Delta Air Lines Flight 1141

On a Wednesday morning in August of nineteen eighty-eight, a Delta Boeing 727 sat on runway 18L at Dallas Fort Worth, holding for wake turbulence from a departing DC-10. While they waited, the crew talked with the flight attendants about the cockpit voice recorder itself. They joked that they should discuss the dating habits of the flight attendants, in case they crashed, so the media would have some kind of a juicy tidbit. They also talked about the upcoming election, and drink mixes, and other crashes. Federal rules require a sterile cockpit before takeoff, with no conversation unrelated to the flight. The chatter stopped only when they were cleared to go. The takeoff looked normal until the main wheels left the ground. Then the plane rolled hard and the right wing dropped. Twenty-two seconds passed between liftoff and the first ground impact. Fourteen of the hundred and eight people aboard died.