Florida Commuter Airlines Flight 65

Florida Commuter Airlines Flight 65 was a scheduled passenger flight from Palm Beach International Airport in West Palm Beach, Florida to Grand Bahama International Airport in Freeport, Bahamas. on the airline's much smaller Piper Navajo, paying $400 for the trip. As the Navajo seats a maximum of 7 passengers, the airline decided to use the larger DC-3 aircraft. In order to fill the excess seats, the airline informally sold tickets for as low as $18 to airline business partners. ==Accident==

Flight 65 was originally scheduled to depart at 19:30 Eastern Daylight Time. At 19:40, Flight 65 attempted to depart, but the pilots aborted the takeoff because they had no airspeed indication. Passengers were deplaned. Maintenance determined that mud dauber nests were blocking the pitot tube openings for the plane's pitot-static system (which is used to measure airspeed). Maintenance cleared the nests, and a high speed taxi run verified the fix. Passengers reboarded, and the plane departed West Palm Beach at approximately 20:35. At 22:43 a United States Coast Guard C-131 reached the area and spotted debris and bodies floating in the water. There were heavy thunderstorms in the area. 16 bodies were recovered prior to the termination of the search on September 15, 1980. There were initial reports that some of the bodies were wearing life jackets, but later reports from the US Coast Guard indicated none of the recovered passengers were wearing life jackets. Eyewitness accounts state that the plane was flying low and plunged into the ocean shortly after passing through a cloud. == Investigation ==

The crash was investigated by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB). Wreckage from the aircraft was not recovered, except for seat cushions and plywood bulkheads found floating near the accident site. Regulations at the time did not require flight recorders to be installed on the aircraft, and no cockpit voice recorder or flight data recorder was installed. During the investigation, investigators received "specific allegations" of the possibility of sabotage. However, in its final report, the NTSB noted "Sabotage, or foul play, has been discounted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and has not been considered in this evaluation". == Aftermath ==

A committee called the Raise the Plane Committee made plans to locate the aircraft and recover it from an estimated depth of 1800 feet. The recovery effort was abandoned after the committee was unable to secure enough money to locate the plane. The Airline was insured by Aviation Insurance Co., a representative of Lloyd's of London. Coverage included aircraft liability, property damage, bodily injury to passengers, and damage to passenger's property. Several of the passenger's families sued the airline, but later settled for $35,000 per passenger. The mother of one of those killed later stated that "I feel badly about it, but we couldn't go through any more. Answering all those questions... They (attorneys for the insurance company) made us feel like she was someone who rented a room from us. I cannot tell you what she meant to me. A beautiful young girl walked out the door and was brutally murdered." == Notes ==