Olympic Airways Flight 411
On the 9th of August 1978, Olympic Airways Flight 411, operated using a Boeing 747-200 with over 400 passengers and crew on board, experienced an engine explosion while taking off from Ellinikon International Airport bound for John F. Kennedy International Airport. The plane's water injection system had been left on prior to take-off, and the flight engineer failed to notice this during pre-flight checks, flipping the switch to the 'off' position. Without water injection to cool off the engines, engine number three exploded. The aircraft landed safely.
The plane flew at very low altitudes, scraping rooftops of houses. The flight recorder showed that it flew as low as 50 metres from the ground. The reason the captain did not try to pull up is because any slight bank would cause the plane to lose even more speed. The plane was flying at a speed slightly higher than that of the limit for a stall. At 2:05 p.m, a light breeze gave the plane some height, which made it possible for the captain to make a small tilt to avoid crashing into the slopes of Mount Aegaleo.
