This Day in Aviation Accident History

A blog describing aviation accidents both new and old, keeping you up to date with recent crashes and "This Day in Aviation Accident History" posts. Suggest a crash or correct a mistake in a previous post here.

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December 28, 1978

On December 28, 1978, United Airlines Flight 173 crashed near Portland International Airport in Portland, Oregon due to fuel starvation. Out of the 181 passengers and 8 crew on board, 179 survived.

 The DC-8 was piloted by a very experienced crew, with a combined flight time of more than 35,000 hours’ flight time. The departure from Stapleton International Airport in Denver was uneventful. As the plane prepared for the descent to Portland International Airport, the pilots deployed the landing gear. However, the deployment was followed by an abnormal vibration and there was no light on the panel, indicating the landing gear was successfully locked in place. Because of this, the crew requested to be put in a holding pattern to work out the problem. Air traffic control obliged, and for the next hour, the crew worked on the problems with the landing gear and to prepare for the potential of an emergency landing. During the time the crew was working on their landing gear, none of the three crewmembers in the cockpit monitored the fuel left on board.

After a significant amount of time in the air, all of the fuel had been effectively used up, and the number one and two engines flamed out almost simultaneously. A mayday transmission was received from Flight 173, and the plane soon crashed into a populated area of Portland, just narrowly missing a row of apartment buildings.

 A map showing the flight path and eventual crash of Flight 173, from the  NTSB report

 The landing gear malfunction was revealed to have been down and locked – it was just a missing bolt that lead to the landing gear ‘slamming’ into place, and the force of the landing gear coming down broke the light in the cockpit that indicated to the crew that the gear was down and locked.

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October 31, 1999

Egypt Air Flight 990 crashed into the Atlantic Ocean on the 31st of October 1999, killing all 217 passengers and crew on board. The flight was a Boeing 767 scheduled to fly from Los Angeles International Airport to Cairo with a stop at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York, before it plunged into the sea. There is controversy over the cause of the crash, with the NTSB and the ECAA reaching vastly different conclusions.

 The aircraft involved in the crash - photo taken in Dusseldorf by Konstantin von Wedelstaedt

 Flight 990 consisted of two complete flight crews, with a captain and a first officer; EgyptAir designated one crew as the “active” and one as the “cruise” or “relief” crew – it was customary for the active crew to make the takeoff and fly the first five hours of the ten-hour flight, and the cruise crew would take over until an hour or so before landing – the active crew would then take over again to land. On EgyptAir 990, however, the relief first officer, named Gameel Al-Batouti, recommended that he relieve the commanding first officer 20 minutes after takeoff. After initially protesting, he eventually conceded and allowed Al-Batouti to take the controls as first officer.

During the takeoff and climb to its assigned cruising altitude, Flight 990 was completely routine, and was handled by three different controllers as it climbed up in stages. The aircraft was equipped with a transponder that automatically reported the plane’s altitude to ATC radar. As the flight levelled off to its assigned altitude of 33000ft, the last controller to handle Flight 990 suggested the plane change frequencies for better reception. The captain acknowledged on the new frequency, and this was the last transmission received on the flight.

Approximately 5 hours into its 10-hour flight, the captain excused himself to go to the bathroom, and very soon after, Gameel Al-Batouti - the relief first officer - disengaged the autopilot and reduced the throttles on both engines to idle. Both elevators were also moved three degrees nose-down. As the first officer was doing this, he was speaking in Arabic, “Tawkalt ala Allah” – “I rely on God” in English. The plane suddenly and dramatically plummeted downwards into a sharp descent - making 14600ft in just 36 seconds.

At this point, the captain returned to the cockpit and asked the first officer what was happening. The elevators then moved to a split position, with the left elevator up and the right elevator down – this most likely occurred due to the captain pulling up on the control column and the first officer pushing down on his. At this point, the engines were shut off; the captain asked, “What is this? Did you shut the engines?” and the first officer replied with “It’s shut.” The captain continuously asked the first officer to ‘pull [on the control column] with me’, however the elevators remained in the split position up until the plane hit the ocean.

About five minutes after the sharp descent and crash into the Atlantic Ocean, the ATC controller, unaware of the crash, attempted to notify Flight 990 that radar had been lost, but received no reply. Two minutes later, the controller contacted ARINC to determine if Flight 990 had switched to an oceanic frequency too early, but ARINC received no response either. Lufthansa Flight 499, a plane also in the area, was asked to attempt contact with Flight 990 as well, but they were unsuccessful.

Because the plane crashed in international waters, the investigation was handled by the country of registry of the aircraft – in this case, it was the Egyptian government. At their request, the US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) helped in the investigation alongside the Egyptian Civil Aviation Authority (ECAA).

The NTSB’s investigation determined that there was no possible way for the split elevator that occurred in Flight 990 to occur unless the captain was commanding nose-up, whilst the first officer was commanding nose-down. The ECAA presented various mechanical failure scenarios for this position, but the NTSB concluded that none matched the evidence found. Additionally, a look into the first officer’s personal life revealed motives for crashing the plane – he had been severely disciplined for reports of strong sexual harassment, and he was recently reprimanded by his supervisor, who was a passenger on Flight 990. His supervisor had just revoked Al-Batouti’s privilege of flying to the US and informed him that Flight 990 would be his last on the route.

After initially allowing the NTSB to take control of the investigation into the accident, the ECAA became unhappy with how the NTSB was handling the investigation and decided to launch their own into the crash. The ECAA report concluded that the relief first officer didn’t deliberately crash the plane, and that mechanical failure was the most likely cause of the accident.

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October 21, 1989

Tan-Sahsa Flight 414 crashed on landing after taking off from Managua, Nicaragua to Tegucigalpa, Honduras on the 21st of October, 1989. 131 out of 146 people died in the crash.

On the final leg of the flight, the crew were cleared by air traffic control for the VOR/DME runway approach, which included three step-downs from the initial approach altitude to avoid high terrain near the airport. Instead of following air traffic control’s instructions, the crew continued their descent from 7500ft. The aircraft impacted a mountain at 4800ft, approximately 9km from the runway threshold.

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October 20, 1977

On the 20th of October 1977, a Convair aircraft hired by the band “Lynyrd Skynyrd” crashed in Gillsburg, Mississippi en-route from Greenville, South Carolina to Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Out of the 26 passengers and crew, 20 survived the crash – 3 members of the band and their manager were killed.

Much of the flight was uneventful, however as the flight neared the end of the route, the Convair CV-240 ran out of fuel. The gauges in the aircraft were faulty and the pilots failed to manually check the tanks before take-off. The pilots attempted an emergency landing on a small airstrip, but missed the runway and crashed into a forest. Six people died in the crash; four members of the band “Lynyrd Skynyrd” and the two pilots.

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October 19, 1988

Indian Airlines Flight 113 was a flight operating from Mumbai to Ahmedabad that crashed on approach on the 19th of October 1988. The crash killed 133 of 135 passengers and crew.

The flight departed Bombay, delayed by 20 minutes. The weather at the aerodrome was causing poor visibility, and so the crew decided to carry out a localiser-DME approach. They reported overhead of the Ahmedabad VOR and the aircraft then reported turning inbound. The flight crew, for an unknown reason, did not request clearance for landing, but continued to descend through the minimum safe altitude without sighting the runway. Both pilots were focused on finding the runway and did not monitor their instruments, which was showing a steady descent.

Just five minutes after their last transmission, the aircraft struck some trees and a pylon. The flight crashed 2500m from the threshold of the runway.  

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October 18, 1992

On the 18th of October 1992, Merparti Nusantara Airlines Flight 5601 (shortened to MZ5601) was a passenger flight that crashed on approach to Badung, Indonesia. The aircraft exploded on impact, killing all 31 people on board.

The flight was on approach to Husein Sastranegaa Airport in Badung, Indonesia. Air traffic control communicated to the crew that the weather in Bandung was poor, with thunder and moderate visibility. Despite this, the crew decided to continue with the approach, and the plane’s altitude dropped to 8000ft. Air traffic control asked he captain if she had seen the runway, and the captain replied in the affirmative. This was the last communication made by the aircraft.

Shortly after, the plane disappeared from radar and went missing. Search and rescue teams later discovered the wreckage, which had exploded on impact in a local bushland. There were no survivors.

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October 17, 1988

Uganda Airlines Flight 775 crashed while attempting to land at Roma-Fiumicino Airport. 33 out of 52 people were killed in the crash.

Flight 775 took off from London-Gatwick for Rome, Italy. While descending to the airport, the flight crew was cleared for an ILS approach, but due to poor visibility, a go-around was executed. A second approach was then attempted, but then also had to be abandoned. The crew then requested radar vectoring, and the aircraft was established on the localiser but descended through the minimum safe altitude. The planer impacted trees and burst into flames less than a kilometre from the runway.

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October 16, 1956

On October 16, 1956, Pan Am Flight 6 ditched in the Pacific Ocean after the failure of two out of four engines. All passengers and crew survived.

Photo of the ditching - by vintagewings.ca

Pan Am Flight 6 left from Honolulu on the flight’s last leg to San Francisco, after multiple layovers. When the cruising altitude of 21,000ft was reached, one of the four engines began to overspeed. The first officer slowed the plane and attempted to feather the propeller, but this was unsuccessful. Eventually, the captain decided to cut off the oil supply to the engine which stopped the engine running.

With only three engines working and one causing excessive drag, the plane began to descend. Soon after, another engine started failing and was only producing minimum power at full throttle before backfiring, forcing the crew to shut it down.

With this added drag and only two engines operative, the crew calculated that there was not enough fuel in their tanks to either return to Honolulu or to continue to San Francisco. The aircraft flew towards Ocean Station November where a cutter maintained by the Coast Guard was stationed, with the intention of ditching their aircraft. The crew circled the boat until daylight, where they made several practice approaches. All passengers were moved to the front of the plane and prepared for the emergency landing.

The cutter, notified that the plane was preparing to ditch, laid out a foam path to aid the crew, and just over three hours since the start of the emergency, the plane touched down on the water. One wing hit a swell and caused damage to the nose and tail. With the help of the Coast Guard, all 31 people were rescued with few injuries.  

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October 3, 1910

On the 3rd October 1910, the very first mid-air collision occurred when a Farman III biplane was struck by an Antoinette IV monoplane. Both pilots survived the impact.

 Artist impression of the collision, published in “Popular Mechanics” magazine in 1911.

 The Milano Circuito Aereo Internazionale was held in Milan, Italy between the 24th of September and the 3rd of October 1910. On the last day of the event, the pilot of the Antoinette IV monoplane, René Thomas, rear-ended British Army Captain Bertram Dickson’s Farman III biplane. Both pilots survived the collision, but Dickson suffered internal injuries that he never quite recovered from. He died three years after the crash.

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September 23, 1999

On the 23rd of September 1999, Qantas Flight 1, a Boeing 747, overran the runway at Don Mueang International Airport as it was landing. There were no fatalities or severe injuries, but 38 people suffered minor injuries.

  During the approach to Bangkok, the weather conditions deteriorated rapidly. Seven minutes prior to Flight 1’s landing, an A330 landed normally in the adverse weather conditions, and so the crew went ahead with their landing. They were unaware that another Qantas plane, Qantas Flight 15, conducted a go-around due to poor visibility due to final approach.

As the crew flew the plane on final approach, the aircraft’s attitude and airspeed were high, but within the limits stipulated by the company. The weather had deteriorated significantly at this point and the crew could barely see the runway. Just before touchdown, the captain ordered the first officer to perform a go-around. The first officer advanced the throttles in accordance with the captain’s orders, but did not engage the “Take off/Go-Around switch” necessary for a go around. The plane then touched down on the runway, with throttles still providing thrust. The captain, as the plane landed, decided to abort the go-around by pulling back the throttles, even though he did not audibly take control of the plane. In addition, the captain also left one engine at ful throttle, and as a result, cancelled the preselected auto-brake settings.

The landing continued, but manual braking did not begin until the aircraft was more than halfway down the runway. The plane began to hydroplane once braking had begun, and skidded down the runway, leading the plane to overshoot the runway. The aircraft collided with a ground radio antenna, and came to rest over a section of soft grassland.

  The incident was the most significant accident to have occurred to Qantas, creating a blemish on the otherwise perfect safety record. The plane technically received enough damage for it to be legally written off, however in order to keep their 100% safety record, Qantas decided to restore the plane and send it back into service, rather than writing it off as a hull loss and destroying their perfect safety record.

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June 10, 1990

British Airways Flight 5390 was a scheduled passenger flight operated by British Airways between Birmingham Airport in England and Málaga Airport in Spain. On 10 June 1990 an improperly installed panel of the windscreen broke apart in mid-flight, and sucked the plane's captain, Tim Lancaster, halfway out of the aircraft. With Lancaster pinned to the outside of the aircraft, the first officer managed to perform an emergency landing at Southampton Airport with no loss of life.

The BAC 1-11 took off from Birmingham Airport with 81 passengers, four cabin crew and two flight crew. The takeoff and subsequent climb-out was very much routine, until the plane reached approximately 17400ft. By this time, the pilots had already unbuckled their shoulder harnesses, in preparation for meal service. The left windscreen suddenly separated from the cockpit with a loud bang, and Lancaster was propelled out of his seat by the rushing air from the rapid decompression and forced head first out of the cockpit. His knees snagged the flight controls, keeping his legs inside the plane. The door to the cockpit was blown out onto the radio and navigation console, blocking the throttle control from the first officer and causing the aircraft to descend. Loose items and debris from the passenger cabin flew into the flight deck.

Flight attendant Nigel Ogden, seeing the captain hanging almost completely outside the cockpit, grabbed Lancaster to prevent him from falling out of the plane. Two more flight attendants soon followed. The copilot, Alastair Atchison, began a rapid emergency descent and broadcasted a distress call - however, due to the damage sustained to the navigation equipment, he was unable to hear a response. 

Eventually Atchison was able to hear the clearance from air traffic control to land at Southampton, while the flight attendants managed in extreme conditions to free Lancaster's ankles from the flight controls and hold on to him for the remainder of the flight. Just 45 minutes after the aircraft had taken off, the aircraft had landed safely on Runway 02 at Southampton. Passengers immediately disembarked from the front and rear stairs, and emergency crews retrieved Lancaster, who was assumed to be dead. However, it was revealed that Lancaster had survived and was taken to Southampton General Hospital, suffering frostbite and fractures to his arms. Flight attendant Nigel Ogden suffered a dislocated shoulder and frostbite to the left side of his face. Nobody else was injured.

Accident investigators found that a replacement windscreen had been installed 27 hours before the flight, and that the procedure had been approved by the shift maintenance manager. However, 84 of the 90 windscreen retention bolts were 0.66 mm too small in diameter, while the remaining six were 2.5 mm too short. The investigation revealed that the previous windscreen had been fitted with incorrect bolts, which had been replaced by the shift maintenance manager without reference to the maintenance documentation, in order to save time as the plane was due to take off soon and there was a tight schedule. The air pressure difference between the cabin and the outside during the flight proved to be too much, leading to the failure of the windscreen.

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April 7, 1922

On April 7, 1922, the first mid-air collision of passenger jets occurred over Picardie, France, in foggy weather. All 7 involved died in the crash.

On the day of the crash, a French de Havilland biplane was flying mail from Croydon, bound for Le Bourget, Paris, with the pilot and a steward aboard. Meanwhile, a Goliath biplane had departed Le Bourget with the pilot, three passengers and a mechanic. The three passengers were an American couple on their honeymoon, and a French national, Monsieur Bouriez.

Following the normal route in drizzle and fog at an altitude of about 500ft, the de Havilland collided with the Goliath over Thieuloy-Saint-Antoine. All seven people died in the first-ever mid-air collision between airliners.

The weather was misty with poor visibility. The two aircraft suddenly encountered each other in the mist, neither having time to take evasive action. During the collision the DH lost a wing and the tail, and impacted the ground first, with the Goliath crashing a few minutes later. Although people on the ground quickly reached the scene, all were found to be dead except for the steward, who was badly injured. He was taken to the nearby village, but died of his injuries.

Following the accident, the universal rule of “keep to the right” in the air was established. Clearly-defined air routes were also introduced in France, Belgium and the UK.

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April 6, 1958

Capital Airlines Flight 67 was domestic scheduled passenger flight operated by Capital Airlines that crashed on final approach to Freeland, Michigan, during a severe snowstorm on April 6, 1958. The flight was en route from Flint-Bishop Airport to the Freeland-Tri City Airport - now MBS International Airport, when it crashed. All 47 passengers and crew died in the crash. 

Wreckage of the aeroplane - photo by Doug Winger of OurMidland.com

Approach conditions towards Freeland were poor due to weather; there was restricted visibility and severe icing conditions. The crew had attempted a steep turn to align with the runway. However, due to the buildup of ice on the horizontal stabilizer of the plane, the steep turn caused the plane to stall, followed by a spin. The crew could not regain control, leading to the crash of the plane.

During the investigation, it was revealed that the aircraft's stall warning device was inoperative.

A memorial to the victims was unveiled in a local cemetery in 2001.

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An Announcement.

First off, welcome to Air Crash History! I see I have almost 50 of you following me now. I’m happy to have you all here to learn about different aviation accidents and incidents. 

Due to my forgetfulness busy schedule, I haven’t queued any posts from the 4th of April, so I’ll be posting two crashes a day until we catch up. Here is the upcoming schedule: April 6 - 1000 UDT 08/04/17 April 7 - 1600 UDT 08/04/17 April 8 - 1000 UDT 09/04/17 April 9 - 1600 UDT 09/04/17

I’ve also implemented a tagging system that may interest you:

Posts with photos are tagged #photo

Posts with passenger / crew deaths are tagged #death

All posts are tagged with the date they occured e.g. #april 4

Posts with an official cause are tagged with that cause e.g. #pilot error, #weather, #mechanical failure. This can include multiple tags.

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April 5, 1991

On April 5 1991, Atlantic Southeast Airlines Flight 2311 crashed on approach for landing at Glynco Airport, now Brunswick Golden Isles Airport. All 23 people on the Embraer EMB 120 Brasilia were killed.

Flight 2311 was scheduled initially to be operated by another EMB-120. However, this aeroplane was experiencing “mechanical problems”, so the flight was switched to the downed jet. The plane chosen to fly the route had already flown four times that day with no reported incidents. 

After takeoff from Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, the crew deviated slightly off-track to avoid bad weather in the area. Apart from this, the flight en-route was pretty routine until the crew radioed Jacksonville Air Traffic Control that the airport was in sight. The tower cleared them for a visual approach, which the crew then acknowledged. 

The flight approached the airport, then suddenly and violently rolled to the left due to a malfunctioning propeller system, causing abnormal blade angles and higher drag on the left side of the plane. The flight crew could not regain control and the aircraft descended rapidly before impacting the ground at a steep angle.

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April 4, 1987

Garuda Indonesia Flight 035 was a Douglas DC-9 operated by Garuda Indonesia that struck a pylon and crashed on approach to Medan-Polonia Airport on 4 April 1987. 23 of the 45 passengers and crew on board were killed in the accident.

The aircraft was on an Instrument Landing System approach to Medan Airport in a thunderstorm when the aircraft struck electrical power lines and crashed, just short of the runway. The aircraft broke up as the tail section separated and a fire broke out.

Most of the survivors escaped through breaks in the fuselage and 11 were flung free of the aircraft. Half of the flight crew died and 19 passengers suffered fatal injuries due to smoke inhalation and burns. Four crew and 18 passengers suffered serious injuries. All of the fatalities were a result of the fire and not due to the impact with the ground.

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April 3, 2008

On April 3 2008, an Antonov An-28 operated by Blue Wing Airlines crashed on landing at the Lawa Antino Airport of Benzdorp in Suriname. All 19 passengers and crew died in the crash.

 The An-28 aborted the landing at Lawa Antino Airport due to another Blue Wing aircraft on the runway. The flight crew attempted a go-around but failed to gain the necessary height and crashed into a mountain near the airport.