GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Today is the 15th anniversary of the crash of Swissair flight 111 off Peggy’s Cove in Nova Scotia. CBC in Canada carries a memorial article; the crash later appeared to many in Switzerland as the beginning of the end of the national airline and all that it represented, but it also had a major impact on Canada.

The cleanup, dubbed Operation Persistance, was long and costly, but ultimately brought 98 percent of the wreckage to the surface.

All 229 people on board died. The flight was popularly known as “the UN shuttle”, flying from JFK to Geneva. It was the second worst airline crash in Canadian history, according to Wikipedia.

The cause of the crash was eventually attributed to flammable material in the aircraft’s structure.