This text examines the harsh lessons of air tragedies, detailing some of the operational experiences which, for all their grim consequences, helped to evolve a global mass-transport system to a level of safety and reliability beyond anything the world had ever seen. Beginning with the saga of the ill-fated Comet, the world's first jetliner, specialist air safety officer, Macarthur Job, brings to life the story behind some of the jet-age accidents that followed, each of them adding to the industry's sum total of knowledge and experience to make operations safer in the future. extensive additional research, it opens up the intricacies of high-altitude, high-speed jetliner operations.