A Czech gunner is shot down in no man's land in the winter of 1939 and finds something alive in an abandoned farmhouse. What follows is the story of how a German Shepherd puppy crossed occupied France, went to war, and was decorated for it — a dog who, according to the paperwork, was never there at all. Join Alice and Zach for a story about loyalty, an escape that happened twice, and a war record that officially does not exist. This episode is dedicated to Benji.

Sources:

• "Antis: Dog of War" by Damien Lewis - Royal Air Forces Association
• "The story of a Czech WW II airman and his remarkable dog" - Radio Prague International
• Dickin Medal Roll of Honour - People's Dispensary for Sick Animals
• Recorded interview with Gary Manley, owner of the Antis Dickin Medal

Find FINAL BOARDING CALL online:

• Website: finalboardingcallpodcast.com
• Email: finalboardingcallpodcast@gmail.com
• Instagram: @FinalBoardingCallPod
• Facebook: Final Boarding Call

Credits: Final Boarding Call is hosted by Alice Stern and Zach Stemas, researched and written by Alice Stern, produced and edited by Alice Stern and Zach Stemas.

A Boeing 727 lifts its nose on a clear Texas morning, and the rest of the plane refuses to follow. Twenty-two seconds later it's a burning wreck in a field a mile from the runway. Join Alice and Zach as they unravel how a routine takeoff at America's third-busiest airport went catastrophically wrong — a disaster that looked at first like an engine failure, then like a freak mechanical fault, and turned out to be something far more unsettling. Discover the chain of small human decisions, a silent alarm, and an airline's buried problems that put 108 people on a runway they were never going to leave cleanly.

Sources:

• Aircraft Accident Report AAR-89/04, Delta Air Lines Flight 1141 — National Transportation Safety Board
• Crashing after 22 seconds?? Delta 1141 — Green Dot Aviation
• Delta Air Lines Flight 1141 crash coverage — WFAA
• Mayday: Air Disaster, Season 18 Episode 3

Find FINAL BOARDING CALL online:

• Website: finalboardingcallpodcast.com
• Email: finalboardingcallpodcast@gmail.com
• Instagram: @FinalBoardingCallPod
• Facebook: Final Boarding Call

Credits: Final Boarding Call is hosted by Alice Stern and Zach Stemas, researched and written by Alice Stern, produced and edited by Alice Stern and Zach Stemas.

On a warm July night in 2013, patrons at a popular Quebec bar heard the screech of metal on metal as an unmanned train barreled toward their town at highway speeds. What followed was a cascade of explosions that turned half the downtown into an inferno, killing 47 people and exposing a corporate culture that valued profits over lives. Discover how a cheap repair, inadequate training, and regulatory failures turned a routine freight run into one of North America's deadliest rail disasters—and why similar conditions persist on railways today.

Sources:

• Railway Investigation Report R13D0054, "Runaway and Main-track Derailment: Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Railway Freight Train MMA-002" — Transportation Safety Board of Canada
• Lac-Mégantic criminal trial testimony, 2017–2018 proceedings — Court record
• "The Lac-Mégantic Rail Disaster: Public Betrayal, Justice Denied" by Bruce Campbell — James Lorimer & Company
• "Bomb Trains: How Industry Greed and Regulatory Failure Put the Public at Risk" by Justin Mikulka
• "The public health response during and after the Lac-Mégantic train derailment tragedy" by Généreux et al. — Disaster Health
• Investigation series on MMA corporate culture and safety record — The Globe and Mail
• Trial coverage and witness testimony — CBC News
• "Lives lost: Remembering Lac-Mégantic's victims" — Montreal Gazette
• "Five Years after Lac-Mégantic, U.S. Freight Rail Going Backward on Safety" — The Century Foundation
• Reporting on former engineer Jarod Briggs's warnings about single-person crews — Bangor Daily News

Find Final Boarding Call online:

• Website: finalboardingcallpodcast.com
• Email: finalboardingcallpodcast@gmail.com
• Instagram: @FinalBoardingCallPod
• Facebook: Final Boarding Call

Credits:

Final Boarding Call is hosted by Alice Stern and Zach Stemas, researched and written by Alice Stern, produced and edited by Alice Stern and Zach Stemas.