Sensing that the Boeing 777-200ER was about to impact the bay on its final approach to San Francisco International Airport, one of the flight attendants watched the water surface move closer through the window in door L2 (left side, second door from the nose) adjacent to his “A position†jump seat. Suddenly, he yelled for the flight attendant facing him — his “B position†colleague at the same door — to brace for impact. No warning had come from the flight deck.
Several other flight attendants realized, too, that the airplane was traveling or descending too quickly relative to the water surface. Then the airplane pitched up in an odd way, and they felt the first impact, similar to a hard landing, which one of them perceived as being quickly followed by a “crushing sensation.†A seawall in front of the Runway 28L threshold had just sheared away the landing gear, part of the lower fuselage and the tail.
Among these details, the U.S. National Transportation Safety Boardâ…
