Portland Air Disaster, December, 1978

16It so happens that, on 23 December 1978, United Air Lines Flight 173 was on approach into PDX from JFK and they had a problem with the landing gear.

It took them over an hour to address the problem, during which time they ran out of fuel (there are a bunch of reasons why that happened, and I'm not going to relitigate them in a little-read blog post. Wikipedia discusses it nicely for the laity)

It crashed to earth at about 157th and E. Burnside, in an area that was, at the time, in unincorporated Multnomah County. 

What you may not know, dear Reader, is that there is a little memorial to it. Go to 164th and E. Burn, get in the westbound lane, and about 500 feet west of 164th, in front of a rather ordinary-looking deep-eastside apt complex, you'll see a crescent-shaped bit of landscaping centering a rather understated plaque:

Eight passengers and two crew died that day. And cockpit-culture reform happened; when they tell you that safety regulations are written in blood, this is what they kinda mean.