He contacted Miami departure air traffic control moments after takeoff at 2:04 p.m. (ValuJet planes are nicknamed "critter" for the airline's cartoon logo.) "Afternoon, departure," Hazen radioed.

Almost two minutes before ValuJet Flight 592 plunged into the Everglades, its passengers and crew knew they were in serious trouble, and one man even used his cell phone to make one last call to ...

MIAMI — Passengers’ terrified shouts of “Fire! Fire! Fire!” echoed from the smoke-filled cabin as flames spread rapidly through a ValuJet airliner over the Florida Everglades in May ...

ValuJet was launched in 1993 by former executives ... a grinning airplane known as Critter. The company was proud of its unorthodox image. Flight attendants told jokes after the safety briefings.

The old ValuJet had a cartoon critter logo that adorned its aircraft. Alan Bender, a professor of airline economics at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach, said he hasn't figured ...

ValuJet Flight 592, with 110 people on board, plunged into the Everglades after taking off from Miami International Airport on May 11, 1996. The DC-9 had traveled less than 100 miles west of the ...

MIAMI, Aug. 14 -- A defunct jet repair company was ordered today to pay $11 million in fines and restitution for hazardous waste violations in the fiery ValuJet crash that killed 110 people in 1996.

The road to rehabilitation began in 1997 when ValuJet acquired AirTran, dumped its cartoon critter logo and moved its headquarters to Orlando from Atlanta. Next came a management shakeup in 1999 ...