The wings had been cleaned. - subversion: if wings were clean, why 28 dead?

Aviation Survival Stories · Oct 21, 2026 · 14m

The wings had been cleaned. - subversion: if wings were clean, why 28 dead?

Cold, routine choices can hide lethal consequences: deicing fluid ran off in sheets, the plane waited in snow for 27 minutes, and 28 people died. How did a cleaned wing and a series of small procedural gaps combine into disaster?

In this episode, we walk through the sequence of events on Continental Airlines Flight 1713 and the operational context at Denver Stapleton on November 15, 1987, detailing crew experience, air traffic communications, and the timing that led to the unanswered question: why was no decision made…