35 Miles From Shore
The Ditching and Rescue of ALM Flight 980 (With a New Afterword)

A Riveting Account of an Airline Disaster! Wow! The drama—the intrigue—is immersive in this historic ditching of an airliner, which was actually the only open-water ditching of a commercial jet ever. Hearing the radio transcripts of the pilot and the control towers drew me right into the moment. And,......more

If you ever wanted a textbook example of Murphy’s Law in full effect this book is it! The sheer magnitude of combined miscalculations, misfortune and errors are astonishing. It led to the ditching of ALM Flight 980 into the Caribbean sea, just 35 miles short of its diverted destination. The only com......more

Great account of the events. I like thoroughness, especially all the footnotes. Books like this make me appreciate technology and people I sometime take for granted in aviation industry.......more

I probably won't remember reading this when I go back to the list of books I've read this year. Slow start, good plot building, but a bit short for me. And a pet peeve - I HATE when photos are put in the middle of a book. The plane hadn't ditched into the ocean yet, but there were tons of photos of......more

Real life drama with the feel of fiction. Well researched and well written. I got lost a couple times with the terminology because the author has a background in aviation but the glossary at the front of the book got me though most of my hazy moments. I felt as though I was on the plane that ditched......more