On Saturday June 30th, a United Airlines Flight 718, a Douglass DC-7, awaited its final clearance to depart Los Angeles International Airport to …show more content…
to avoid the storm. The request was denied due to air traffic. Flight 2 then requested a clearance of 1,000 ft. “on top”, meaning that it would allow a clearance of 1,000 ft. above said air traffic, and was granted permission to ascend. At 9:59 a.m. Flight 2 sent out a call stating it had passed Lake Mohave and would pass the Painted Desert at 10:31. This would be the last radio communication between Flight 2 and ground control.
United Flight 718 took of from the same runway in Los Angeles at 9:04 a.m., only three minutes behind TWA Flight 2. 718 was to flight a VOR path from Los Angeles to Palm Springs, Needles to Durango, Pueblo to St. Joseph, and finally Joliet to Chicago Midway. The flight plan called for a true airspeed of 288 knots at an altitude of 21,000 ft. This was also a routine flight with 3,850 gallons of fuel and a takeoff weight of 105,835 pounds, well below that of the maximum allowable of 122,200