await further instructions, but there are problems. the plane has two navigational instruments used at the time to determine position. one of them isn t working. and the plane is also traveling more than 500 miles per hour, a speed later determined to be excessive, and the dc-8 flies past its clearance. the united crew lost its bearings. i would equate it to driving down a street. if you know where you are and you know the second left turn is the turn you need to make, that s great. but if you didn t see the first road to the left, you would drive beyond it because you didn t recognize the first cue. at 10:33 a.m., laguardia tower advises twa of traffic off to its right. no one realizes it, but the united dc-8 is heading straight for them. then, seven seconds later, as both planes approach 5,000, there s a brutal collision.
several hours with little oxygen. this boy is thought to have breached perimeter security in charlotte, north carolina and hidden in the wheel well of a flight to boston. as the plane landed the teenager fell to his death as the landing gear deployed. this is a tragedy, first and foremost for the family. secondly, it s something once this occurs we want to make sure it never happens again. reporter: for decades now, stowaways have been a rare but real problem. look at this life magazine photo from 1970. 14-year-old keith drops out of the gear bay of a japan airlines dc-8 and falls to his death shortly after takeoff in sydney australia. a gruesome sdet a risk during take off and landing. body parts from a stowaway fell from a well wheel of a jet in 2005 before it landed in new york. a woman on the flight path
hidden in the wheel well of a flight to boston. as the plane landed the teenager fell to his death as the landing gear deployed. this is a tragedy, first and foremost for the family. secondly, it s something once this occurs we want to make sure it never happens again. reporter: for decades now, stowaways have been a rare but real problem. look at this life magazine photo from 1970. 14-year-old keith drops out of the gear bay of a japan airlines dc-8 and falls to his death shortly after takeoff in sydney australia. a gruesome death a risk during take off and landing. body parts from a stowaway fell from a well wheel of a jet in 2005 before it landed in new york. a woman on the flight path describes how some of his remains landed on her home. i noticed something that looked like a human or animal part.
goodness, jeffrey thomas, most of the time people have attempted this, they don t live through it. how common is it for people to stowaway using this message, jeffrey thomas? well, according to the statistics, about 80%, unfortunately, die, either by the cold or when the doors open they do fall out. there was a famous case in sydney that was actually photographed of a japan airlines dc-8 taking off and the boy had stowed away and when the doors opened to attract the gear, he fell out and was photographed falling from the cases. but one of the most famous cases was in 1969, again, a dc-8. the boy actually ran through long grass when the airplane turned to take off, leapt up on to the wheel, jumped in, and he survived an eight and a half hour flight to madrid.
see this massive door here? after takeoff it swings open to make room for the huge tires. inside of that compartment, there s really no room for anything else but those awfully big tires. still stowaways have managed to survive, though some endured severe frostbite like this man who flew from havana to madrid in a dc-8, more than 4500 miles. this man who flew from vienna to london, perhaps we can add another name to the list of unlikely survivors. ryan owens, abc news, mojave, california. a lot of people cannot believe this happened. it has happened in the past. ryan showed you a couple of examples. check this out. from 1947 to january 2004 there were reported 103 stowaway attempts involving 92 flights. of them, 76% of them die which is 79 people. so there s a very small survival rate. absolutely. positively. lucky kid. very lucky kid. i hope he doesn t have any damage from this.