The Emmerdale Plane Crash: The Disaster That Saved a Soap 

The plane crash wouldn't be topped until Seth used the CD tray on his PC as cup holder in the late 90s.

what a legend! just appears out of nowhere and drops the best soap analyses on the platform every time 🤯

Ain’t even press play yet just celebrating we got a new video 😤

I was 16 years old when these episodes aired, still evokes a strong memory for me, used to watch this show with my gran in the years leading up to this,, had a massive crush on Craig McKay who played Mark Hughes but was something I couldn’t share with anyone nor how upset I was to see him leave,, probably my first teenage celebrity love,, his funeral episode had me in floods of tears.

Absolutely fantastic video as ever I have said for many years that Phil Redmond is one of Britains best writers. He writes with such grit and harsh realism that appeals to a wide audience. Once again you have knocked it out of the park with your research and time taken bravo!

Excellent piece of work. My parents, who are in their 70’s are very much split down this timeline. Mum is BCP (even having some Emmerdale Farm paperbacks in the 70’s!), Dad is ACP and a huge fan now 😂 How about a study on Prisoner Cell Block H and its enduring cult like legacy?

Dont forget how popular Neighbours and Home and Away were in the late 80s to early 90s too.. Really enjoyed this :) very informative.

Great video. I'm unfamiliar with Emmerdale but this was an exceptionally well put together piece about its history. Thanks!

I was 12 when this aired so wasn’t a soap viewer but remember this happening. Also, being Scottish, I remember Lockerbie happening too. Our house is also on the flight paths for Glasgow and Edinburgh airports so both were pretty scary. As for the episodes, they seem to have a horrifyingly gritty realism similar to the scariest film ever made: Threads. I might need to see if I can find the episode online. Great video BTW, very informative.

I had a shop in Harrogate aat this time, “Jackie” came into m shop in following week, I told him that he looked well after being blown up in a plane crash. Loved the series.

Wow! What a high quality video which I didn't expect from such a topic. Look forward to your next one!

I have absolutely zero interest in soaps but I've binged all of your videos in 24 hours and I am obsessed please do more x

Great watch, your description of the crash itself is (to borrow a word you use) harrowing. Talking of Phil Redmond's works, I think you have mentioned the Nat and Georgia Simpson storyline in Brookside as a potential future video. I actually watched the storyline elsewhere on RU-vid quite recently and it seems like a storyline that is tailor-made for a channel such as this.

Yay I been waiting for another soap video from you. Desperately need these high quality videos on soaps there’s definitely a gap in the market

Great analysis; would love to see more deep dives on brookside, as you said it really stands out in soap as something very unique and (imo) ahead of it's time.

I'm not a big soap fan, but love your videos. Keep it up!

This is an incredible video, made me go watch the lead up to, the main story and then the aftermath just before this video got to speaking about the actual plane crash. It was an amazing storyline.

Another very interesting and well researched video.

Love seeing a new video pop up! Another really interesting look into a topic I had no idea about!

Yet again m8 it was a fantastic video extremely enjoyable, well researched and narrated and I can't wait to see your next one! I think the corrie tram crash would be a brilliant video too.

Absolutely brilliant, thoughtful, revealing and interesting study. I've never watched Emmerdale but was mesmerized by this insightful journey. Primo 👌

Great video. I always look forward to these.

I was 1 when this came out but growing up, the plane crash in Emmerdale was always recalled and remembered as a big TV moment. The shots of the flames and sheer destruction became iconic but I never realised how *big* it was until I read about it reviving the soap. This is a great summary of the plot and its context. I don't think the soap was ever going to escape the Lockerbie comparisons and when was there ever going to be a good time to do a soap plot where a plane crashes in the village?

Great video ! Can you do one about the demise of brookside ? I think it’s fascinating how a groundbreaking soap like it in the 1980s ended up the way it did.

I watched the storyline through for the first time when it was repeated on ITV3 a few years ago. It's a remarkable feat and even now still hugely impressive.

Fantastic video I really remember the plane crash well at the time I thought wow that's different thanks again for showing this video great stuff 👍

Another great video, love these.

this was really interesting! enjoyed it a lot, nice to see something like this analysed with so much depth.

Another interesting video documenting the dramatic aircrash that marked the transformation of Emmerdale into a more far fetched sensationalistic show featuring lurid storylines and plots far removed from the shows traditional slower paced depiction of rural life. ITV 3 show old episodes and I remember watching episodes from the very early 90s that featured actual farming scenes with the format and feel of the show so laid back and slow pre the aircrash spectacle.

This was so interesting and I'm glad I stumbled across it, I've now subscribed to your channel. However, there is one major error you made made throughout. You reference the village as was as "Beckinsdale", however, it was Beckindale. There was no S in it.

At the end of the day Phil Redmond being brought in saved the show ....even if some of the cast were NOT happy about the story line it (apart from the ones who got canned but they were leaving anyhow as was mentioned in the vid) saved the show and kept thier jobs ......ontherwise they would have all been jobless if itv cancled it as was apparently on the cards! ...I remember watching the orginal Emerdale farm as a kid in the 70s in the afternoons as i hadnt quite started school so my gran looked after me when mum and dad were at work and she tuned in EVERY afternoon! also remember general hospital, crown court, paint along with nancy and the galloping gourmet from those times too in the afternoons!

The 5 unnamed villagers killed were the entire Hutchinson family. I think the partially demolished house Frank Tate passes at the beginning of the second crash episode is supposed to be theirs.

Very interesting doc on this I still watch the Emmerdale Plane Crash from time to time it was very unique and a devastation now stunts are ten a penny in soaps.

I was 9 then, I’m 40 now, I clearly remember watching the plane crash episode on a family holiday in London!

Whilst Lockerbie probably had some bearing on this story line, the one you overlooked happened only 2 months before and was disturbing for different reasons, in fact, I would argue reflects "a plane dropping on a town" was EL-AL Flight 1862 which happened in October 1992. Granted, ITV has filmed all this before the EL-AL disaster, hearing the ITV exec being overjoyed that their new year had been saved, I wonder how the tabloid press or press in general had of felt about this considering the horrific injuries, death and the mourning that would've still been going on, would've looked at ITV very differently. For those that do not remember this flight or old enough to know, I recommend going to look at how a "Jumbo Jet" can literally fall from the sky when 2 of its engines had fallen off. The more and more I think about that flight, it's eerry just how life like Redmond got.

I really enjoy your videos. I hope you don't mind people making suggestions for future videos as i was thinking it would be interesting to see you look at Brookside's demise and the different elements that led to its decline and axing. I think that would be a good one to do.

"This isn't evidence... It's a baby. It's a _baby._ " That really hit me. 😢

Great video once again. Fantastic stuff looking forward to what you've got next! - Ash from Watching Walford

What I like about Emmerdale is how it uses its child characters. They have lines, storylines, they're *actors* and characters in the show. Very good.

Honestly as someone with a passing interest in aviation disasters, I have no idea how this storyline went under my radar until now. Then again I was never raised on soaps 😅 .... Will also say I immediately said "wait they Lockerbied Emmerdale?" when I saw the title

found my new fave youtube channel 🎉

So glad this popped up in my recommended!

I started watching Emmerdale last year and I started with the new episodes and then I saw they are not good, and then I went to old episodes and when I came across the plane crash storyline, it’s when I realised Emmerdale plane crash changed the soap then

31:50 Tbf there were interviews at the time of Lockerbie and they said similar things thinking it might be a nuke. Also from personal experience of having doors and windows nearly blown out by fighter jets being scrambled and breaking the sound barrier, we thought that was a plane crash. It’s funny how the upscaling of what something could be works. So I am not surprised people would say is it a nuke when a plane crashes. So Emmerdale got that right.

This is a great documentary. I was born in 1976, and I vividly remember the hazy "sunset at dawn" titles and original theme tune and that was enough to make my heart sink at another boring episode of Emmerdale Farm! My younger self preferred Crossroads!! 😂 "Oh my God. The MOTEL! It's on FIRE. MUM!!" - terrifying to this then 5 year old lad !! My first memory of a disaster on this show was one that isn't mentioned in this video - Pat Sugden's nippy beige Ford Fiesta carreering down a hillside, killing her off - it was 1986 and I remember being actually quite shocked. I was still quite young though, and that was quite a big stunt for this show, at that time. By the time we get to the plane crash episodes, I never watched the series regularly, by now, a big - no, HUGE - Brookside fan, and because of this, I followed Uncle Phil Redmond to see what he was going to do to Emmerdale, and I wasn't disappointed! These episodes are a masterclass in writing, directing, with real special effects as well - no CGI here!! You can see that they threw everything at these very expensive episodes, and they work beautifully. What I also admired was that it _wasn't_ a gratuitous bloodbath, it was very restrained with regards to what was shown, and the relatively low number of characters that were killed off. Fun fact; Malandra Burrows revealed in an interview that her character (no idea what her name was!) was earmarked to be killed-off in these episodes, but Phil Redmond vetoed the plans as he liked the character and she got a last minute reprieve. This was undoubtedly a landmark in British soap! Having said all of that, I never did become a regular Emmerdale viewer !! 😂

Bit of a slight nit pick here, but you've used a picture of Steve Howe (guitarist for YES) for Ken Horn at 30:12

A shame the show today tends to kill off its most interesting characters and leaves all the boring ones alive.

Can you look into New Zealand's 🇳🇿 longest running soap "Shrotland Street" please

Interesting documentary and thankyou for putting it together. Just wanted to point out a minor error, at 30:12, the photo in the middle isn't a writer - that's guitarist Steve Howe from the band Yes.

Great video! Thank you!! Just out of interest, who were the three out of the four who died, that wanted to leave?

You put some effort into that, well done👍

Emmerdale became the one soap i like to follow as Eastenders got way too depressing for me and Coronation Street became absolute garbage. It was always the one that appealed since i was a kid

The disaster that killed Emmerdale as a soap. Went down hill after this with the introduction of the Dingles. RIP Emmerdale Farm

Interesting video, the Emmerdale Plane Crash was a defining. Moment not just for Emmerdale but for the genre in the U.K. as a whole, it raised the stakes, whatever standard EastEnders and Brookside set in the 80s, Emmerdale raised by 100, ironically Emmerdale would outlast Brookside as that was cancelled in 2003, at the same point Emmerdale had its second biggest disaster in ten years with the hurricane storyline which was just as destructive as the plane crash of 1993, If I recall, the actor who played Mark Hughes didn’t want to leave, in hindsight I feel his death was a mistake, especially with how the shows trajectory went from the mid 90s onwards, I’d have killed off Nick Bates instead who was deadweight by 1993, Mark was coming into his own, however I can also see that his death affected the Sugden’s and Rachel, great video, you should do a video on the Hurricane storyline of 2003

When they brought the Dingle family into Emmerdale it killed it As a realistic rural soap

I was nine when I watched the episodes. I was very scared after that I had nightmares about it and didn't like anything involving fire

First time to this channel and this looks quite interesting so I would love to watch it but the volume is too quiet. Please can you turn it up? I'm going to see if I can watch it and hear it too if I strain my ears! ✌

Isnt this in the same universe as brookside and this was on the newspaper in brookside

Fantastic! Of the 3 soaps Emmerdale would be the one I was never invested in. However my mam loves it. I found this video fascinating

Oh your back thought you were gone forever I hate emmerdale but your analysis is always great

For once and for all, it was a plane explosion, not a plane crash. The passenger jet exploded over the village, it didn’t crash into it. Sorry if I seem a tad pedantic but I’m just describing it correctly and nobody else ever seems to.

Hi mate great video and I was wondering how about if you upload and talk the best personality transplant changes in soap history including characters who are hardmen, loveable buffoon, villains and LGBTQ characters like in EastEnders, Emmerdale, Coronation Street and Hollyoaks please.

Wait! They never found the body of Archie Brookes? Does this mean he could be …. he could be alive?

Have you ever considered making a video about the BBC’s failed attempt at a second soap. Eldorado?

Mad that Emmerdale nearly predicted COVID 😂

I thought the Nuclear Dump storyline of 1987 was outstanding. Didn't like the plane crash or what the show was becoming. But then I switched off. My choice. Do you have copies of the BARB ratings for the show for the months immediately preceding and following the plane crash episodes?

There's an error in your assertion Corrie had a week point in the early 90s. That's absolutely not the case. Corrie was still very much in a golden age and Eastenders was still in a bit of a slump at that point. Eastenders' rejuvenation and Corrie's slump actually began in 1995.

Tbh Emmerdale dd have goo story lines and best looking women from the Tate women to the other blondes etc, etc. it went a bit farcical with the introduction of the Dingles but they brought the humour into it if not the nice looking women!

Your volume was too low which is a shame as I enjoyed this study. Would have been a lot better if I didn't have to strain to hear every word. Please could you fix it? 📢 😊 ✌

Eek what folks from Lockerbie think about that 😳

Interesting...but it's BECKINDALE not BECKINSDALE.

WHAT DO YOU MEAN THE VILLAGE IN EMMERDALE IS CALLED BECKINDALE

Beckindale

Love Coronation Street, Eastenders comes and goes with the good but Emmerdale I can’t bloody stand lmao! Ooh err

I remember the plane crash I was only 3 years ago in 1993 what a breathing talking best bit ever wow Emmerdale was first episode was outstanding kind I wish soaps like today too much Corrie since 2003 was badly kick off in October but for the best gang cast duckworth platts Websters the Watts ivy and don ect ect so you cast wad perfect but the whole contrast Emmerdale and Corrie in the past was innocent 1980s and 1990s 00s 2003 blimey SU garden

Beckensdale? It's Beckindale.

THE PLANE CRASH OR RATHER THE LACK THEREOF DIDN'T LOOK REALISTIC ! ! !

BECKINSDALE. Sorry had to stop watching. You claim to have seen this show yet get the town name wrong !!

Yeah the only problem I have with the 1993 Christmas special of the plane crash is? That it came only 5 years after the Lockerbie terrorist bomb explosion of flight 103 ……so in a way it was a bit insensitive on the town of Lockerbie …….this is nuts I put this comment way before you mentioned Lockerbie? But here you are mentioning Lockerbie how nuts is that?!! But my view still stands because funny how everyone else thought the same

Beckindale