WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.120 --> 00:00:02.560 So it is six point four to six in the morning, 2 00:00:02.799 --> 00:00:06.120 it's pitch black, and the freezing rain is just coming 3 00:00:06.160 --> 00:00:08.599 down hard at Gander International Airport. 4 00:00:08.320 --> 00:00:11.320 Right way out on the eastern edge of Newfoundland, Canada. 5 00:00:11.800 --> 00:00:13.560 Really icy conditions exactly. 6 00:00:13.720 --> 00:00:18.320 But inside the terminal, the atmosphere is like completely contradicting 7 00:00:18.359 --> 00:00:21.039 the weather outside. You have two hundred and forty eight 8 00:00:21.160 --> 00:00:26.320 United States soldiers radiating this overwhelming, exhausted joy. 9 00:00:26.440 --> 00:00:27.600 Oh yeah, they're thrilled. 10 00:00:27.640 --> 00:00:30.399 They're milling around, lining up at pay phones, dropping in 11 00:00:30.480 --> 00:00:33.240 coins to call home, saying you know, we're in Canada, 12 00:00:33.359 --> 00:00:34.200 we'll be home by. 13 00:00:34.039 --> 00:00:36.439 Breakfast, and wish to mention these are members of the 14 00:00:36.479 --> 00:00:40.079 elite hundred first Airborne Division, right, the screaming Eagles ick exactly. 15 00:00:40.280 --> 00:00:43.479 They've just finished this grueling five and a half month 16 00:00:43.679 --> 00:00:47.399 peacekeeping deportment over in the Sinai Peninsula. So the terminal 17 00:00:47.399 --> 00:00:49.719 at Gander is really just a refueling stop for them, 18 00:00:49.880 --> 00:00:52.320 just a quick lay over, right. Their final destination is 19 00:00:52.359 --> 00:00:55.560 Fort Campbell, Kentucky, where you know their families are already 20 00:00:55.560 --> 00:00:59.000 waking up, getting ready for this massive holiday homecoming. 21 00:00:59.320 --> 00:01:01.039 And some of these young men are wandering through the 22 00:01:01.079 --> 00:01:05.040 airport gift shop buying souvenirs for those families. And there's 23 00:01:05.040 --> 00:01:07.200 this one detail from the records that just haunts you 24 00:01:07.239 --> 00:01:09.280 when you read it. Yeah, the T shirts, Right, several 25 00:01:09.319 --> 00:01:11.319 of them buy these tourist T shirts that read I 26 00:01:11.400 --> 00:01:15.920 survived Gander, Newfoundland, which is just it's this dark irony. 27 00:01:16.040 --> 00:01:17.480 It's heartbreaking really. 28 00:01:17.280 --> 00:01:20.920 Because just hours later, all two hundred and forty eight 29 00:01:20.959 --> 00:01:24.239 soldiers along with eight crew members would be gone. Yeah, 30 00:01:24.719 --> 00:01:26.719 Airflight twelve eighty five would become one of the most 31 00:01:26.719 --> 00:01:28.920 catastrophic aviation disasters in history. 32 00:01:29.040 --> 00:01:29.719 It really was. 33 00:01:29.799 --> 00:01:32.560 But the thing is, what makes this disaster so chilling 34 00:01:33.120 --> 00:01:35.159 isn't just the sheer loss of two hundred and fifty 35 00:01:35.200 --> 00:01:38.359 six lives. It's what happened to the truth in the aftermath, 36 00:01:38.799 --> 00:01:41.959 and that is the mission of our deep dive today. 37 00:01:41.799 --> 00:01:45.480 Right, because we've pulled together the official accident investigation records, 38 00:01:45.519 --> 00:01:48.840 the expert testimonies, the historical context of the era, and 39 00:01:48.920 --> 00:01:50.000 it's a mess. 40 00:01:49.840 --> 00:01:52.359 A total mess. We rely on the scientific method to 41 00:01:52.359 --> 00:01:54.840 cut through tragedy and give us objective answers, right, But 42 00:01:54.920 --> 00:01:58.480 the investigation into Arrow Air twelve eighty five literally fractured 43 00:01:58.519 --> 00:02:00.480 an entire government safety agency. 44 00:02:00.840 --> 00:02:04.560 It completely broke them. We are looking at this deeply 45 00:02:04.599 --> 00:02:09.840 disturbing scenario where highly trained aviation experts stared at the 46 00:02:09.919 --> 00:02:13.400 exact same twisted metal wreckage and somehow walked away with 47 00:02:13.439 --> 00:02:17.000 two completely fundamentally incompatible realities. 48 00:02:17.080 --> 00:02:19.360 It's like a locker room mystery where half the detector 49 00:02:19.360 --> 00:02:22.199 has proved it was a tragic meteorological accident and the 50 00:02:22.240 --> 00:02:25.360 other half were dead certain it was an international terrorist conspiracy. 51 00:02:25.360 --> 00:02:29.039 It's wild. And to understand how a scientific investigation tears 52 00:02:29.080 --> 00:02:31.240 itself apart like that, we really have to. 53 00:02:31.199 --> 00:02:33.039 Start out on the tarmac walk us through it. 54 00:02:33.439 --> 00:02:36.680 So the aircraft is a massive Douglas DC eight. It's 55 00:02:36.719 --> 00:02:39.919 operated by Arrow Air, which was a charter carrier frequently 56 00:02:39.960 --> 00:02:42.960 contracted by the US military to move troops around. The 57 00:02:43.000 --> 00:02:45.759 pilots finish their pre flight checks in that freezing rain. 58 00:02:46.240 --> 00:02:48.759 The massive tanks are topped off with jet fuel and 59 00:02:48.800 --> 00:02:50.599 they taxi out to runway too two. 60 00:02:50.960 --> 00:02:53.759 So the four engines roared to life, pushing this heavy 61 00:02:53.879 --> 00:02:57.080 jet down the runway. It accelerates, hitting one hundred and 62 00:02:57.120 --> 00:02:59.840 sixty seven knots. The first officer pulls back on the 63 00:02:59.879 --> 00:03:02.080 UK the nose listen to the dark sky, and the 64 00:03:02.120 --> 00:03:04.639 wheels leave the pavement, but the relief. 65 00:03:04.280 --> 00:03:08.960 Of takeoff just it never comes. Almost instantly, the flight 66 00:03:09.039 --> 00:03:11.879 data shows their speed isn't climbing, it's rapidly decaying. 67 00:03:12.159 --> 00:03:14.159 Wait, so the plane is physically in the air, but. 68 00:03:14.120 --> 00:03:17.479 It refuses to go up exactly. The aircraft is caught 69 00:03:17.520 --> 00:03:23.680 in this terrifying aerodynamic limbo. It's pitched nose up, basically 70 00:03:23.719 --> 00:03:26.120 hanging in the sky, completely starved of lift. 71 00:03:26.360 --> 00:03:27.439 That sounds like a nightmare. 72 00:03:27.560 --> 00:03:30.639 Aviators call this being behind the power curve. The first 73 00:03:30.639 --> 00:03:33.759 officer is desperately pulling the control column back, trying to 74 00:03:33.879 --> 00:03:34.800 force the plane to. 75 00:03:34.759 --> 00:03:38.439 Climb, but at a low altitude with failing speed, It's 76 00:03:38.639 --> 00:03:40.639 just an unwinnable fight against gravity. 77 00:03:40.759 --> 00:03:41.960 Completely unwinnable. 78 00:03:42.319 --> 00:03:45.120 I mean, the physical sensation inside that cabin would be 79 00:03:45.199 --> 00:03:48.919 sheer terror. You'd feel the engine straining at maximum power, 80 00:03:49.120 --> 00:03:51.719 the massive fuselage violently shaken. 81 00:03:51.560 --> 00:03:53.800 And they had no time. Just half a mile from 82 00:03:53.840 --> 00:03:55.960 the end of the runway, the heavy DC eight begins 83 00:03:56.000 --> 00:03:56.360 to fall. 84 00:03:56.439 --> 00:03:59.039 It descends into a heavily wooded area and slams into 85 00:03:59.039 --> 00:04:02.319 the earth. Resulting explosion creates a thirty foot high wall 86 00:04:02.360 --> 00:04:05.639 of fire, igniting thousands of gallons of jet fuel and 87 00:04:05.800 --> 00:04:07.199 basically shattering the dawn. 88 00:04:07.520 --> 00:04:10.919 Yeah, and Canadian Air Force Captain Tom Badcock was one 89 00:04:10.960 --> 00:04:13.120 of the first responders on the scene. He was a 90 00:04:13.159 --> 00:04:16.439 seasoned military man, you know, heavily experienced with crash slights. 91 00:04:17.000 --> 00:04:19.959 But finding his own comrades, two hundred and fifty six 92 00:04:20.000 --> 00:04:23.600 of them in a state of utter destruction, he said, 93 00:04:23.720 --> 00:04:26.920 the scale of the devastation was incomprehensible. 94 00:04:27.120 --> 00:04:31.399 So the Canadian Aviation Safety Board the CSB, they immediately 95 00:04:31.480 --> 00:04:34.759 dispatched their lead investigators, David McNair and Peter Boeck. 96 00:04:35.160 --> 00:04:39.360 Yes, and they land in Gander to find absolute chaos. Now, 97 00:04:39.399 --> 00:04:43.519 in modern accident investigation, you cut through that chaos by 98 00:04:43.560 --> 00:04:46.680 finding the black boxes. You need the plane's memory. 99 00:04:46.879 --> 00:04:49.279 But the memory was essentially wiped, wasn't. 100 00:04:49.040 --> 00:04:52.160 It, tragically, Yes, the cockpit voice recorder had malfunctioned and 101 00:04:52.199 --> 00:04:53.560 captured absolute silence. 102 00:04:53.639 --> 00:04:56.360 Oh wow. So without a voice recorder, the investigators are 103 00:04:56.399 --> 00:04:58.680 basically trying to read a novel with every other page 104 00:04:58.759 --> 00:05:01.000 ripped out. What about the light data recorder? 105 00:05:01.120 --> 00:05:03.879 It wasn't much better. Honestly, this wasn't a modern digital 106 00:05:03.920 --> 00:05:06.680 system tracking hundreds of parameters. It was a primitive, old 107 00:05:06.720 --> 00:05:07.920 style foil. 108 00:05:07.720 --> 00:05:10.600 Recorder, a foil like tinfoil, oh sort of. 109 00:05:10.920 --> 00:05:14.639 It operated by literally engraving lines onto a slow moving 110 00:05:14.720 --> 00:05:16.360 roll of stainless steel foil. 111 00:05:16.560 --> 00:05:18.959 So it's basically just scratching a line graph of the flight. 112 00:05:19.079 --> 00:05:19.879 That's it. That's it. 113 00:05:20.079 --> 00:05:24.360 And it only tracked four basic parameters airspeed, altitude, heading, 114 00:05:24.560 --> 00:05:25.680 and vertical acceleration. 115 00:05:25.959 --> 00:05:27.800 Oh man, that's nothing, right. 116 00:05:27.879 --> 00:05:30.439 So because of these limitations, McNair could see the speed 117 00:05:30.519 --> 00:05:34.199 dropped off violently after liftoff, but he was completely blind 118 00:05:34.319 --> 00:05:36.600 to what the pilots were actually doing with the controls. 119 00:05:36.680 --> 00:05:39.800 Were they turning, were the engines maxed out? What was 120 00:05:39.839 --> 00:05:41.720 the pitch angle? The data just. 121 00:05:41.720 --> 00:05:44.759 Isn't there exactly. So without a voice recorder and with 122 00:05:44.920 --> 00:05:48.920 this primitive data graph, investigators have to reconstruct the physics 123 00:05:48.959 --> 00:05:50.439 of the aircraft from the outside in. 124 00:05:50.839 --> 00:05:53.240 And that forced them to look closely at the paperwork, right, 125 00:05:53.720 --> 00:05:56.240 which leads to this massive revelation about the weight. 126 00:05:56.519 --> 00:06:00.839 Yes, McNair pulls the flight manifest which used a standard 127 00:06:00.839 --> 00:06:04.279 commercial airline estimate of one hundred and seventy pounds per passenger. 128 00:06:04.519 --> 00:06:07.439 But one hundred and seventy pounds is an average designed 129 00:06:07.480 --> 00:06:10.160 for a civilian flight. You know, a mix of men, women, 130 00:06:10.199 --> 00:06:12.360 and children carrying regular luggage. 131 00:06:12.519 --> 00:06:17.079 Precisely, this flight was entirely populated by adult male paratroopers. 132 00:06:17.360 --> 00:06:21.079 These are large, physically imposing soldiers returning from a half 133 00:06:21.160 --> 00:06:22.319 year deployment. 134 00:06:21.920 --> 00:06:26.560 Carrying heavy military duffel bags, personal gears, souvenirs, weapons, all 135 00:06:26.600 --> 00:06:26.839 of it. 136 00:06:27.160 --> 00:06:30.319 So the investigators dig deeper. They pulled the actual medical 137 00:06:30.360 --> 00:06:33.360 records of these soldiers to get their true biological weights, 138 00:06:33.560 --> 00:06:35.399 and they factor in all that heavy gear. 139 00:06:35.680 --> 00:06:38.319 And the real average wasn't one hundred and seventy pounds was. 140 00:06:38.319 --> 00:06:40.720 It not even close. It was closer to two hundred 141 00:06:40.720 --> 00:06:42.720 and twenty pounds per passenger. 142 00:06:42.519 --> 00:06:45.279 Which is wild because when you multiply that fifty pound 143 00:06:45.319 --> 00:06:48.160 difference across two hundred and forty eight troops, you uncover 144 00:06:48.279 --> 00:06:50.079 this massive mathematical illusion. 145 00:06:50.240 --> 00:06:53.319 The plane was carrying over twelve thousand extra pounds of 146 00:06:53.399 --> 00:06:54.959 completely undocumented weight. 147 00:06:55.079 --> 00:06:58.079 So the pilots had calculated their necessary takeoff speed and 148 00:06:58.120 --> 00:06:59.879 thrust based on phantom numbers. 149 00:07:00.160 --> 00:07:02.720 Right, But the twelve thousand pounds wasn't the sole killer. 150 00:07:02.839 --> 00:07:05.000 I mean, the jet had flown with that exact same 151 00:07:05.079 --> 00:07:06.120 heavy load all night. 152 00:07:06.399 --> 00:07:08.639 True, it flew from Cairo to Germany and then from 153 00:07:08.680 --> 00:07:11.680 Germany to Gander and it didn't crash exactly. 154 00:07:12.279 --> 00:07:15.399 Something unique happened on the tarmac in Newfoundland to turn 155 00:07:15.439 --> 00:07:17.399 a heavy plane into a doomed plane. 156 00:07:17.680 --> 00:07:21.240 And that variable was sitting on the wings because Gander 157 00:07:21.360 --> 00:07:23.600 was getting hit with severe freezing rain. 158 00:07:23.839 --> 00:07:26.959 Yeah, and when the Arrow aircrew did their pre flight checks, 159 00:07:27.639 --> 00:07:30.680 they elected not to de ice the aircraft, which. 160 00:07:30.480 --> 00:07:33.480 Seems like a fatal decision in hindsight, but it wasn't 161 00:07:33.480 --> 00:07:36.759 an entirely uncommon one at the time. Right, Another large 162 00:07:36.879 --> 00:07:39.480 jet took off around the same time without de icing 163 00:07:39.519 --> 00:07:40.959 and flew perfectly fine. 164 00:07:41.199 --> 00:07:44.319 Right, Because prior to the mid eighties, the danger of 165 00:07:44.439 --> 00:07:48.199 just a microscopic layer of ice wasn't fully understood by 166 00:07:48.240 --> 00:07:49.480 the aviation industry. 167 00:07:49.720 --> 00:07:52.920 We aren't talking about massive, visible icicles hanging off the. 168 00:07:52.879 --> 00:07:55.360 Metal, No, we are talking about a layer of ice. 169 00:07:55.879 --> 00:07:58.639 The thickness and texture of coarse sandpaper resting on the 170 00:07:58.720 --> 00:07:59.480 leading edge. 171 00:07:59.279 --> 00:08:02.079 Of the wing edge is the very front of the wing, 172 00:08:02.199 --> 00:08:05.360 the part that literally slices through the air. First, exactly 173 00:08:05.920 --> 00:08:09.720 to understand why a little sandpaper texture matters, think about 174 00:08:09.720 --> 00:08:12.160 it like this. It's like trying to sprint up an 175 00:08:12.360 --> 00:08:15.240 icy hill in booths, but someone secretly slipped a fifty 176 00:08:15.279 --> 00:08:18.120 pound dumbell into your backpack right before you started running. 177 00:08:18.319 --> 00:08:20.319 That's a great way to put it. The air needs 178 00:08:20.319 --> 00:08:23.360 to hug the curve of the wing perfectly to create section, 179 00:08:23.519 --> 00:08:26.600 which is what we call lyft. But that sandpaper thin 180 00:08:26.680 --> 00:08:30.720 layer of ice acts like gravel. It trips the air up, so. 181 00:08:30.600 --> 00:08:35.080 The airflow violently detaches from the wing, tumbling into chaotic eddies. 182 00:08:35.320 --> 00:08:37.879 Yeah, suddenly the wing isn't lifting the plane. It's just 183 00:08:37.919 --> 00:08:41.240 a heavy piece of metal dragging through the sky. Wind 184 00:08:41.279 --> 00:08:44.919 tunnel tests later prove that even this tiny disruption destroys 185 00:08:44.960 --> 00:08:46.840 a wing's aerodynamic capability. 186 00:08:46.919 --> 00:08:48.840 So you have a jet trying to climb with the 187 00:08:48.879 --> 00:08:52.120 aero dynamic equivalent of gravel on its wings while carrying 188 00:08:52.159 --> 00:08:55.759 a secret, undocumented twelve thousand pounds dumbbell. 189 00:08:55.879 --> 00:08:59.320 The plane physically could not fly under those combined conditions. 190 00:08:59.639 --> 00:09:02.879 And to i' prove it, the CISP programmed commercial flight 191 00:09:02.919 --> 00:09:06.879 simulators with the true two hundred and twenty pound passenger weight, and. 192 00:09:06.799 --> 00:09:08.879 They degraded the lift to mimic the thin. 193 00:09:08.799 --> 00:09:12.039 Ice exactly, and every single time they ran that simulation 194 00:09:12.159 --> 00:09:15.480 with Arrow Air's data, the digital plane stalled and crashed 195 00:09:15.480 --> 00:09:18.159 into the virtual trees. The physics seemed undeniable. 196 00:09:18.240 --> 00:09:21.120 It looks like a close case, a devastating combination of 197 00:09:21.159 --> 00:09:23.279 an administrative error and invisible ice. 198 00:09:23.519 --> 00:09:25.879 But and this is where things go off. The rails. 199 00:09:26.480 --> 00:09:30.200 Accident investigations do not exist in a vacuum. They are 200 00:09:30.360 --> 00:09:32.559 highly susceptible to the global temperature of. 201 00:09:32.559 --> 00:09:35.320 The era, and the temperature in December nineteen eighty five 202 00:09:35.960 --> 00:09:40.320 was boiling. The Cold War is still active, but the 203 00:09:40.360 --> 00:09:42.240 Middle East has become a powder keg. 204 00:09:42.399 --> 00:09:45.799 Yeah, the United States military is on extremely high alert. 205 00:09:46.159 --> 00:09:49.360 Just two years prior, a devastating suicide truck bombing in 206 00:09:49.399 --> 00:09:53.639 Beirut killed two hundred and forty one American military personnel. 207 00:09:53.759 --> 00:09:56.440 So there is a very real shadow war happening in 208 00:09:56.480 --> 00:09:57.879 the background of this crash. 209 00:09:57.919 --> 00:10:00.480 And right in the middle of this investigation, an oversees 210 00:10:00.600 --> 00:10:04.759 US consulate receives a chilling phone call. A caller claiming 211 00:10:04.799 --> 00:10:07.759 to represent Islamic Jihad, which is a branch of Hesbola 212 00:10:08.120 --> 00:10:11.919 takes official responsibility for blowing up Arrow Airflight twelve eighty five. 213 00:10:11.879 --> 00:10:14.919 Which instantly changes everything. Suddenly, the lens shifts. You start 214 00:10:14.960 --> 00:10:16.720 looking at Aarow air completely differently. 215 00:10:16.840 --> 00:10:19.159 Right because this wasn't just a random charter company. The 216 00:10:19.200 --> 00:10:22.879 airline had known ties to covert operations being orchestrated out 217 00:10:22.879 --> 00:10:25.559 of the Reagan White House by Colonel Oliver North. 218 00:10:25.320 --> 00:10:28.639 Which is the very beginning of the Iran contra affair exactly. 219 00:10:29.039 --> 00:10:33.399 And look at where this specific flight originated, Cairo, Egypt. 220 00:10:33.960 --> 00:10:37.120 The records indicate the security in Cairo was shockingly lax. 221 00:10:37.399 --> 00:10:41.039 Yeah, when the troops boarded, several large military crates were 222 00:10:41.080 --> 00:10:45.000 loaded onto the plane. Crucially, there was no official cargo 223 00:10:45.120 --> 00:10:46.080 manifest for them. 224 00:10:46.440 --> 00:10:49.879 Nobody could definitively prove what was inside those boxes. 225 00:10:50.120 --> 00:10:52.919 So put yourself in the shoes of Lis Philotus. He 226 00:10:53.039 --> 00:10:55.960 is a highly credentialed aviation expert and a member of 227 00:10:55.960 --> 00:10:59.240 the Canadian Aviation Safety Board. He looks at the draft 228 00:10:59.279 --> 00:11:01.960 report blaming the crash on ice and weight and he 229 00:11:02.039 --> 00:11:05.039 completely rejects it. He wasn't buying it, and frankly, I 230 00:11:05.080 --> 00:11:08.200 understand his skepticism. You have an airline known for flying 231 00:11:08.240 --> 00:11:11.679 covert ops originating in the Middle East, loaded with mystery 232 00:11:11.720 --> 00:11:14.879 military cargo during a period of intense global. 233 00:11:14.559 --> 00:11:17.120 Terrorism, and a known terror group actually hauls in a 234 00:11:17.159 --> 00:11:19.639 claim right, It is incredibly hard to look at that 235 00:11:19.679 --> 00:11:22.720 cocktail of circumstances and just say, oh, some frozen rain 236 00:11:22.759 --> 00:11:23.320 on the wings. 237 00:11:23.519 --> 00:11:26.159 What physical evidence did the dissenters actually have. 238 00:11:26.320 --> 00:11:29.000 Well, Folotus and a faction of the board argued the 239 00:11:29.039 --> 00:11:33.440 official physics didn't make sense. Folodus calculated the rapid deceleration 240 00:11:33.519 --> 00:11:37.159 of the aircraft, the specific way it lost speeds so 241 00:11:37.360 --> 00:11:38.639 violently after liftoff. 242 00:11:38.679 --> 00:11:39.600 Okay, what did you find? 243 00:11:40.120 --> 00:11:43.080 He argued that to lose that much forward thrust, you 244 00:11:43.080 --> 00:11:46.120 wouldn't just need a wingstall, you would need all four 245 00:11:46.200 --> 00:11:48.159 engines to fail simultaneously. 246 00:11:48.399 --> 00:11:50.000 Well, all four at once. 247 00:11:50.200 --> 00:11:52.720 Yeah, and the only thing that drops four engines at 248 00:11:52.720 --> 00:11:55.399 once is catastrophic sabotage. 249 00:11:55.679 --> 00:11:58.759 This is where my mind bends, because you now have 250 00:11:58.879 --> 00:12:01.919 two groups of objects, to have highly trained scientists looking 251 00:12:01.960 --> 00:12:04.960 at the exact same pieces of broken metal and seeing 252 00:12:05.000 --> 00:12:07.039 completely different realities. 253 00:12:06.480 --> 00:12:09.759 And the dissenters start bringing forward physical evidence to support 254 00:12:09.799 --> 00:12:12.799 the bomb theory. First up is the metal itself? 255 00:12:12.919 --> 00:12:13.679 What about the metal? 256 00:12:13.840 --> 00:12:17.159 The dissenters pointed to a phenomenon called pedaling found inside 257 00:12:17.159 --> 00:12:19.879 the engine wreckage. If you take a sheet of aluminum 258 00:12:19.879 --> 00:12:22.720 foil and poke your finger through it, the metal curls 259 00:12:22.799 --> 00:12:24.919 outward away from the force of your finger right. 260 00:12:24.960 --> 00:12:27.200 It clearly shows the direction the impact came. 261 00:12:27.039 --> 00:12:31.639 From exactly, and investigators found metal inside the engines curled outward. 262 00:12:31.919 --> 00:12:35.799 Felodas argued this proved an explosive force originated from inside 263 00:12:35.799 --> 00:12:38.440 the fuselage, blowing debris into the engines. 264 00:12:38.639 --> 00:12:42.559 I mean, to a lay person, outward curled metal screams 265 00:12:42.759 --> 00:12:43.840 internal explosion. 266 00:12:44.039 --> 00:12:47.639 They also found red paint transferred onto the engine guide veanes. 267 00:12:48.159 --> 00:12:51.120 Now guide veins are the stationary metal blades just inside 268 00:12:51.159 --> 00:12:53.480 the front of the engine that direct the incoming air 269 00:12:53.559 --> 00:12:55.639 smoothly into the spinning fan blades. 270 00:12:55.720 --> 00:12:58.919 And finding red paint deep inside there suggested a bomb 271 00:12:59.000 --> 00:13:03.000 went off in the cargo, blowing red painted fuselage debris outward, 272 00:13:03.159 --> 00:13:05.519 which were then sucked into the engines before the plane 273 00:13:05.559 --> 00:13:06.480 even hit the ground. 274 00:13:06.600 --> 00:13:09.720 That was the theory, and the dissenters also had eyewitnesses. 275 00:13:09.879 --> 00:13:12.639 Two truckers driving on the Trans Canada Highway near the 276 00:13:12.679 --> 00:13:15.320 airport testified that they looked up and saw a glowing 277 00:13:15.399 --> 00:13:18.080 fire on the belly of the plane while it was still. 278 00:13:17.840 --> 00:13:20.080 In the air, before it descended into the trees. 279 00:13:20.080 --> 00:13:23.000 That's huge and perhaps the most disturbing piece of evidence. 280 00:13:23.200 --> 00:13:27.159 The autopsies, medical examiners found exceptionally high levels of carbon 281 00:13:27.200 --> 00:13:28.960 monoxide in the blood streams of. 282 00:13:28.879 --> 00:13:30.799 The victims, meaning what exactly. 283 00:13:30.919 --> 00:13:33.399 The dissenters argued. This meant the soldiers were breathing in 284 00:13:33.480 --> 00:13:37.480 toxic combustion products thick black smoke while the plane was 285 00:13:37.480 --> 00:13:38.080 still flying. 286 00:13:38.519 --> 00:13:41.600 So a bomb detonates, fills the cabin with toxic smoke, 287 00:13:41.639 --> 00:13:43.960 they breathe it in, and then the plane crashes. 288 00:13:44.200 --> 00:13:48.320 Exactly when you stack that up outward bent metal transferred 289 00:13:48.320 --> 00:13:51.720 paint on the internal veins, eyewitnesses seeing fire in the 290 00:13:51.720 --> 00:13:55.320 sky and carbon monoxide in the blood, It paints a compelling, 291 00:13:55.799 --> 00:13:57.960 terrifying picture of sabotage. 292 00:13:58.279 --> 00:14:01.519 Seriously, if I'm reading that minority, I'm thinking the official 293 00:14:01.519 --> 00:14:05.759 investigation is a massive government cover up. How did David 294 00:14:05.840 --> 00:14:09.039 McNair and the official team definitively prove it wasn't a bomb. 295 00:14:09.799 --> 00:14:12.279 I struggle to accept that all this physical evidence was 296 00:14:12.320 --> 00:14:13.159 just a coincidence. 297 00:14:13.639 --> 00:14:16.879 Well, McNair responded with a deeply clinical, step by step 298 00:14:16.919 --> 00:14:22.240 aerodynamic rebettal. First, the RCMP forensics lab tested the wreckage extensively. 299 00:14:22.279 --> 00:14:26.360 They swabbed everything. They found absolutely zero trace of explosive residue. 300 00:14:26.440 --> 00:14:28.679 I hear that, But absence of evidence is an evidence 301 00:14:28.679 --> 00:14:30.960 of absence. You know, what about the curled metal and 302 00:14:31.000 --> 00:14:33.720 the red paint. How do you explain an internal explosion 303 00:14:33.759 --> 00:14:35.320 signature without a bomb. 304 00:14:35.080 --> 00:14:39.000 By investigating the recovery process itself. To clear the massive 305 00:14:39.000 --> 00:14:42.159 amounts of heavy debris from the freezing woods, cleanup crews 306 00:14:42.240 --> 00:14:46.799 used a massive industrial front end loader, basically a huge tractor. 307 00:14:46.879 --> 00:14:48.120 Wait, are you saying the tractor did it? 308 00:14:48.919 --> 00:14:51.480 The official report concluded that the pedaling and the red 309 00:14:51.480 --> 00:14:53.879 paint transfer didn't happen at one thousand feet in the air. 310 00:14:53.960 --> 00:14:57.039 It happened on the ground days later. Oh wow, heavy 311 00:14:57.080 --> 00:15:00.600 machinery violently crunched into the engine cowlings during the cleanup, 312 00:15:00.840 --> 00:15:03.960 physically pushing the metal inward and then dragging it outward, 313 00:15:04.279 --> 00:15:05.919 leaving red tractor paint behind. 314 00:15:06.159 --> 00:15:11.679 So you're saying the cleanup crew essentially contaminated the crime scene. Okay, 315 00:15:11.840 --> 00:15:15.080 But a clumsy bulldozer can't explain two truckers seeing fire 316 00:15:15.120 --> 00:15:15.600 in the sky. 317 00:15:15.879 --> 00:15:19.000 No, it can't. But the physics of a wingstall can 318 00:15:19.600 --> 00:15:22.679 Jet engines need a smooth, continuous gulp of incoming air 319 00:15:22.759 --> 00:15:25.879 to keep the massive fire inside the combustion chamber, pushing 320 00:15:25.919 --> 00:15:29.679 backward out the exhaust. Right when the DC eight's nodes 321 00:15:29.759 --> 00:15:33.159 was pitched up too high, struggling for lift, that incoming 322 00:15:33.200 --> 00:15:35.399 air was suddenly choked off because the air. 323 00:15:35.279 --> 00:15:38.000 Can't get into the engine properly due to the extreme angle. 324 00:15:38.240 --> 00:15:41.519 Right precisely, and when you choke off the intake, the 325 00:15:41.559 --> 00:15:44.720 immense pressure inside the engine has nowhere to go but forward. 326 00:15:45.159 --> 00:15:48.600 It violently burks back out the front. Oh man, this 327 00:15:48.639 --> 00:15:51.840 is called a compressor stall. It shoots a massive jet 328 00:15:51.919 --> 00:15:54.759 of raw, glowing flame out the front of the engine. 329 00:15:55.159 --> 00:15:56.960 To a trucker on the ground in the dark, it 330 00:15:57.000 --> 00:15:59.000 looks exactly like the plane is on fire. 331 00:15:59.159 --> 00:16:01.639 But to an aerow down an anasist, it is the 332 00:16:01.679 --> 00:16:06.799 textbook mechanical symptom of a stalling aircraft desperately starved of air. Okay, 333 00:16:07.080 --> 00:16:11.279 that perfectly explains the fire. But what about the soldiers. 334 00:16:11.600 --> 00:16:14.159 The carbon monoxide in the blood means they breathed smoke 335 00:16:14.240 --> 00:16:14.919 before they died. 336 00:16:15.000 --> 00:16:18.960 Right, not necessarily, The crash resulted in a massive, intense, 337 00:16:19.159 --> 00:16:21.399 fuel fed inferno on the ground. 338 00:16:21.200 --> 00:16:22.240 Right the thirty foot fire. 339 00:16:22.360 --> 00:16:25.519 The official report stated that those high carbon monoxide levels 340 00:16:25.600 --> 00:16:28.919 were tragically but commonly the result of the post impact fire. 341 00:16:29.279 --> 00:16:32.320 Some victims survived the initial blunt force trauma just long 342 00:16:32.440 --> 00:16:34.399 enough to draw breaths in the center of that jet 343 00:16:34.399 --> 00:16:35.279 fuel fire. 344 00:16:35.159 --> 00:16:38.360 Absorbing massive amounts of co before succumbing to the flames. 345 00:16:38.559 --> 00:16:41.639 That is that's deeply unsettling. It really is, because we 346 00:16:41.759 --> 00:16:46.360 want science to be this cold, hard, binary truth. But 347 00:16:46.480 --> 00:16:49.600 here you see how the questions we ask completely shape 348 00:16:49.639 --> 00:16:52.399 the answers we find. If you are looking for an 349 00:16:52.440 --> 00:16:55.559 international terror plot, you look at a red paint smudge 350 00:16:55.600 --> 00:16:56.799 and see a bomb. 351 00:16:56.639 --> 00:16:59.840 But if you're looking for an aerodynamic failure, you look 352 00:16:59.840 --> 00:17:02.559 at the exact same smudge and see a tractor. 353 00:17:02.759 --> 00:17:05.519 It is a profound demonstration of narrative bias. 354 00:17:05.920 --> 00:17:09.119 It really is. Both factions believed they were fighting for 355 00:17:09.160 --> 00:17:12.480 the truth. The sources make it very clear the official 356 00:17:12.519 --> 00:17:16.759 investigators weren't operating a malicious government cover up, and Leffalota 357 00:17:16.799 --> 00:17:19.799 and his dissenters weren't crazy conspiracy theorists. 358 00:17:19.839 --> 00:17:23.440 They were just highly intelligent people trapped by completely different paradigms. 359 00:17:23.680 --> 00:17:27.160 Yeah, but the consequences of that trap were devastating. The 360 00:17:27.200 --> 00:17:30.960 Canadian Aviation Safety Board literally tore itself apart over this 361 00:17:31.519 --> 00:17:34.160 four of the nine board members refused to sign the 362 00:17:34.200 --> 00:17:37.279 official report, blaming ice and weight, and in. 363 00:17:37.160 --> 00:17:40.480 A move that completely shocked the aviation world, they issued 364 00:17:40.519 --> 00:17:43.720 their own minority descending report alongside the official one. 365 00:17:43.759 --> 00:17:46.720 Right explicitly claiming an explosion brought down the plane. 366 00:17:46.920 --> 00:17:48.160 So what happened to the agency? 367 00:17:48.400 --> 00:17:52.599 The public fallout was immense. The agency's credibility was entirely 368 00:17:52.599 --> 00:17:56.160 destroyed by the infighting. It was eventually scrapped entirely by 369 00:17:56.160 --> 00:17:59.680 the Canadian government and replaced with a newly structured Transportation 370 00:17:59.759 --> 00:18:00.559 sne board. 371 00:18:01.079 --> 00:18:03.839 But the bureaucratic death of an agency is just paperwork. 372 00:18:04.559 --> 00:18:06.960 The real tragedy is what the world missed while they 373 00:18:06.960 --> 00:18:07.599 were arguing. 374 00:18:07.799 --> 00:18:12.160 Exactly because while the media, the politicians, and the public 375 00:18:12.160 --> 00:18:15.920 were obsessing over this sensational terrorist bomb versus government cover 376 00:18:16.000 --> 00:18:21.359 up narrative, the actual hard won safety message was completely buried. 377 00:18:21.519 --> 00:18:24.640 McNair and his team had uncovered a lethal, invisible threat. 378 00:18:24.920 --> 00:18:29.079 They proved mathematically and physically that just a microscopic layer 379 00:18:29.119 --> 00:18:31.559 of ice on the wing of a large passenger jet 380 00:18:31.720 --> 00:18:33.440 could be an absolute death sentence. 381 00:18:33.559 --> 00:18:36.000 That was the warning they were desperately trying to broadcast 382 00:18:36.000 --> 00:18:38.559 to the entire global aviation industry. They were trying to 383 00:18:38.559 --> 00:18:41.359 tell pilots, you know, do not trust your eyes. If 384 00:18:41.359 --> 00:18:43.400 there is freezing rain, you de ized the plane no 385 00:18:43.480 --> 00:18:43.839 matter what. 386 00:18:44.319 --> 00:18:47.640 But because the report was permanently tainted by the controversy 387 00:18:47.680 --> 00:18:51.039 of the Minority Report, the urgency of that warning was 388 00:18:51.079 --> 00:18:53.960 lost in the noise. It was treated as just one 389 00:18:54.000 --> 00:18:55.839 side of a bitter political debate. 390 00:18:56.039 --> 00:19:00.799 And that failure brings us to March tenth, nineteen eighty nine. 391 00:19:00.119 --> 00:19:04.640 Years after Gander. We are in Dryden, Ontario. The weather's wintry, 392 00:19:04.720 --> 00:19:06.559 with freezing conditions and snowfalling. 393 00:19:06.640 --> 00:19:07.720 It sounds so familiar. 394 00:19:07.799 --> 00:19:10.720 A Fokker F twenty eight passenger jet is sitting on 395 00:19:10.759 --> 00:19:14.839 the tarmac preparing for takeoff. The crew, perhaps not fully 396 00:19:14.839 --> 00:19:19.400 appreciating the severe, unforgiving danger of thin ice contamination, elects 397 00:19:19.440 --> 00:19:20.839 not to de ice the aircraft. 398 00:19:20.880 --> 00:19:24.400 The sequence of events is chillingly identical. The plane accelerates 399 00:19:24.400 --> 00:19:27.079 down the runway. It attempts to lift off, but the 400 00:19:27.079 --> 00:19:30.960 microscopic ice acts exactly like the gravel in our river metaphor. 401 00:19:31.000 --> 00:19:32.599