Sergeant Bluff, Iowa

There is no bluff at Sergeant Bluff. The town lies on Missouri River bottomland.
Not surprisingly perhaps, this town owes its misleading name to a bureaucratic
snafu. In 1853, the Iowa Legislature ordered three men to select the location of
the Woodbury County seat and name the town Sergeant's Bluff. They could have
chosen the area around Sergeant Charles Floyd's burial site, but they didn't.
Despite local objections, the name of the town stuck, even after the county seat
moved to Sioux City in 1856.

The town prospered nonetheless, and today has 3,321 inhabitants. There are
more than 100 businesses in the community.

Interstate 29 runs along Sergeant Bluff and on the west side of the highway is
the Sioux City airport, site of the crash of United Airlines Flight 232 in 1989. The
crash killed 112 passengers, but could have been far worse. The efficient and
rapid response of local emergency management personnel is widely credited
with helping to save the lives of 184 people on board the stricken aircraft.

The crash was caused by a fan disk in the DC-10's tail engine, which flew apart
and severed all of the aircraft's hydraulic lines, making it virtually impossible for
the crew to control the airliner. Improvising by manually adjusting the throttles on
the two remaining engines, the crew, led by Captain Al Haynes, made a heroic
effort to get the jet to the Sioux Gateway Airport. They succeeded and managed
to touch down near the centerline of a runway, but the jet's unusually rapid
descent caused the tip of the right wing to touch down first. The tail section also
broke off on impact and the jet quickly became a careening ball of fire,
appearing to cartwheel down the runway. Sections of the aircraft came to rest on
the runway and in a neighboring field. Some passengers were able to escape
the fire by exiting through areas where the jet broke apart. Others were rescued
by local emergency responders and 285 members of the Iowa Air National
Guard, which happened to be on duty at the airport. It was the only day of the
month that the Air National Guard was scheduled at the airport.