Chateau de Sully

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Air France "Chateau de Sully"
Summary
Date  June 3, 1962
Type  RTO
Site  Orly Airport, Paris, France
Fatalities  130
Injuries  2
Aircraft
 Aircraft type  Boeing 707
Operator  Air France
Tail number  F-BHSM
Passengers  122
Crew  10
Survivors  2

Air France charter flight Chateau de Sully, a Boeing 707, crashed on June 3, 1962 while attempting to depart Paris Orly Airport enroute to Atlanta, Georgia via New York City Idlewild. The 707 carried 122 passengers and 10 crew. The aircraft failed to climb out and the flight crew attempted to abort the take off with less than 3000 feet of runway remaining. While under emergency braking, the 707 departed the end of Runway 8 and burst into flame after the left undercarriage failed. Two flight attendants seated in the tail cone survived the crash and fire. Another flight attendant survived the disaster but died later in hospital. At the time, it was the world's worst air disaster involving one aircraft. [1]

Contents

[edit] Impact on Atlanta, Georgia

The Atlanta Art Association sponsored a month long tour of the art treasures of Europe and 106 of the passengers were art patrons heading home to Atlanta on this charter flight. The tour group included many of Atlanta's cultural and civic leaders. Atlanta mayor, Ivan Allen Jr., went to Orly to inspect the crash site where so many important Atlantans perished. [2]

[edit] Chateau de Sully in art and popular culture

Andy Warhol painted his first "disaster painting": 129 Die in Jet (Plane Crash) from a front page of New York Mirror the day after the crash. At the time, the death count was 129.[3]

[edit] References

  1. ^ BBC "On This Day"
  2. ^ Photo of Mayor Allen inspecting the crash site at Orly
  3. ^ Jonathan Crane: "Sadism and Seriality: The Disaster Paintings", The Critical Response to Andy Warhol (ed. Pratt), 1997, p. 260.

[edit] External links

  • [1] North Georgia Magazine Article recalling the disaster
  • [2] New Georgia Encyclopedia entry about the impact on Atlanta.
  • [3] BBC "On This Day"
  • [4] Aviation Safety Network including probable cause statement.