[Doug Taylor]

On July 19, 1989 United Airlines flight 232 departed Denver at 2:09 p.m. and climbed to 37,000 feet. At 3:16 p.m. the flight notified Minneapolis Air Traffic Control that the number 2 engine had FAILED and the aircraft was marginally controllable.

Captain Al Haynes is one of the most in-demand speakers today. He has spoken to over a thousand audiences. Now retired from the airlines, his travel itinerary for speaking is possibly more grueling than that of an airline pilot. Captain Haynes tirelessly speaks so that other pilots, controllers, flight attendants, emergency crews and emergency planners can learn from this experience. His narrative of the July 19, 1989, "against all odds" crash landing is a tremendous teaching tool. There were 184 survivors, but we will never know how many more lives will be saved in the future by this valuable information being shared.

Captain Al Haynes was born in Paris, Texas and raised in Dallas. He attended Texas A&M College before joining the Naval Aviation Cadet Training program in 1952. He was released from the service in 1956 after serving as a Marine Aviator. He joined United Airlines that year as a flight engineer and served in that capacity until his promotion to first officer in 1963. He flew the DC-6, DC-7, DC-8, Boeing 727, and

DC-10. Al was promoted to captain in 1985 and flew the Boeing 727 and DC-10 up to his retirement in August 1991, accumulating over 27,000 hours of flight time.

Al has been a volunteer umpire for Little League Baseball for the past 34 years and a stadium announcer for high school football for the past 25 years.

The Story:
The Story of Flight 232

That 184 people survived the crash landing of United 232 can be attributed to five main factors: Luck, Communications, Preparation, Execution, and Cooperation. Luck involved the fact that the airplane remained flyable, location, weather, and time of day. Quick and total response by Air Traffic Control, cockpit and cabin crew training, proper inter-communications training among ground units, and proper use of available facilities contributed to the communications factor.

A live drill leading to improvements and better planning for disasters coupled with thorough training of cockpit and cabin crews helped prepare everyone of this seemingly impossible task. Everyone responded as his or her training dictated and required a total team effort coupled with complete cooperation from every agency involved as well as the general public. These factors allowed what appeared to be a non-survivable accident to be one in which a large percentage of those aboard to survive.