Aviation

Citation

(2008), "Aviation", Disaster Prevention and Management, Vol. 17 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/dpm.2008.07317bad.008

Aviation

Article Type: Disaster database From: Disaster Prevention and Management, Volume 17, Issue 2.

29 June 2006 9G-MKJ

The October 2004 crash of a Boeing 747 (9G-MKJ) aircraft that killed seven crew members was caused in part by incorrect data entered into takeoff software, but crew fatigue “increased the probability” of such a crucial mistake, the Transportation Safety Board said today. The board’s final report on the accident found the crew of the MK Airlines jet failed to notice that the engine throttles were set too low before the crash. The report said the disaster likely occurred because a crew member neglected to click on the correct icon of a computer software program. That inadvertently put the weight from the previous takeoff, more than 220,000 pounds lighter, into the system, which caused the aircraft to attempt an underpowered takeoff and crash just beyond the runway. The heavily loaded aircraft carrying lobsters and tractor parts failed to lift off from the Halifax International Airport and dragged its tail along the runway before crashing into the woods. All crew members were killed. British-based MK Airlines has said it believes the crew received adequate rest, and that it provided adequate training on the software used for takeoff.

10 July 2006 AP-BAL

A Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) passenger aircraft has crashed in central Pakistan, killing all 45 people on board, officials say. The Fokker aircraft crashed soon after taking off from the city of Multan and burst into flames. Rescue teams are still struggling to control the blaze. Eyewitnesses say that they have seen a number of bodies which have been badly burnt. Police have cordoned off the area and are keeping people away from the scene. The twin-engined aircraft was carrying 41 passengers and four crew members when it went down. “All passengers and crew are dead in the air crash,” district coordination officer Iftikhar Babar told Pakistan’s private Geo TV channel. “Fire erupted after the crash and all bodies were charred beyond recognition.” Flight PK 688 was heading for Lahore and then Islamabad, reports say. It appeared to hit an electric power line while crashing in a field. “The plane lost contact with the control tower about two minutes after take-off. We don’t know what happened to it,” PIA engineer Mansoor A. Rahi said.

11 July 2006

Shortly after takeoff the Fokker F-27 Friendship 200, AP-BAL, operated by Pakistan International Airlines, reportedly sustained engine problems, at 12:00, July 10. It struck an electric power line before crashing in a field. The F-27 broke up and caught fire. All 45 persons on board were killed.

11 July 2006

Investigators have recovered the flight data and cockpit voice recorders of a Pakistan International Airlines’ (PIA) plane that crashed killing all 45 people on board, a senior official said today. Shahnawaz Dara, head of PIA’s flight safety wing, said the flight data recorder and the cockpit voice recorder with information about the aircraft’s final moments were recovered in good condition. “Pilots did not contact the control tower before the crash... the voice recorder will give a direction on what was happening at the time of the crash and why there was no contact from the cockpit crew,” Dara told Reuters. “Both pieces of equipment are good enough to find out what happened to the aircraft before the crash.” Pakistan’s aviation regulator said help of foreign experts could be sought to examine the recorders if necessary. Witnesses said they saw flames coming from the aircraft after it took off, and it appeared to be tilting to the right. It was the third Fokker Friendship operated by PIA to have crashed since 1970. PIA officials said there were no plans to ground the remaining six Fokkers in the fleet and all of the planes, including the one that crashed, were airworthy. However, airlines’ pilots demanded an immediate phasing-out of the Fokkers, which are due to be replaced in any case. PIA is replacing the Fokkers with ATR 42-500 aircraft from Avions de Transport Regional - a joint venture between France-based European Aeronautic Defense and Space Company and Italy’s Alenia Aeronautica. One of the new planes has already been delivered and six more are due by mid-2007, PIA spokesman Hasan Jaffery said.

12 July 2006

Pakistan government today decided to ground all Fokker aircraft for passenger service by state owned Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) with immediate effect. According to an official statement, the Federal Cabinet headed by Prime Minster Shaukat Aziz, has directed the Ministry of Defence to propose immediately alternate measures to provide air service to remote areas through C-130 or other aircraft. Fokker F-27 flight PF-688 (AP-BAL) of Pakistan International Airlines (PIA), crashed on July 10, while operating from Multan to Lahore in southern Punjab Province of Pakistan. About 45 people were killed in the accident. PIA F-27 fleet, is now comprising six aircraft.

9 July 2006 F-OGYP

A Russian Airbus A-310, (F-OGYP) carrying 200 people, many of them holidaymakers, crashed during a domestic flight to Siberia today, killing most of those on board, news agencies said. The Airbus A-310 crashed and exploded into flames after landing in the city of Irkutsk following a 5,000 km night flight from Moscow, emergency services said. A total of 192 passengers and eight crew were on board flight number 778 when it overshot the runway on landing in Irkutsk, and slammed into a concrete wall and buildings nearby at 02:50, Moscow time. “Fifty-five of those on board have been taken to hospital. Up to now, 65 bodies have been recovered,” a spokeswoman for Russia’s emergencies ministry said. Earlier, Interfax news agency quoted a source at the prosecutor’s office in Irkutsk as saying only 43 people had been taken to hospital and the rest had perished. The dead included the eight-member crew, Interfax said. Many of those on board were holidaymakers bound for a vacation on Lake Baikal, Itar-Tass news agency said. Only the aircraft’s tail section was left intact. Around 600 rescue workers were at the scene. Rescue teams, working in rainy weather and poor visibility, used cutting equipment to recover bodies from the smouldering wreckage. “We can confirm that the aircraft crashed on landing and caught fire,” a spokesman for Sibir, the company that operated the aircraft, said.

9 July 2006

A Russian Airbus A-310 (F-OGYP) burst into flames after it crashed on landing in the Siberian city of Irkutsk early today, killing at least 118 people. Russian news agencies said the death toll could be close to 150. Transport Minister Igor Levitin said the crash happened on a wet runway after rain. He told Russian state television Rossiya that the aircraft appeared to have skidded off the runway because of the wet conditions. “The aircraft veered off the runway. There was rain, the landing strip was wet. So we’ll have to check the clutch and the technical condition of the aircraft,” he said. The Prosecutor-General’s Office said that investigators considered a technical fault or human error as the two most likely versions of the crash, news agencies reported. Rescue workers who were sifting through the wreckage of the aircraft so far had found 118 bodies, said a duty officer at the Ministry’s regional branch. Interfax and ITAR-Tass reported that around 150 people had died, quoting a preliminary toll from the regional prosecutor’s office and transport ministry. Russian television pictures showed the wreckage of the aircraft, which crashed into one-story garage facilities on the airport perimeter after ploughing through the two-meter high concrete barrier, with a plume of smoke pouring from it. The aircraft came to halt only a short distance away from a number of small residential houses. The Ministry’s regional branch said that 54 people were injured in the crash, of whom 47 were hospitalized with burns. It took five emergency services more than two hours to extinguish the flames, Andrianova said. The Ekho Moskvy radio station, quoting local reports, said that about a ton of fuel had remained in the aircraft, causing two explosions. The Transport Minister said that the aircraft’s two black boxes had been recovered and were being deciphered. Levitin added that the pilot had radioed ground control to say the aircraft had landed safely and then communication cut off.

9 July 2006

At least 124 passengers and crew died when a Russian Airbus A-310 (F-OGYP raced out of control while landing and burst into flames today in the eastern Siberian city of Irkutsk. The Sibir (S7) airline jet arriving from Moscow with 200 people on board overshot the runway at 22:44 yesterday, smashed through a concrete fence, struck garages and caught fire. Revising an earlier figure of 55 survivors, prosecutors said 71 people escaped from the wreckage through the rear of the jet, many of them seriously injured. The front of the fuselage was completely destroyed by the blaze, which took firefighters three hours to extinguish. Investigators were trying to establish how the plane went out of control after the pilot told ground controllers that it had landed, said Russian Transport Minister Igor Levitin. ‘What we do know is that the aircraft shot off the runway in rain,’ he said, adding that experts would examine the drive mechanism and other systems for faults. Pilot error was also not excluded as a possible cause. One passenger said, the jet set down smoothly after the 5,000-kilometre flight before it rapidly accelerated again and hurtled off the end of the runway. Rescuers searching the wreck for missing persons recovered the flight recorders and sent them to Moscow for examination. The Airbus was carrying an eight-member crew and 192 or 193 passengers, according to conflicting reports. A pilot was among the survivors. A number of foreigners were among the passengers on flight 778 according to a list published. These included several with Chinese names. The German consulate in Novosbirsk confirmed that one German national survived. Three more unlisted people were also thought to have been on board. The 220-seater jet was built in 1987 and clocked up 52,000 flying hours on more than 10,000 flights, said Airbus, which announced it was sending a team of experts to Russia to assist the investigation.

9 July 2006

A failure of brakes on a wet runway was the possible cause of the crash of a Russian Airbus A310 (F-OGYP) in Siberia which killed at least 122 people, initial reports suggested. The S7 Airlines flight from Moscow ran out of control after landing at Irkutsk this morning and hit a building. Latest reports said 70 of the 204 on board survived; 12 were still missing. Russian President Vladimir Putin has expressed his condolences to the families of the dead and called for a national day of mourning tomorrow. Many of the passengers were travelling to the nearby popular holiday destination of Lake Baikal. Eight of those confirmed dead were children. The airline said one German, an Azeri and three Chinese were among the dead. The aircraft - operated by S7, known until recently as Sibir Airlines - overshot the runway, crashing through a concrete wall and hitting a building close to the airfield. It then broke up and burst into flames. Transport Minister Igor Levitin said the pilots had reported a successful landing to air traffic controllers but then contact was lost. An official told RIA-Novosti news agency that the aircraft’s hydraulic braking system appeared to have failed. “The information we have shows that after landing, when the aircraft put on the thrust reverser, there was a failure in the braking system that led other mechanisms in the system to break down,” he said. The deputy director of the Gromov Flight Research Institute, Anatoly Kochur, agreed that failure of the reverser was the most likely cause of the crash. Moisture on the runway may have compounded the problem rendering the aircraft in effect uncontrollable, he told Interfax news agency. The cause of the crash would be established for sure after examination of the two flight recorders, officials said. The cabin was wrecked and passengers had to be evacuated via the rear of the aircraft. Ten of them leapt from the aircraft after a stewardess opened an emergency exit. Others were brought out by rescuers. Most of those treated in hospital had suffered burns. The fire took three hours to put out, authorities said.

10 July 2006

Airbus A.310-324, F-OGYP, operated by Sibir Airlines, Sibir flight 778 departed Domodeovo (DME) at night for a flight to Irkutsk (IKT). On board were eight crew members, 193 passengers and three persons that were not on the flight manifest. Weather at Irkutsk was poor. It was raining, overcast clouds at 600 feet and a thunderstorm in the area. The Airbus landed on runway 30 (concrete, 3165 m/10343 feet long) but failed to stop on the runway at about 07:50, July 9. Preliminary reports indicate that the aircraft overran the runway at high speed, collided with a concrete barrier and burst into flames. At 16:00, Moscow time, July 9, it was reported that 122 bodies have been recovered. Seventy occupants have survived the accident. It is feared that the remaining twelve occupants died in the accident, bringing the presumed death toll to 134.

11 July 2006

One individual who was on board the Airbus A310 (FOGYP) which crashed at Irkutsk Airport on Sunday (July 9) remains unaccounted for, Russian Deputy Transportation Minister Boris Korol, a deputy head of the government commission investigating the incident, said today. The bodies of 21 victims of the crash have been turned over to their relatives, Korol said. In addition, biological samples have been taken from 107 people to carry out a DNA analysis of the remains, he said. At present, 123 bodies and six body parts are at the morgue, he said.