The Crash

The Crash is the first episode in the series. It first aired on September 22, 1968.

Plot
Suborbital Flight 612, bound for London, crash lands and its crew and passengers soon realize that this not Earth... this is the Land of the Giants.

On June 12, 1983, sub-orbital passenger Flight 612 (aka Spindrift), on its way from Los Angeles to London, encounters a bizarre storm and is forced to make a crash landing. Those aboard—the crew: pilot Capt. Steve Burton, co-pilot Dan Erickson, stewardess Betty Hamilton, and passengers: engineer Mark Wilson, pampered city girl and jet-setter Valerie Scott, bank robber Alexander B. Fitzhugh disguised as Naval Commander and orphan boy Barry Lockridge with his dog Chipper—find themselves in a mysterious land dominated by giants. While exploring, Steve and Valerie are captured by a giant scientist and the others mount a rescue.

A sub-orbital aircraft named the Spindrift flying from Los Angeles to London is pulled into a space warp which transports its crew and passengers to a planet where everything is 12 times larger than normal. In their first night on the planet they are attacked by a giant cat and two of their party, Captain Steve Burton and movie star Valerie Scott, are captured by a pair of giant scientists but are eventually rescued by the rest of the castaways. Unfortunately, they soon realize that for the time being they are stuck on this strange world.

Cast

 * Gary Conway as Captain Steve Burton
 * Don Marshall as Dan Erickson
 * Heather Young as Betty Hamilton
 * Don Matheson as Mark Wilson
 * Deanna Lund as Valerie Scott
 * Stefan Arngrim as Barry Lockridge
 * Kurt Kasznar as Alexander Fitzhugh

Supporting Cast

 * Anne Dore as Giant Female
 * Don Watters as Giant Entomologist

Notes & Trivia

 * The day the Spindrift crashed is given as June 12, 1983. June 12 was Irwin Allen's birthday.
 * It should be noted that as of 1983, the United States did not have any sub-orbital space crafts used in commercial flights. However the LOTG creators weren't that far off as the American Space Shuttle program used partially reusable low Earth orbital spacecraft which operated from 1981 to 2011 by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
 * In the pilot, the Spindrift left on their trip on June 12, 1983. However, their departure date in Wild Journey is September 25, 1983.
 * In some references, it is claimed the cast was traveling from New York City to London, but in the actual series and unaired pilot it was NEVER New York, always Los Angeles.
 * There were two different versions of The Crash, only one of which was originally aired in syndication. The original version had a different musical score and had more character scenes. The one most commonly seen has the familiar musical cues, but many earlier scenes were trimmed for the inclusion of more action scenes (i.e., the climactic encounter with the giant dog at the end). The unseen version is on the original DVD release.