American Airlines Flight 6780

1952 aviation accident

American Airlines Flight 6780
Accident
An American Airlines CV-240 similar to the accident aircraft
Date	January 22, 1952
Summary	CFIT on approach for reasons unknown
Site	Elizabeth, New Jersey, United States 40°39′28″N 74°12′52″W / 40.6579°N 74.2144°W / 40.6579; -74.2144
Total fatalities	30
Aircraft
Aircraft type	Convair CV-240-0
Aircraft name	Flagship New Haven
Operator	American Airlines
Registration	N94229
Flight origin	Buffalo Municipal Airport
1st stopover	Rochester Municipal Airport
Last stopover	Hancock Airport
Destination	Newark International Airport
Occupants	23
Passengers	20
Crew	3
Fatalities	23
Survivors	0
Ground casualties
Ground fatalities	7

American Airlines Flight 6780, the first fatal crash of a Convair 240, occurred on January 22, 1952.

The twin-propeller aircraft was on the routing Buffalo-Rochester-Syracuse-Newark. On final approach to runway 6 at Newark Airport using the instrument landing system, it crashed at 3:45 p.m. into a house at the intersection of Williamson and South Streets, in the city of Elizabeth, New Jersey, approximately 3.4 miles (5.5 km) southeast of Newark. The cause of the crash was never determined.

The plane, which had gone 2,100 feet (640 m) off course to the right, narrowly missed hitting the Battin High School for girls, which had dismissed for the day only 45 minutes before.

Casualties

All 23 occupants on board (20 passengers and 3 crew), plus 7 people on the ground, were killed in the crash and ensuing fire.

The Captain, Thomas J. Reid, whose home was only blocks from the crash scene, had recently returned from an airlift to Japan; his wife heard the crash and told reporters that they had been planning to move to a house they had constructed in Point Pleasant, New Jersey.

Among the passengers was Robert P. Patterson, a jurist and former Undersecretary of War under Franklin Delano Roosevelt and former War Secretary under Harry S. Truman. Patterson was returning from meeting Thomas J. Watson of IBM, who had just hired him for a new case on the previous day. Patterson had finished a federal case in Buffalo earlier than expected the day before, and changed his rail ticket in for the aircraft seat, according to the Jan 23 edition of the Deseret News.

Aftermath

This was the second in a string of three crashes to hit the town of Elizabeth in less than two months. On December 16, 1951, a Miami Airlines C-46 had crashed into the Elizabeth River shortly after take-off, with 56 people on board and no survivors.

The third crash, National Airlines Flight 101, on February 11, 1952, killed 29 of the 63 people on board and narrowly missed an orphanage. Following a public outcry, Newark Airport was immediately closed by the Port of New York Authority and remained so for nine months, until November 15. The State of New York passed a bill requiring operators to approach airports over water wherever possible.

President Harry Truman launched a temporary commission of inquiry, headed by Jimmy Doolittle, to study the effects of airports on their neighbors. The report recommended the establishment of effective zoning laws to prevent the erection of schools, hospitals and other places of assembly under final approach paths.

The three crashes later provided the inspiration to writer and Elizabeth resident Judy Blume for her 2015 novel In the Unlikely Event.

References

"FAA Registry (N94229)". Federal Aviation Administration.
Archived June 13, 2015, at the Wayback Machine Civil Aeronautics Board Accident Report
"Convair CV-240" ASN Aviation Safety Database
"Plane Falls in Elizabeth, 31 Die, 8 of them in 3 homes set on fire; Ex-Secretary Patterson a Victim; All Aboard Perish; Craft From Buffalo Was on a Radar Approach to Newark Airport; Buildings Burn Quickly 'Gas' Tanks Explode on Impact -- Pilot's Wife Hears Crash in Her Home, Near Scene; Searching For Victims After Convair Struck Dwellings in Jersey Plane Crash Kills 31 In Elizabeth". The New York Times. January 23, 1952. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved February 24, 2009.
Thomas J. Watson, Peter Petre. Father, Son & Co: My Life at IBM and Beyond 2nd ed. Bantam Books (1991) p.233 ISBN 0-553-29023-1
Turner, Jean-Rae; Koles, Richard T. (August 27, 2003). Elizabeth: First Capital of New Jersey. Arcadia Publishing. ISBN 978-0-7385-2393-4.
"Airport Moats Needed?" Flight March 14, 1952 p.305
"The Doolittle Report" Flight July 11, 1952 pp.53-54
J. H. Doolittle, et al., "The Airport and its Neighbors", The Report of the President's Airport Commission. May 16, 1952. LCCN 52061225 (recommendation 5)
Hyman, Vicki (December 15, 2014). "Judy Blume's upcoming adult novel tackles real-life plane crashes in 1950s Elizabeth". NJ.com. Retrieved December 17, 2019.

Sources

Report - Civil Aeronautics Board - PDF
- Amendment - PDF
"Plane Crash" The Herald-Press, January 23, 1952. St. Joseph, Michigan. pp. 1, 6
"Airliner Crash Deaths Reach 28" The Deseret News January 23, 1952. pp. 1,2
"Patterson called Great American by Truman" Pittsburgh Post-Gazette January 23, 1952, pp. 1,3

American Airlines

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Allied Pilots Association
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Category

Elizabeth, New Jersey

Areas

Education

Closed	Battin HS Benedictine Acad. Thomas Jefferson HS St. Patrick HS

Landmarks

Transportation

Elizabeth station (NJ Transit)
North Elizabeth station (NJ Transit)
Newark Liberty International Airport (part)

History

This list is incomplete.

v t e Aviation accidents and incidents in 1952 (1952)
Jan 19 Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 324Jan 22 American Airlines Flight 6780Feb 11 National Airlines Flight 101Mar 3 Air France LanguedocMar 22 KLM Flight 592Apr 9 Japan Air Lines Flight 301Apr 11 Pan Am Flight 526AApr 29 Pan Am Flight 202Jun 10 Poznań Pe-2 crashJun 13 Catalina affairJun 28 American Airlines Flight 910Aug 12 TAN C-47 crashSep 6 Farnborough Airshow crashOct 7 Habomai Islands RB-29 shootdown incidentOct 26 BOAC Flight 115Nov 22 Mount Gannett C-124 crashNov 28 Tacoma C-54 crashDec 6 Cubana de Aviación Bermuda crashDec 20 Moses Lake C-124 crashDec 30 Luqa Avro Lancaster crash
1951 ◄ ► 1953

Aviation accidents and incidents in 1952 (1952)

Jan 19 Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 324Jan 22 American Airlines Flight 6780Feb 11 National Airlines Flight 101Mar 3 Air France LanguedocMar 22 KLM Flight 592Apr 9 Japan Air Lines Flight 301Apr 11 Pan Am Flight 526AApr 29 Pan Am Flight 202Jun 10 Poznań Pe-2 crashJun 13 Catalina affairJun 28 American Airlines Flight 910Aug 12 TAN C-47 crashSep 6 Farnborough Airshow crashOct 7 Habomai Islands RB-29 shootdown incidentOct 26 BOAC Flight 115Nov 22 Mount Gannett C-124 crashNov 28 Tacoma C-54 crashDec 6 Cubana de Aviación Bermuda crashDec 20 Moses Lake C-124 crashDec 30 Luqa Avro Lancaster crash

1951 ◄ ► 1953

v t e Aviation accidents and incidents in the United States and U.S. territories in the 1950s
1950	Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 307 (March 1950) Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 2501 (June 1950) Myrtle Beach USAF C-46D crash (July 1950) Fairfield-Suisun Boeing B-29 crash (August 1950)
1951	National Airlines Flight 83 (January 1951) Cubana de Aviación Flight 493 (April 1951) United Air Lines Flight 610 (June 1951) United Air Lines Flight 615 (August 1951) Miami Airlines C-46 crash (December 16 1951) Continental Charters Flight 44-2 (December 29 1951)
1952	American Airlines Flight 6780 (January 1952) National Airlines Flight 101 (February 1952) Pan Am Flight 526A (April 1952) American Airlines Flight 910 (June 1952) Mount Gannett C-124 crash (November 22 1952)* Tacoma C-54 crash (November 28 1952) Moses Lake C-124 crash (December 1952)
1953	National Airlines Flight 470 (February 1953) Western Air Lines Flight 636 (April 1953) Delta Air Lines Flight 318 (May 1953) USMC R4Q NROTC crash (July 1953) American Airlines Flight 723 (September 1953) BCPA Flight 304 (October 1953)
1954	Western Air Lines Flight 34 (February 1954}
1955	Cincinnati mid-air collision (January 1955) TWA Flight 260 (February 1955) American Airlines Flight 711 (March 20 1955) Hawaii R6D-1 crash (March 22 1955)* Pan Am Flight 845/26 (March 26 1955) MacArthur Airport United Airlines crash (April 1955) American Airlines Flight 476 (August 1955) United Air Lines Flight 409 (October 1955) United Air Lines Flight 629 (November 1955)
1956	TWA Flight 400 (April 1 1956) Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 2 (April 2 1956) Grand Canyon mid-air collision (June 1956) Trans-Canada Air Lines Flight 304 (July 9 1956) United States Air Force Flight 441/13 (July 13 1956)
1957	American Airlines Flight 327 (January 6 1957) Pacoima mid-air collision (January 31 1957) Northeast Airlines Flight 823 (February 1957) Northeast Airlines Flight 285 (September 1957)
1958	Capital Airlines Flight 67 (April 1958) Capital Airlines Flight 300 (May 1958) Westover Air Force Base KC-135 crash (June 1958) Northeast Airlines Flight 258 (August 1958)
1959	Southeast Airlines Flight 308 (January 1959) The Day the Music Died (February 3 1959) American Airlines Flight 320 (February 3 1959) Capital Airlines Flight 75 (May 1959) American Airlines Flight 514 (August 1959) Braniff International Airways Flight 542 (September 1959) Piedmont Airlines Flight 349 (October 1959) National Airlines Flight 967 (November 1959) Allegheny Airlines Flight 371 (December 1 1959) San Diego F3H crash (December 4 1959)
This list is incomplete. An asterisk (*) denotes an incident that took place in a U.S. territory, including Alaska and Hawaii prior to statehood. 1940–1949 ◄ 1950–1959 ► 1960–1969

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