Air Crash Investigation

Mayday is a documentary television program produced by Cineflix in Canada, airing on Discovery Channel Canada, and also airs in the United States (as Air Emergency[1]) on the National Geographic Channel, and as Air Crash Investigation in other parts of the world. As of February 2006, 3 seasons of programs have been produced. A spinoff detailing non-aircraft disasters, titled Crash Scene Investigation in all parts of the world except Canada, has also been released. In Canada, both the original series and the spinoff are referred to as simply Mayday.

It is a documentary that investigates the air crashes in modern history. It reveals events that led up to each crash and the causes to the crashes. It features reenactments, interviews, testimony, computer-generated imagery (CGI), and in some episodes, Cockpit Voice Recordings (CVRs) to reconstruct the sequence of events to the audiences.

Name

As there are many different names to the series, there is some confusion over the proper name of the series. The program was originally produced in Canada under the name Mayday -- Air Disaster as is still referred to as such in Canada (but without "Air Disaster" after the spinoff Crash Scene Investigation started to air). However, viewers also refer to this series as Air Crash Investigations while National Geographic Channel does not officially use the final s. [2]

Furthermore, the spinoff series Crash Scene Investigation is also billed as the fourth season of Mayday in Canada, and this program, along with the similar series Blueprint for Disaster, are typically billed together as Disaster Detectives on Discovery Channel Canada, leading to further confusion as to the name of the series.

Format

Several passengers and crew members (whether they survived the accident or not) of the accident aircraft would be picked and actors/actresses would play the role of those passengers and crews throughout the accident flight usually starting from boarding of the flight. The flight routines in the air traffic control, cockpit and cabin would be recreated on screen starting from departure up to the moment of the accident. At the moment of the accident, external view of the aircraft from different angles would be recreated to show the effect and what had happened to the aircraft. The responses and reactions of the passengers, crews and air traffic control after the accident had happened leading up to the eventual crash or emergency landing are then recreated. All the scenes in cockpit and air traffic control centres are recreated using the actual script obtained from the cockpit voice recorder of the accident aircraft.

The rescue and recovery effort and the investigations process is then recreated in details, showing how the aircraft parts, the flight data recorders and cockpit voice recorders are recovered and examined, how the pieces are related together to maintenance records, initial design, training procedures, etc. to draw the final conclusion.

Surviving passengers and crews or surviving relatives and friends of deceased passengers are interviewed throughout each episode. Investigators, from NTSB in most cases, involved in the subsequent accident investigations are interviewed to explain the flow of the investigations and how the conclusion and subsequent recommendations are made. Each episode usually ends with a short interview with one of the survivors (or a relative of a deceased) to summarize their experience and how they feel.

Episode List

* Season 1
** Episode 1: Unlocking Disaster (United Airlines Flight 811)
** Episode 2: Racing The Storm (American Airlines Flight 1420)
** Episode 3: Fire on Board (Swissair Flight 111)
** Episode 4: Cutting Corners (Alaska Airlines Flight 261)
** Episode 5: Flying Blind (AeroPeru Flight 603)
** Episode 6: Flying on Empty (Air Transat Flight 236)
* Season 2
** Episode 1: Wounded Bird (ASA Flight 529)
** Episode 2: Blow Out (British Airways Flight 5390)
** Episode 3: Hijacked (Air France Flight 8969)
** Episode 4: Mid-Air Collision (Bashkirian Airlines Flight 2937/DHL Flight 611)
** Episode 5: Lost (American Airlines Flight 965)
** Episode 6: Deadly Delay (Avianca Flight 52)
* Season 3
** Episode 1: Kid in the Cockpit (Aeroflot Flight 593)
** Episode 2: Out of Control (Japan Airlines Flight 123)
** Episode 3: Attack over Baghdad (European Air Transport DHL Flight on 22 November, 2003)
** Episode 4: Suicide Attack (FedEx Flight 705)
** Episode 5: Hanging by a Thread (Aloha Airlines Flight 243)
** Episode 6: Mistaken Identity (Iran Air Flight 655)
** Episode 7: Egypt Air 990 (EgyptAir Flight 990)
** Episode 8: Bomb on Board (Philippine Airlines Flight 434)
** Episode 9: Helicopter Down (G-TIGK North Sea ditching)
** Episode 10: African Hijack (Ethiopian Airlines Flight 961)

Channels

* National Geographic Channel Asia
* National Geographic Channel Australia
* Discovery Channel Canada
* National Geographic UK
* National Geographic Channel U.S.A.
* Seven Network (Australia)

See also

* List of National Geographic Channel programs
* Seconds from Disaster
* Crash Scene Investigation

External links

* Official site in National Geographic UK