch, along with Captain Alfred Hayes, First Officer William Records, and Flight Engineer Dudley Dvorak are incredible heroes for their impossible landing!
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u/aboxofkittens Aug 04 '25
I thought I knew everything about United 232 but I didn’t know that. Thank fuck Denny Fitch was there that day to handle the throttles
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u/pedro-turbine Aug 02 '25
These pilots were truly legends in their own regard. They kept their plane in the air for as long as they humanely could
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u/Pookypoo Aug 02 '25
Yeah I remember they had other pilots simulate their incident and non of them could keep the plane flying as long as they could.
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u/Sacharon123 Aug 02 '25
As another professional pilot doing this as a profession, this feels a bit like a band of brothers moment to me. Recently had the full hydraulics loss scenario on the recurrent simcheck. With our aircraft its much better managable, but in their shoes? Shit. May they rest in eternal peace and never run out of fuel and runway wherever they sail now.
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u/Effective_Pin_4858 Aug 02 '25
You guys should goggle JAL flight 123 cockpit recording. The last words were chilling. “Power! Power! This is the end!!” sounds of impact
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u/Cycleofmadness Aug 02 '25
This accident wasn't b/c of a Boeing defect it was b/c a repair was done improperly about 8 yrs prior after I believe a tailstrike.
And this type of accident happened again to another 747 b/c of the same reason - improper repair made due to a tailstrike, a few yrs later.
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u/musicloverincal Aug 02 '25
Correct. When the airplane was sent back to Boeing for repair, a singular piece of metal should have been used as replacement to maintain the integrity of the structure.
Instead, several pieces of product were used for the repair. As a reult, the integrity of the piece was dilluted. Once wear and tear caused it to give out, the airplane was doomed.
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u/Ok-Consideration2463 Aug 02 '25
FYI, it Wasn’t this crews fault at all. like so many others, Boeing the corporate murderer caused this crash also. Faulty repair in this case.
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u/pukurindesu Aug 03 '25
The story of this flight haunts me. One of the passengers onboard was Kyu Sakamoto, known for the song “Sukiyaki” which was an internationally known song back in 1963!
I learned about this flight from the German band Rammstein, of all places. Their album Reise Reise features a sound clip of the crash that was recovered from the black box on the first track. It’s so eerie to listen to.
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u/aboxofkittens Aug 04 '25
Is the sample in Dalai Lama? I love the album but don’t really care for that song in particular so I have only listened to it a handful of times. But I know what it’s about.
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u/pukurindesu Aug 05 '25
It’s at the very beginning of the album - if I recall, it’s a hidden pregap track (where you start the first track then have to rewind it to get to the actual start of the CD.)
The song “Dalai Lama” is about a plane crash, which was wild to just read the translations for. I forgot that’s what the song was about.
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u/nogaesallowed Aug 03 '25
the crash didn;t kill 520 - the JSDF refuse to perform rescue at night killed at least 1/3 to half.
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u/DropKnowledge69 Aug 02 '25
Where's We Tu Lo, Sum Ting Wong and Ho Li Fuk?
Now those guys were the worst I heard on a news report.
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u/tzulik- Aug 02 '25
Did that sound funny in your head?
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u/vy_you Aug 02 '25
I think they are referring to this:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asiana_Airlines_Flight_214#KTVU_prank
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u/rohithkumarsp Aug 02 '25
Iirc there was another plane crash few months later and the Chinese news reporter made the same type of joke when naming American Pilots, I could never find that news post again.
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u/Upper_Rent_176 Aug 02 '25
Is it the worst single plane crash in history though. What about one of the two wtc places?
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u/Br0boc0p Aug 02 '25
Worst single, not single worst. As in, not 2 planes colliding or a plane crashing into something.
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u/ButDidYouDie0725 Aug 02 '25
There’s also the Tenerife Disaster from 1977, though technically the crash happened as both planes were taking off, out of the 624 combined passengers from both planes. Only 41 survived (all passengers from one of two planes were killed).
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u/BadMan125ty Aug 02 '25
They fought to keep that plane from crashing for 32 minutes! That’s bravery. 🥺