Pan American once touted themselves as “The World’s Most Experienced Airline”. As an industry leader, introducing the Boeing 707 first and being somewhat responsible for the Boeing 747’s existence, other airlines followed their lead. It did not mean they were immune from accidents such as this runway overrun.
In fact, if you investigate Pan Am’s history, they lost a lot of aircraft in accidents. 1968 is notable with three Boeing 707 crashes in the year, as is the 12 month period from July 1973 to June 1974, where another four Boeing 707s went down. Makes you realise just how safe flying is today, doesn’t it?
A Runway Overrun in Sydney
On Monday, 1 December 1969, Pan Am flight 812 was taking off on Sydney’s 8,000ft long runway 16 when it passed through a flock of seagulls. These were a notorious problem at the airport at that time, due to the location of the Tempe Tip attracting the scavenging birds.
The number two engine immediately lost power and the flight crew elected to reject the take-off. In the post-accident report, the crew remembered aborting take off before the V1 decision speed (after which, you are committed to fly), but the Flight Data Recorder indicated otherwise.
Happily all 125 passengers and 11 crew evacuated safely with no injuries using all the emergency exits, a textbook outcome. After the overrun the Boeing 707 was repaired over several months in a hangar by Qantas Engineers in Sydney. It flew for many more years in the blue and white colours of Pan American.
Overall Thoughts
There are two web pages you should visit for the full story. First is a piece written by John McHarg, which is what I have summarised to produce this article.
Second, arguably even more interesting, is this set of images of the aircraft both in situ after the accident, and taken during the repair process in Sydney. It’s a fascinating look at the damage and repair. All the images in this article are from there, on the excellent AussieAirliners site.
Did you know about this overrun in Sydney by a Pan Am Boeing 707? Thank you for reading and if you have any comments or questions, please leave them below.
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Quite true, Pan American was largely responsible for the Boeing 747, but I am sure the market also presented itself as an opportunity as PA would hardly have been able to make it a profitable programme on its own. Yes indeed, it’s funny how history turned out!
I’d never heard of this. Very interesting. I recall from the book Skygods how Pan Am had a nasty series of largely avoidable accidents around that time, largely due to arrogance.
I’d slightly dispute your assertion that Pan Am is only partially responsible for the 747. No other airlines were even dreaming of such a plane while Trippe was talking Boeing into building it. I’d say that places Pan Am and Boeing as the only two responsible parties. I do find it somewhat ironic that Pan Am got walloped in the 1970’s for having so many giant gas guzzlers while Boeing made a mint from the various 747’s for decades.