NATIONWIDE -- Now that April is here, spring showers are more prevalent. And as we all know, some of those showers sometimes can quickly develop into more intense thunderstorms.

• During the flight from Huntsville to Atlanta, Flight 242 ended up crashing into several buildings, killing 63 people
• The flight crew thought they were flying into a weaker part of the storm when it actually was the worst part of the storm
• Many lessons were learned due to the crash of Flight 242, mainly with improvements made to radar technology and pilots now receiving critical weather reports

One airline catastrophe from 42 years ago took place during a spring thunderstorm, and it has since led to several improvements in the aviation industry.

Southern Airways Flight 242 was a routine flight from Muscle Shoals, Alabama to Huntsville, Alabama to Atlanta on April 4, 1977. The plane was a DC-9, a reliable, short-haul jet with two experienced pilots on the flight-deck.

On the afternoon of April 4, the weather was unsettled across southeastern United States. Thunderstorms were in the forecast with the chance of strong to severe storms and even isolated tornadoes.  

During the flight from Huntsville to Atlanta, Flight 242 encountered a line of thunderstorms. Using the aircraft's radar, the pilots spotted an area of lesser precipitation and altered their course to fly though it.  Not known to them, they were flying into the worst part of the storm.

Aircraft radars in the 70s were not as accurate as they are today. The DC-9's radar only had so many color levels to indicate precipitation. Once you went past the last color level, the next color displayed would be the first color on the scale, a "weaker" color.  This is called the radar's attenuation effect. Hence the reason the flight crew thought they were flying into a weaker part of the storm.

Large hail battered the airliner. The windshield was smashed. Surviving passengers described the sound in the plane "like someone beating on the fuselage with a hammer." The combination of hail and heavy rain stalled the engines with the hail damaging them to the point they would not restart.

With no airport close enough for an emergency landing, the pilots tried to set the crippled jet down on a highway in New Hope, Georgia. As the plane rolled down the road after touch-down, it clipped several buildings and burst into flames.

Sixty-three people on the plane died including nine fatalities on the ground.

The accident led to several improvements in the aviation industry. One change led to better and more timely weather reports for flight crews, along with air traffic controllers being able to update planes in flight as to weather hazards in their area and along their route of flight.

Many lessons were learned due to the crash of Flight 242, mainly with radar technology and sending out critical weather reports to pilots, and the aviation industry is safer today because of changes put into place following the accident.