
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.

A helicopter carrying offshore drilling workers crashes into the ocean, leading to an investigation that reveals a fatal flaw in the chopper's design.

During a storm, a strong gale slams Delta Air Lines Flight 191 to the ground, killing most people on board.

A cleaning crew makes a careless error while cleaning a Boeing 757, affecting the plane's computer system and causing it to crash into the Pacific Ocean.

A freight train carrying an excess of cargo loses its brakes while descending a mountain causing it to gain speed and derail into a neighborhood killing several people.