Mayday (2003)
Mayday is a 2003 documentary series created by André Barro and Bernard Vaillot. It stars Stephen Bogaert, Gregory Feith and John Cox.
Each episode of this Canadian docudrama rebuilds a single aviation disaster from the ground up. Cockpit voice recordings, air traffic control transcripts, and the findings of crash investigators drive dramatized reconstructions of what went wrong in the air. Survivors, retired pilots, and safety experts walk through the chain of small failures that ended in catastrophe, then explain how each one was traced and, often, how the industry changed afterward. The tone stays sober and procedural. The series treats every flight as a puzzle with lives at stake, and the answer as something earned through patient investigation.
Quick answers
What is Mayday about?
Each episode of this Canadian docudrama rebuilds a single aviation disaster from the ground up. Cockpit voice recordings, air traffic control transcripts, and the findings of crash investigators drive dramatized reconstructions of what went wrong in the air. Survivors, retired pilots, and safety experts walk through the chain of small failures that ended in catastrophe, then explain how each one was traced and, often, how the industry changed afterward. The tone stays sober and procedural. The series treats every flight as a puzzle with lives at stake, and the answer as something earned through patient investigation.
When was Mayday released?
Mayday was released on 3 September 2003.
How many episodes does Mayday have?
Mayday has 240 episodes across 26 seasons.
Who made Mayday?
Mayday was created by André Barro and Bernard Vaillot.
Where can I watch Mayday?
Mayday is available on Paramount Plus, Paramount+ (Via Amazon Prime), Peacock, Peacock Premium, Philo and Prime Video.
Where to watch Mayday
Stream: Paramount Plus, Paramount+ (Via Amazon Prime), Peacock, Peacock Premium, Philo, Prime Video, YouTube TV, fuboTV
Watch free: Amazon Freevee, The Roku Channel, Tubi TV
Buy: Amazon, AppleTV, Fandango at Home
Cast
- Stephen Bogaert as Self - Narrator (voice)
- Gregory Feith as Gregory Feith
- John Cox as John Cox
- Robert Benzon as Bob Benzon
- Tom Haueter as Tom Haueter
- Von Flores as Lead Investigator
- Leon Aureus as Captain Rozaq
- Jon De Leon as Engineer
- Daniel Junghuan Park as Maintenance/Ground Engineer
- Jason Weinberg as Clint Crookshanks
- Daniel Falk as Air Traffic Controller
- Redd Ochoa as NTSC Investigator
Similar series
Explore Mayday guides
Mayday in our writing
- Companion guide: Disaster
A few thoughts on Mayday
Viewers drawn to the forensic patience here should watch Sully, Clint Eastwood's account of the Hudson landing reconstructed hearing by hearing. United 93 works the same nerve in real time, a catastrophe rebuilt minute by minute, with the human cost never offscreen.
Plane crash stories that dig into what really happened
Mayday rebuilds each aviation disaster from the black box outward, tracing a chain of small failures to their final cause. Sully and United 93 dramatize real flights under exactly that kind of scrutiny, Departure follows an investigator chasing a vanished airliner, and Flight 29 Down puts survivors of a crash through its aftermath.
True-crime stories that reconstruct a case piece by piece
Mayday leans on cockpit recordings and crash investigators walking through exactly how a disaster unfolded, piece by piece. Forensic Files and American Monster apply that same procedural patience to crime scenes, Rescue 911 reenacts real emergencies as they happened, and Wormwood and The Murder of Rachel Nickell trace a single case back through every misstep.
Historical disasters and atrocities restaged through dramatized reenactment
Mayday treats every crash as a puzzle rebuilt from testimony and evidence until the full sequence of failure is clear. The Great Fire, Roman Empire, and Testament: The Story of Moses restage historical catastrophe and power struggles with that same dramatized reenactment, The War pairs survivor testimony with archival footage, and Eichmann in Jerusalem traces a different kind of disaster through its bureaucratic chain of decisions.