that point, the crew decided to abandon the approach. They retracted the landing gear, changed the flaps setting from 40 degrees to 20 degrees, and angled the aircraft to begin climbing, with a climb angle of between three and five degrees above the level position. However, the pilots did not increase the engine power. Because they had retracted the flaps without increasing the power that the engines were providing, the aircraft lost lift, one of the wings struck the ground, and the aircraft tumbled across a marsh. The fuselage separated from the wings on a mound of earth approximately high, located down the runway. The fuel tanks in the left wing ruptured, igniting a fire on the ground. The fuselage broke apart approximately at the separator between the tourist and first class sections and came to rest in soft sand approximately from the runway. At 9:45p.m., tower personnel saw a bright orange flash and initiated emergency procedures. They requested that the crew of American Airlines Flight 8, which was on approach immediately after Flight 512, overfly the runway to see if they could see what had happened. After the flyover, the crew reported back that they could see a fire to the left of the runway. Aftermath After the crash, emergency vehicles were dispatched to the accident site, but they were delayed by the thick fog and the soft marshy terrain where the aircraft ended up. One ambulance driver reported that visibility was as low as , which made it difficult to locate the crash victims. The arrival of some of the emergency vehicles from areas outside the airport was delayed by slow-moving traffic on nearby roads. Police prevented all but emergency traffic from entering the area, but curious onlookers still caused traffic congestion on the streets around the airport. Many were seen walking around the perimeter, having left their vehicles on surrounding roads. The airport was closed to air traffic until 7:10a.m. the following morning. Survivors said that the plane burst into flames immediately after the crash. While the rear section of the fuselage remained relatively intact, other sections of the fuselage, engine parts, and broken pieces of propellers, were scattered around the crash site. Many of the survivors were thrown clear of the aircraft when it hit the ground, still strapped to their seats. Others climbed out of the broken fuselage and were assisted by the two flight