A reconstructed 28m-long piece of flight TWA 800's double-decker fuselage at the National Transportation Safety Board Training Centre in Ashburn, Virginia. Photo / Getty Images
A reconstructed 28m-long piece of flight TWA 800's double-decker fuselage at the National Transportation Safety Board Training Centre in Ashburn, Virginia. Photo / Getty Images
For 25 years a mangled plane fuselage has sat in a warehouse, a harrowing reminder of one of America's worst aviation disasters.
It was shortly after taking off from New York's JFK airport, bound for Paris, on July 17, 1996 that TWA flight 800 suddenly exploded into a fireball and crashed into the Atlantic Ocean, killing all 230 people on board.
The cause of the Boeing 747's explosion — the third deadliest aviation incident in United States history — was determined to be an accident, most likely caused by sparks from a short circuit igniting the central fuel tank.
Despite this, the disaster kicked off years of conspiracy theories about the cause, from a terrorist attack to a wayward military missile.
Since the incident, a reconstructed 28 metre-long piece of the jet's double-decker fuselage that was pulled from the ocean has sat in storage in a university warehouse in Virginia, used by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) as a learning tool for aviation crash investigators.
But now, with modern technology surpassing the need for actual plane wrecks for crash research, the NTSB has finally determined TWA 800's fate: "Certified destruction".
In other words, the remains of the plane — including seats, which were painstakingly put back in place by investigators — will be cut down and melted into scrap, USA Today and NorthJersey.com said in a joint report.
A US Coast Guard boat picks up pieces of debris on July 18, 1996 - the morning after TWA Flight 800 crashed in the Atlantic Ocean about 16km off East Moriches, New York. Photo / Getty Images
Before it is finally destroyed, loved ones of those killed on TWA 800 have been invited to see the plane wreck one last time, although most have declined the offer.
"I saw it once. It was more than enough in my lifetime," John Seaman, whose 19-year-old niece Michele was killed in the tragedy, told the outlets.
"If you had someone sitting in these seats, when you see that plane it's a very horrible experience."
The dismantling of the fuselage, which coincides with the 25th anniversary of the crash, has been marred by an extra tragedy — the death this week of the chief FBI investigator into the crash.
Former FBI assistant director James Kallstrom, who died on July 3 aged 78, led a team of about 100 agents who probed the crash and concluded, like the NTSB, that it was not caused by terrorism but a fuel tank explosion.
Once those who wish to see the plane a final time do so, the dismantling of TWA 800 will be a highly secretive process, USA Today reports.
The NTSB workers will need to completely break down the fuselage and all its features, including seats, into unrecognisable pieces so they can't be sold off by people hoping to make a profit off the tragedy.
Loved ones have also been concerned about parts winding up in a museum.
"We don't want any of this turning up on eBay," NTSB spokesman Christopher T. O'Neil said. "When all is said and done, there will be nothing that can be used as an artefact of TWA 800."
