The Sightseeing Flight and the Invisible Mountain

In November 1979, Flight 901 departs New Zealand on a sightseeing journey over Antarctica, heading directly towards a volcano. When the plane vanishes, investigators are left with a mystery: how could a seasoned pilot miss a 12,000-foot peak? As they try to piece together the incident, conflicting stories emerge, key evidence disappears, and a troubling picture takes shape - one defined by human error, deceptive illusions, and the hunt for someone to blame. For a full list of show notes, see timharford.com .

You can listen to The Sightseeing Flight and the Invisible Mountain online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

The Sightseeing Flight and the Invisible Mountain is an episode from Cautionary Tales with Tim Harford by Pushkin Industries.

This episode is 39:36 long.

This episode was published on Mar 27, 2026.

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