Duration: 0:59

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By: fuzzymemories

Description: Here's Part 1 of a special expanded edition of Eyewitness News at 10pm with Fahey Flynn and Joel Daly on WLS Channel 7, dealing almost entirely with the crash of American Airlines Flight 191 at O'Hare Field, the worst air disaster in U.S. history. Featuring Jim Gibbons and Hugh Hill. Includes:

WLS Eyewitness News bumper promo - "Chicago's #1 News Team" - different from the one on this clip from earlier in the year (voiceover by Mike Rapchak?)

Newscast opens with voice of Fahey Flynn introducing the newscast without the opening theme, and accompanied by footage of an aerial shot of the wreckage and firemen investigating same. Fahey indicates this is a special expanded edition, with a look into how the disaster happened, and the people involved.

Fahey lists the death toll at 272 - 257 passengers, 10 stewardesses, three crew members, and two crew members. As of this newscast, the complete passenger list was unavailable, but four executives of Playboy magazine were also identified as being among the dead.

Jim Gibbons, live at the crash site, reports on the start of an FAA investigation into the crash. He mentions that the area is secured and has been roped off, and is manned entirely by police, firemen, rescue crews and Red Cross workers. He had been at the site since earlier in the day, when the twisted wreckage of the DC-10 was still burning; there had been difficulty in getting water to the site, but he says water would not likely have helped at that point.

Joel Daly, holding up a model airplane of the type that crashed, is next to a board representing the runway, explaining the timeline and trajectory of the events leading up to the crash, the wind at the time of the flight, and where it was to take off from (32-R, which consisted of 10,000 feet of concrete). He explains that as the plane was taking off, the left engine fell off and landed on the right side of the runway. A video clip of a maintenance engineer on one of the jet engines is shown briefly. Joel continues to hold the model plane until he reaches the point on the board representing where it crashed.

Fahey then introduces a report on an American Airlines hangar at O'Hare International being set up as a temporary morgue, reported by Hugh Hill on the scene outside the hangar. Only the lights shining around the hangar can be seen at this time of night. He reports on how the bodies were put into black bags and carried by firemen and other rescuers to Chicago Police vans which in turn traveled to the morgue a mile and a half away. Footage of such transports are aired throughout Hugh's report. He indicates that Medical Examiner Dr. Robert Stein is on the scene, and that bodies are remaining in the morgue in contrast to other reports that suggested some bodies were being taken out of the morgue.

Joel then announces that they will pause for a break before the tape runs out.

This aired on local Chicago TV on Friday, May 25th 1979 during the 10pm to 10:08pm timeframe.