December 28,1978

The Douglas DC-8

United Airlines Flight 173 from Denver, a DC-8 approaching Portland, Ore., with 181 passengers, circled near the airport for an hour as the crew desperately tried to sort  
out a landing gear problem. Although warned of the rapidly diminishing fuel supply
by the planes flight engineer, the captain, according to investigative findings, waited
too long to begin his final approach. The DC-8 never made it to runway 28Left. it ran
out of fuel and crashed at 6:15 pm on a cold, clear Thursday evening in 1978. 

In response, United revamped its cockpit training procedures around a new concept
of Cockpit Resource Management (CRM). It emphases teamwork and communication among the crew. It proved to be so successful that it is now used throughout the
world.

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Cockpit reenactment

Denzel Hayes Washington, Jr. is 58 today

                    Fontella Bass (July 3, 1940 – December 26, 2012)

Fontella Bass, the singer whose 1965 hit “Rescue Me” was an indelible example of
the decade’s finest pop-soul, died on Wednesday in St. Louis. According to her
daughter Neuka Mitchell, the cause was complications of a recent heart attack.

James Arness as The Thing

The Thing from Another World is a 1951 sci-fi classic based on the 1938
novella "Who Goes There?" by John W. Campbell.

No actors are named during the film’s dramatic opening credits; the cast
credits appear at the end of the film. The movie was partly filmed in Glacier
National Park and interior sets built at a Los Angeles ice storage plant.

In 2001, the movie was deemed to be a "culturally, historically or aesthetically"
significant motion picture by the United States Library of Congress and was
selected for preservation in the National Film Registry.

James Arness In his first movie role, played The Thing, but he is hard to
recognize in costume and makeup, because of both the lighting and the
other effects used to obscure his features.

 
  
       Marlene Dietrich ( 27 December 1901 – 6 May 1992)

In 1999, the American Film Institute named Dietrich the ninth-
greatest female star of all time. Before fame, she dreamed of
becoming a concert violinist. 

Famous scene from “Shanghai Express”, 1932