
Statistically, traveling by airplane is safer than driving and other forms of transportation, but when something goes wrong during a flight, it can be catastrophic with potentially hundreds of lives at stake. This series examines some of the world's worst air disasters, using official reports, transcripts and interviews with people involved to tell the stories of midair mishaps and discover what went wrong in each case. Episodes include a discussion of how the weather affects flights -- including stories of aviation disasters and near-misses -- and a New Year's Eve flight that fell from the sky into the Florida Everglades.

How routine flights can turn catastrophic in mere seconds when the pilots become momentarily distracted; three flights end in a disaster.

A simple error years prior causes the deadliest single-plane crash in history.

The FBI and NTSB join forces to determine how terrorists hijacked American Airlines Flight 77 and flew it into the Pentagon on September 11, 2001.

TANS Perú Flight 204 crashes into a muddy swamp while attempting to land at Pucallpa Airport, Peru, in a thunderstorm, killing 40 of the 98 people on board.