Rebuilt TWA Flight 800 wreckage to be used for training
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A section of the TWA jumbo jet was reconstructed by the NTSB during its investigation.
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GARDEN CITY, New York (AP) -- More than seven years after TWA Flight 800 exploded over the Atlantic Ocean off Long Island, the reconstructed jumbo jet has been packed up and is being sent to a college in Virginia, where it will be used to train air safety investigators.
All 230 people aboard the plane died minutes after takeoff from Kennedy Airport on a flight to Paris on July 17, 1996.
The National Transportation Safety Board found that Flight 800 was destroyed by a center fuel tank explosion, probably caused by a spark from a short-circuit in the wiring that ignited vapors in the tank.
As part of its investigation, the NTSB rebuilt a 96-foot section of the Boeing 747 in a hangar at the site of a former defense contractor in Calverton, on eastern Long Island.
The jetliner has since been taken apart and packed into shipping containers and will now be sent to the NTSB's new training academy on the campus of George Washington University in Ashburn, Va., said NTSB spokesman Paul Schlamm.
He said it is expected to take about six weeks to move the airplane pieces on flatbed trucks to their new location. The reassembly of the plane is expected to take another eight to 10 weeks, Schlamm said.
"We get air safety investigators from all over the country, all over the world, in fact, who come to us for training," Schlamm said. "This will be used as a teaching tool, both in learning about the breakup of the plane as well as the techniques that were involved in doing the reconstruction."
Copyright 2003 The
Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
