On May 15, 2001, an experienced freight engineer steps down from his locomotive in a rural Ohio rail yard to fix a misaligned switch. He's done this kind of work for thirty-five years, the train is creeping along at walking pace, and he'll be back on board in seconds. Then everything goes wrong. Join Alice and Zach for the story of CSX 8888 — a three-thousand-ton freight train carrying tank cars of toxic chemicals that runs loose through northwestern Ohio with nobody at the controls, and the ordinary railroaders who have to figure out how to stop it before it reaches the next town. This is the story Hollywood turned into the movie Unstoppable, with all the parts they left out.

Sources:

• "Runaway Train" by William M. Hendryx — Reader's Digest, March 2002
• "A 3,000-Ton Locomotive Was Loose, Unstoppable, and Filled with Toxic Cargo" by Jesse Hicks — Popular Mechanics
• "CSX's Runaway Train: The Crazy Eights Incident" — AmtrakGuy365 (YouTube)
• "Ordinary Railroaders Stop Deadly Runaway Train: The Crazy Eights Incident" — Fascinating Horror (YouTube)
• "CSX 8888 — Crazy Eights" by Dan Robie — WVNC Rails
• Federal Railroad Administration incident memo, May 2001
• Contemporary news coverage from CNN, the Los Angeles Times, and CBS News
• EPA emergency response documentation on phenol-related rail incidents

Find FINAL BOARDING CALL online:

• Website: finalboardingcallpodcast.com
• Email: finalboardingcallpodcast@gmail.com
• Instagram: @FinalBoardingCallPod
• Facebook: Final Boarding Call

Credits: Final Boarding Call is hosted by Alice Stern and Zach Stemas, researched and written by Alice Stern, produced and edited by Alice Stern and Zach Stemas.

On December 1, 1993, Northwest Airlink Flight 5719 crashed three miles short of its destination in northern Minnesota, killing all 18 people aboard. The weather wasn't extreme. The aircraft wasn't broken. Both pilots were certified, qualified, and physically capable of flying the approach. But as the turboprop descended through the dark, something else was happening in the cockpit — something that wouldn't show up in the wreckage. This is the story of how investigators traced a routine night flight back through twenty years of warning signs that nobody connected, and what the cockpit voice recorder revealed about the silence that killed eighteen people.

Sources:

• NTSB Aircraft Accident Report AAR-94/05 — Express Airlines II, Inc., Northwest Airlink Flight 5719
• Cockpit Voice Recorder Transcript (NTSB Appendix B)
• Mayday: Air Disasters, Season 17 Episode 1, "Killer Attitude"
• NTSB Safety Recommendations A-94-70 through A-94-72
• Express Airlines II General Operations Manual and Standard Operating Procedures (as cited in AAR-94/05)

Find FINAL BOARDING CALL online:

• Website: finalboardingcallpodcast.com
• Email: finalboardingcallpodcast@gmail.com
• Instagram: @FinalBoardingCallPod
• Facebook: Final Boarding Call

Credits: Final Boarding Call is hosted by Alice Stern and Zach Stemas, researched and written by Alice Stern, produced and edited by Alice Stern and Zach Stemas.

What happens when a brand-new Boeing 737 flies into a hailstorm so violent that both engines die in the same instant, 16,500 feet above the Gulf Coast? Join Alice and Zach as they explore the 1988 emergency landing of TACA Flight 110, where a 29-year-old captain with one eye, a first officer he trusted, and a brand new aircraft were tested in a way no flight simulator had ever prepared a crew for. Discover how a near-miss nine months earlier was waved off as a freak event, why the engines on one of the most reliable jets in the world were vulnerable in a way no one had imagined, and how a 43-ton glider found the only piece of dry ground for miles. This is the rare story where everyone walks away — including the aircraft itself.

Sources:

• "Boeing 737-300 | TACA International Airlines Flight 110, N75356" — Federal Aviation Administration, Lessons Learned from Transport Airplane Accidents
• NTSB Brief of Incident FTW88IA109 — National Transportation Safety Board
• "Nowhere to Land," Mayday: Air Disaster, Season 11 Episode 11 — National Geographic / Cineflix
• "Interview with Capt. Carlos Dárdano: Hero of TACA 110" — Carlos Dardano Fans, YouTube
• "This Incredible Pilot: Carlos Dárdano" — Plane & Pilot Magazine
• "The Miracle on the Levée" — Fear of Landing
• "¡Misión Cumplida! Se Jubila el Histórico Piloto Salvadoreño Carlos Dárdano" — El Diario de Hoy
• Aviation Safety Network — TACA Flight 110 Profile

Find FINAL BOARDING CALL online:

• Website: finalboardingcallpodcast.com
• Email: finalboardingcallpodcast@gmail.com
• Instagram: @FinalBoardingCallPod
• Facebook: Final Boarding Call

Credits: Final Boarding Call is hosted by Alice Stern and Zach Stemas, researched and written by Alice Stern, produced and edited by Alice Stern and Zach Stemas.