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Flight TWA 800 had departed JFK airport at 8:19 p.m. on July 17th, 1996, after a long, hot delay on the tarmac. At thirteen thousand seven hundred feet above the Atlantic Ocean, a stray spark in a mostly empty fuel tank had created a massive explosion in the sky that sliced the 747 in two.
In the largest and longest NTSB investigation in history, ninety-five percent of the debris was recovered from the depths of the continental shelf. The main fuselage was entirely reconstructed, one tiny piece at a time, until the investigators were able to trace the exact cause, and make numerous safety recommendations. Some of those safety measures would be implemented on every commercial airliner and military plane throughout the world. The death of her parents and the other two hundred and twenty
