Pacific Southwest Airlines Flight 1771

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2024-10-08 23:00:06

Pacific Southwest Airlines Flight 1771 was a scheduled flight along the West Coast of the United States, from Los Angeles, California, to San Francisco. On December 7, 1987, the British Aerospace 146-200A, registration N350PS, crashed in San Luis Obispo County near Cayucos,[ 3] [ 4] after being hijacked by a passenger.

All 43 passengers and crew aboard the plane died, five of whom, including the two pilots, were presumably shot dead before the plane crashed. The perpetrator, David Burke, was a disgruntled former employee of USAir, the parent company of Pacific Southwest Airlines.[ 5] The crash was the second-worst mass murder in Californian history, after the similar crash of Pacific Air Lines Flight 773 in 1964. It was the second fatal crash of PSA after Pacific Southwest Airlines Flight 182.

The aircraft involved was a British Aerospace 146-200A, that had first flown on November 24, 1984, and was delivered to Pacific Southwest Airlines on December 7, exactly three years before the hijacking. The aircraft was named The Smile of Stockton and was powered by four Lycoming ALF502R-3 turbofan engines.[ 6] [ 7] [ 2]