Thanks, Moose4. Steve86 explained that it didn’t cartwheel, and you further described what might have happened. It’s unfortunate some people on the news described it that way.
The news didn’t describe it that way, witness in the area did...And they just repeated it.
Can you imagine several hundred thousand pounds in lengths of hundreds of feet cartwheeling? Nuh-uh. There would be millions of little bitsy pieces and that’s about it.
Well, it may well have been a “cartwheel” because it was partially off the ground for a little bit of the process as it turned sideways. In any case I’m sure it was quite spectacular to anyone that saw it, and the term “cartwheel” would probably be the first thing to pop into someone’s mind when thinking about a 175-foot-long, 200-ton airplane spinning sideways as it tried to land!
}:-)4