It was a bomb explosion at the nearby Gran Canaria Airport that forced KLM Flight 4805 and Pan Am Flight 1736 to divert to Los Rodeos Airport (now Tenerife North Airport) on March 27, 1977, for what would turn out to be a fateful day. A dense fog, lack of ground radar at the small airport and several miscommunications resulted in the two Boeing 747 passenger aircraft colliding on the runway in what remains to this day the deadliest accident in commercial aviation history. All 248 passengers and crew aboard the KLM flight perished, along with 335 of the 396 people aboard the Pan Am flight, resulting in a staggering death toll of 583.
Lasting Impact: Air traffic control phraseology was standardized to reduce the chance of misunderstandings, which were believed to have played a crucial role in the events leading up to the accident. The disaster also led to the concept of Crew Resource Management, and gave less experienced flight crew more leeway to challenge their captains if they believed something was not correct.
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