United Airlines Flight 227 Crash: The Disaster at SLC

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One evening I was sifting through Utah death records when I found a startling entry on November 11, 1965. Instead of the usual 15-20 names on a specific date, there were 52, all tied to a single catastrophic event: the United Airlines Flight 227 crash at Salt Lake City International Airport.

Flight 227: A Routine Trip Turns to Disaster

United Airlines Flight 227, a Boeing 727, left New York’s LaGuardia Airport that morning, making stops along the way to its final destination in San Francisco. By the time it reached Denver, nothing was out of the ordinary. The flight crew changed, the passengers stretched their legs, and the plane continued west.

At 5:47 p.m., Salt Lake City air traffic control cleared the plane for landing.

At 5:52 p.m., Flight 227 slammed into the ground 335 feet short of the runway, broke apart, and erupted into a fireball.

The initial impact was survivable. The fire wasn’t.

The Crash: A Chain of Bad Decisions

As Flight 227 approached Salt Lake City International Airport, air traffic control asked the crew to confirm their speed and altitude. The reply?

“250 knots at 10,000 feet.”

The plane was descending at over 2,300 feet per minute, three times the recommended descent rate. The captain didn’t correct it. The First Officer, Philip Spicer, tried to apply power to slow the descent. Captain Kehmeier stopped him and told him to wait. Thirty seconds later, the captain finally tried to add power. It was too late.

At 5:52 p.m., Flight 227 hit the ground full speed, bounced once, and skidded for nearly 3,000 feet before coming to a violent stop. The landing gear and an engine ripped free, severing a fuel line inside the fuselage. Sparks from the impact ignited the fuel, and the aircraft erupted into an inferno.

The cabin filled with thick smoke. Passengers scrambled for the exits.

Survival and Tragedy: The Human Cost

Out of 91 people onboard, 43 died. Not because of the crash itself.

The Civil Aeronautics Board’s official report found:

“There were no traumatic injuries that would have precluded escape.”

Most of the victims would have survived. The fire and smoke killed them. When emergency responders arrived, they found bodies piled in the aisles, overtaken by flames before they could reach an exit. Among the victims was Bill Linderman, a champion rodeo cowboy, who had left behind a final message hours before the crash. He cashed a check at Denver’s Pig ‘n Whistle restaurant and, in the space for his address, wrote one word: “Heaven.” The remains were removed in 40 separate body bags.

Survivor Testimonies:

Marvin Bennett, a missionary returning home from Colombia, tried to unbuckle his 6-year-old daughter, Rosa. Before he could free her, a fireball from a ruptured oxygen line engulfed them. Another passenger, Nad Brown, pulled Bennett out of the flames. Rosa, his wife Janet, and their daughter Maria did not make it out.

Shigelakia Shimura, a Japanese scientist, survived because he was already unbuckled at impact and escaped before the flames consumed the cabin.

A young Air Force member survived. The two friends sitting next to him didn’t. Entire families were wiped out. The Blaisdell family was traveling together that night.

What Went Wrong? The Captain’s Troubling History

The official cause of the crash was pilot error, specifically Captain Kehmeier’s failure to arrest the plane’s descent in time. What investigators found about his past is worse. Captain Kehmeier should never have been flying that night.

His training record was a catalog of failures and second chances that should never have been granted:

1960: He failed his DC-8 transition training due to poor judgment and inability to follow standard procedures.

1961: After being removed from jets, he was reassigned to the DC-6, where he was rated “average to above average.”

1962: He was given another chance in the Boeing 720, but his type rating was delayed because he needed extra training.

1964: He failed an instrument proficiency check and only passed on a second attempt, two days later.

1965: His final Boeing 727 flight check was described as “below average.” The FAA examiner noted he had to be reminded to maintain altitude and airspeed, basic piloting skills.

And yet he was still allowed to command a jetliner. Had anyone in the chain of command acted on these concerns, Flight 227 never would have crashed.

The Aftermath: How Flight 227 Changed Aviation

The crash forced the FAA to overhaul pilot training and safety standards. Procedures for recognizing and correcting dangerous descent rates were made explicit. Pilots were required to demonstrate they could identify and respond to a high-rate descent before certification. What Captain Kehmeier failed to do on November 11, 1965, became required training for every pilot who came after.

The FAA also raised minimum experience requirements for captains. First officers, who had long been expected to defer to the captain even when something was clearly wrong, were explicitly granted authority to challenge command decisions. Flight 227 helped push a shift in cockpit culture that the industry had resisted for years.

Fire suppression systems were overhauled, and fuel lines were redesigned to be less likely to rupture on impact. The post-crash fire that killed 43 people became the direct cause of changes that have since saved lives in accidents across the industry.

The regulations changed. The questions didn’t. How many documented failures does it take to ground someone? How many second chances before accountability costs lives? For 43 people on Flight 227, those questions came five years too late.

Final Thoughts: A Preventable Tragedy

The FAA had the records. United had the records. Five evaluations told them exactly who Captain Kehmeier was. Nobody acted on any of it. Forty-three people survived the crash. The fire took them anyway.

List of Flight 227 Victims:

Sources & References:

1. Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB) Official Report on UAL Flight 227

2. FAA Lessons Learned Database

3. Survivor Testimonies from the Idaho State Journal

4. Aviation Safety Network Database

5. Historical News Clippings (Salt Lake Tribune, Ogden Standard-Examiner)