With all the travel that teams do it's a wonder that I can only think of one other instance in wwhich something like this occurred. Thoughts are with the players and all others who lost their lives.
I recall the ManU crash of the 1960s and I knew there was an African national team (just googled it - Zambia). But you are correct, with all the miles they put now a days it is surprising it does not happen more often. Reading more about it, Alianza Lima and The Strongest had similar accidents: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_accidents_involving_sports_teams Another anecdote that comes to mind is the Non-flying dutch (Dennis Bergkamp) who would drive or take a train or even skip a game to avoid flying, since he was terrified of being in the air.
That's actually a lot more than I thought and I was thinking about the Zambia team but had completely forgotten about the Man U crash. In my mind, it seems to be more frequent with movie stars, singers or single-sport athletes (Aaliyah, Payne Stewart, Ricky Valenz, Buddy Holly, John Kennedy Jr.) who travel alone which isn't unusually since they're more likely to fly in single-engine or smaller luxery jets with fewer safeguards and less oversight while teams tend to charter professional passenger liners. The plane that this club was using was made in the UK, but it didn't look like a chartered passenger liner.
Very nice of Nacional fans to honor the Chapecoense squad: https://www.facebook.com/WinSportsTv/videos/1426360964071358/
They've requested that Chapecoense be awarded the title. Beautiful... http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/29/s...o-nacional-crash-copa-sudamericana-title.html
It just underscores how incredibly unlikely it is to die in an airplane crash. So many things have to go wrong at the same time for something like this to happen. Whereas if your travelling by car or bus really it only requires one idiot driver or one patch of ice on the road for total disaster to ensue.
Correct. Depending on who you ask, the odds of dying in a plane crash are 1 in 5.5 million or 1 in 11 million. The odds of dying in a car accident in the US range from 1 in 4,ooo (Montana) to 1 in 30,000, depending on the state. 3 orders of magnitude higher.
I think the fear of flying is the lack of control involved. When you're in your car, you tend to assume that you hold your life in your own hands, despite the fact that any external factor outside of your control can end your life at any time. Usually, when a plane goes down, there's something that the pilot or the crew overlooked or knew enough about the risks to make a decision on whether or not to delay the flight. I'll wait to see if some detail comes to light.
Are you going back to the Chapecoense? What I've heard was that the Avro plane had a fuel autonomy range shorter than recommended for that flight and that its landing was delayed because another plane was having an emergency. While circling, LaMia plane ran out of gas and plunged into a near mountain... http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-38165757 Apparently the pilot made multiple judgement mistakes that led to the crash, but the chain of events that led to it makes me think that, at least for some people, there is a written destiny.
Looking more and more like sheer stupidity ruled the day. I can't believe they brought it to the point where the plane can’t even circle for 15 minutes before running out of fuel.
That part yes. But when you look at the whole thing, like a series of unfortunate events: 1. Brazilian Aeronautic Authority denies the charter request. 2. Chapecoense travel to Bolivia to get into LaMia plane. 3. Pilot cannot refuel in Cobija as planned due to late arrival 4. Pilot decides to head straight for Medellin instead of Bogota, probably because it is a short distance. 5. Landing is delayed due to another plane's emergency.
This type of thing happens alot more than you'd think sadly. Especially with private aircraft and charters. No professional liner would dream of even going past #3 on that list. Late or not, you don't leave the ground without refueling. But some charters will push the limits of safety to make a payday. And with the emergency at the airport, a smart pilot would have just called the police and told them that he was landing on an adjacent highway and he needed traffic blocked off. Anything to avoid risking running out of fuel. It's much safer to charter an entire jet from a professional fleet with a name on the side. Granted that's what La Mia was (but it has such a small fleet that it may as well have been private). I wonder if they took any time to find out how good that service was. They probably weren't very familiar with them. It's often the private single-engine planes and jets chartered from small "airlines" that safety is compromised. I'm no pilot, but I wouldn't set foot inside a privately-owned plane unless they let me whip out Google on my phone and inspect it myself. This is so sad and maddening at the same time considering how easily this could have been prevented...
I also heard that this was the same plane that Argentina's NT used during their trip from Belo Horizonte to Buenos Aires for Conmebol Qualifiers. http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/...chapecoense-death-toll-accident-a7445391.html
I just went to the following website to get the straight-line distance between Santa Cruz and Medellin: http://distancecalculator.globefeed.com/World_Distance_Result.asp?fromplace=Santa Cruz de la Sierra (Santa Cruz,Bolivia)&toplace=Medellin (Cordoba,Colombia)&fromlat=-17.8&tolat=8.66&fromlng=-63.1666667&tolng=-75.9147222 "The Distance between Santa Cruz de la Sierra (Santa Cruz,Bolivia) and Medellin (Cordoba,Colombia) is : 3258.2 kilometers (km). In Other Units: 2024.55 miles. 1758.12 nautical miles. " Then I looked up some information on the aircraft: " Built and sold in 1999, it was part of the stable of British Aerospace 146, or BAE 146, planes. BAE 146s and the related Avro RJ models — of which the crashed plane was one of — can have a range of about 1,700 nautical miles (1,955 miles, 3,150 kilometers), according to David Dorman, a spokesman for BAE."
http://primebaze.ga/2016/12/02/ronaldinho-riquelme-offer-to-play-for-chapecoense-for-free/?i=2 This is a Nigerian publication, so information may need verification out of Brazil, but if this is true my level of respect for 'Dinho and Riquelme just went up 1000%. Apparently they may be willing to play for the club for free next season. They may not be in their prime, but just making such an offer is an amazing gesture. It's awesome to see how Brazil is really rallying around this club and the city.
They'll also be awarded a spot in the Copa Libertadores. I'll be rooting for them there. Also a story about Alan Ruschel who survived the crash also previously survived a serious automobile accident. This man has alot to live for. But survivors guilt will be alot for these survivors. It has to be traumatizing. https://www.thesun.co.uk/sport/foot...third-time-he-has-miraculously-cheated-death/
http://www.espnfc.us/club/chapecoen...hapecoense-to-finally-play-nacional-in-recopa United by tragedy, Chapecoense to finally play Nacional in Recopa