The Nation - News from Sept. 14, 1988

The pilot of a Delta jet that crashed on takeoff, killing 14 people, said everything went normally on the flight until he heard two loud bangs but that he does not know what caused the accident, federal investigators said. Capt. Larry Lon Davis, 48, of Greenville, Tex., was discharged from Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas, after speaking with National Transportation Safety Board investigators for the first time since the Aug. 31 crash, a hospital spokeswoman said. Davis was at the controls of the Boeing 727-200 as it lifted off from Dallas-Ft. Worth International Airport en route to Salt Lake City. The plane failed to gain altitude, crashed and burned. Davis told investigators that to his knowledge, the flaps were in the correct position for takeoff, investigators said.