Mayday (television series)

Mayday (also known as Air Crash Investigation, Air Emergency and Air Disasters) is a Canadian docudrama examining air crashes, near-crashes, terrorism and other disasters.

Premise
The episode usually starts in a medias res before cutting back to the events leading up to the accident. The flashback is generally normal until something suddenly goes terribly wrong. Aside from a few examples, near the end is when the investigators find a cause before publishing their report and recommendations.

The series also features interviews with survivors, colleagues and families of victims. The most notable example is "Blow Out" which features interviews will all of the flight crew except Captain Lanchester who declined the offer.

Development
The series started production on August 13, 2002 and was given a budget of 2.5 million CDN for a season of six one-hour episodes. The series debuted on September 3, 2003 with the episode "Racing the Storm", which covers American Airlines Flight 1420.

The 90-minute special Crash of the Century was a co-production between Cineflix, Adélaïde Productions and Galaxie Production. An alternate version for NOVΛ was aired under the name The Deadliest Plane Crash during its thirty-fourth season. It is not branded as Mayday by Cineflix.