A Boeing 747-100 exploded on July 17, 1996, near Peconic Bay in Long Island, New York. Although initially believed by authorities to be the result of a bomb or a missile, “The National Transportation Safety Board theorized that a spark from a bad wire had set off a spontaneous combustion of fumes that had built up in the nearly empty center fuel tank.”
– John Miller, Michael Stone, and Chris Mitchell, The Cell, Page 169