Aircraft accidents, incidents and air crashes in the USSR and Russia. Aircraft accidents, incidents and air crashes in the USSR and Russia Crew commander A.D. Borodai
Exactly 20 years have passed since the tragic crash of the An-124 plane onto a residential building in Irkutsk. Residents of house No. 45 on Grazhdanskaya Street were doing their usual things on this Saturday: someone was watching TV, someone was busy in the kitchen. Parents and children were planning the weekend, and at that time the children from the neighboring orphanage No. 1 were walking in the yard.
The An-124 "Ruslan" is a heavy transport carrier with a payload capacity of 120 tons. On December 6, he was supposed to take off from the Irkutsk airfield aircraft plant for transportation to Vietnam of two Su-27 fighters assembled at the plant.
On December 6, 1997, at 14.42 local time, the Ruslan, unable to gain altitude, crashed directly into a residential area of the aircraft manufacturing town in Irkutsk.
All that was left of the huge plane was the tail section. Photo: From personal archive/ Boris Khlebnikov
Recalls the events of that day Igor Petrovich Utkin, lieutenant colonel of internal service, deputy head of the 2nd fire department of Irkutsk:
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| Igor Utkin |
“On this day, I, as the commander of a separate detachment of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, went on duty as part of the group accompanying this flight. I was personally at the airfield when the Ruslan took off. It became immediately clear that something was wrong with the plane. It was clear that he could not gain altitude. Everything happened very quickly, in a matter of seconds. When Ruslan began to descend, we already understood that the crash site would be a residential area.”
The Ministry of Emergency Situations teams managed to get to the scene of the disaster quickly. A terrible picture appeared before the eyes of the rescuers: the collapsed plane damaged several wooden barracks at once, part of the orphanage No. 1 was burning, the huge tail of the aircraft crushed the five-story building. But the most terrible sight was house No. 45, completely engulfed in fire.
Fire extinguishing. Photo: From personal archive/ Boris Khlebnikov
“After the fall, a terrible fire started,” continues Igor Utkin. - Ruslan’s tanks were filled to capacity; they were almost two railway tanks. The impact caused aviation fuel to splash out and the fire flared up instantly with enormous force. People caught in the fire wave died in a matter of seconds.”
By the time the fire crews arrived, the surviving people were rushing about on the balconies and in the open windows, it was clear that panic and fire were pushing them outside, a few more minutes and someone could have jumped out. Firefighters had to deploy light ladders and remove people directly from the burning balconies.
“Of course the situation was very difficult psychologically. The family of one of our employees lived in house 45. At the time of the disaster, he was in the apartment younger brother who sat at the table and did his homework. We found him in this position in a burnt-out apartment. The boy didn’t have time to understand anything, not even to jump up,” says Igor Utkin.
House No. 45 on Grazhdanskaya Street. Photo: Irkipedia.ru / Boris Slepnev
“My family still lives in a dormitory whose windows overlook the very place where the plane crashed,” recalls Natalya Bochkarnikova. “That day, I came home from work, tired. I remember seeing a plane flying low through the window and even managed to shout to my son to move away from the window. Then everything was like in a dream... I jumped out into the yard, it was already full of people, the forty-fifth house was in some kind of thick fog and fire, and from there burning people were running out to meet us. We placed them in their rooms, revived them, and provided medical assistance. Everything is still before my eyes.”
Extinguishing the burning fuel and rubble lasted more than a day and a half. All this time, the firefighters were supported by residents of the area. Despite the double cordon of the meta-disaster, the townspeople managed to bring tea and sandwiches to the rescuers.
“My friends and I wanted to help in some way,” says the Irkutsk resident Andrey Nikolaev, - Then we still didn’t know exactly what had happened and what was burning, we just walked towards the glow. As a result, they went straight to the fire. Houses and cars parked nearby were on fire. Rescuers carried the wounded. It was scary to see how dead people They were stacked in front of the school building, which was very close to the site of the tragedy. Of course, there was no help from us; they simply didn’t let us in. A huge number of cadets, the fire service, and the police worked on the spot without us. Through the cordon, ordinary people passed tea, buns, and some pies. Many were crying. I was struck by the feeling of extraordinary unity. Trouble brought us together."
Burnt cars. Photo: From personal archive/ Boris Khlebnikov
During the disaster and fire, 72 people died. Of these, 23 were crew members and 49 Irkutsk residents, including 14 children. Witnesses say that on this day a wedding was planned in house No. 45. In the morning, a multi-colored poster “Tili-tili, dough” hung on the entrance door. The bride lives here." The newlyweds left just a few minutes before the plane crashed, but there was nothing left in the apartment. large number their guests.
“There was a feeling of unreality of what was happening. “It feels like you’re in a horror movie,” recalls a resident of an aircraft manufacturing town. Natalia Pushkareva. - Several of my friends died in this fire. There were also those who miraculously escaped death. I just went about my business a minute before the disaster and turned the corner of the house. One of our friends died in his apartment along with his child. They were found in a chair, sitting in an embrace.”
Firefighters worked in the cold without noticing it. Photo: Irkipedia.ru / Boris Slepnev
There were only a few children in Orphanage No. 1 at the time of the disaster. Some went to the Children's Art Center, others to the pool and skating rink. In the fifth group there were only three girls left and their teacher, who 15 minutes before the tragedy brought her son Makar to the group. As employees of the institution later recalled, the fire literally rushed into the room, Makar burst into flames like a candle, and other children were also burning.
At this very time, pupils of the orphanage Yana Potanina and Lyuda Shashkina were playing on the playground very close to the 45th house. The girls were missed only in the evening, when all the children from the orphanage were transported to boarding school No. 13. The director of the orphanage, Galina Kryukova, and her staff wandered for a long time near the cordon, questioning the firefighters. At night, the woman was called for identification. The girls' bodies were burned so badly that they were reduced to 70-80 centimeters.
Exactly five days later, 15-year-old Anya Zernis, who was injured in a fire in the group, died in an Irkutsk hospital. Makar Mileshko was flown to Moscow, but his life could not be saved; he died in mid-January 1998.
Sergei Shoigu at the scene of the disaster. Photo: Irkipedia.ru / Boris Slepnev
The perpetrators have not been named
The investigation into the causes of the accident raised many questions. It was not possible to definitively answer why Ruslan fell. During the fire, the “black boxes” were almost completely burned out and the information from the crew’s conversations could not be restored. It is known that three engines of the plane failed at once, so the ship was unable to rise into the air higher than 66 meters. Some experts believe that this was due to the aircraft being overloaded. The case materials also contain a reference to possible problems D-18T engines, which were produced by the Ukrainian company Motor Sich OJSC. These units apparently had problems with gas-dynamic stability, especially at high angles of attack.
On December 6, 1997, the An-124 Ruslan military transport aircraft crashed into a residential area of Irkutsk immediately after takeoff due to the sequential failure of three of its four engines.
The plane took off from the Irkutsk-2 airfield on Saturday at 14.40 local time (09.40 Moscow time). On board were two Su-27 fighters, assembled by the Irkutsk Aviation Production Association, which were to be delivered to Vietnam.
Within less than half a minute after the plane took off from the runway, the first and third engines switched off, after which the same thing happened with the second engine. An attempt to keep the aircraft on one remaining engine, undertaken by the crew under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Vladimir Fedorov, was unsuccessful, and the aircraft, entering a right roll, crashed onto house No. 45 on Grazhdanskaya Street. The tail of the plane significantly hit house No. 120 on Mira Street, and the remaining debris hit the building of an orphanage located nearby. The severe consequences of the disaster were largely caused by the instantaneous ignition of tens of tons of aviation fuel. A few minutes after the disaster, fire trucks arrived at the scene of the disaster and began to evacuate people. Firefighters carried twenty-seven people out of the burning apartments.
On the night of December 7, 1997, Prime Minister of the Russian Federation Viktor Chernomyrdin and Minister of Emergency Situations of the Russian Federation Sergei Shoigu, an operational group of the Ministry of Emergency Situations - twenty-two rescuers and with them four search dogs - arrived in Irkutsk.
By the morning of December 7, 1997, the fire was localized, but individual sources, mainly building ceilings and unburned fuel, were still smoking and periodically caught fire. Rescuers began clearing the rubble and removing the bodies of the dead. The homeless people were temporarily housed in nurseries. A collection of things and products from the population has been organized.
The tail section of the plane, which remained virtually undamaged, rested on the building adjacent to the burnt house and posed a threat to working rescuers. On the afternoon of December 7, it was decided to drop the tail of the plane to the ground. The remains of the burnt houses had to be completely demolished.
The crew's internal conversations were not preserved - both flight recorders were at the epicenter of the fire and were severely damaged. The commission never came to a clear conclusion regarding engine failure. The reasons for their switching off, both using objective control means and experimentally, could not be definitively established. At the same time, experts have repeatedly expressed their opinion about the design shortcomings of the D-18T engines manufactured by the Ukrainian Motor Sich OJSC (these engines were installed on the deceased An-124).
After the disaster, Minister of Emergency Situations Sergei Shoigu announced that it was not the crew’s fault. The plane was piloted by experienced, well-trained pilots. The ship's commander, Vladimir Fedorov, had 2,800 flight hours, 110 of which he flew in 1997. Co-pilot Vladimir Ivanov spent 4020 hours in the air, of which 240 hours were in 1997.
In 1999, in Irkutsk, on Mira Street, on the site of one of the destroyed houses, the Church of the Nativity of Christ was erected, the very first service in which was dedicated to the memory of the victims.
The material was prepared based on information from RIA Novosti and open sources
The crew of the ASTC named after. OK. Antonov performed a certification flight on the third An-124-100 aircraft produced. The flight assignment included tests to determine controllability characteristics at maximum speed pressure. In the test flight area at an altitude of 5,800 m, the crew began to accelerate the speed from 530 km/h to 650 km/h with the rudder completely deflected to the right. When the speed reached 614 km/h, the nose fairing of the radar antenna and the forward deflectable part of the fuselage were destroyed. This led to sudden braking and strong vibration and noise in the cabin. Debris that got into engine No. 3 led to its self-shutdown and, as a consequence, to the failure of the 3rd hydraulic system. This, in turn, led to numerous failures of the aircraft’s systems, including the information complex for altitude and speed parameters - which led to the cessation of providing the crew with reliable indications of speed, altitude, angle of attack and vertical overload indicators. The angle of attack readings fluctuated between 12°-25°, the speed readings decreased to 0 km/h, and the altimeter readings increased by 1,200 m.
In the pilot's cabin, there was a continuous activation of sound and light alarms of a critical flight mode, which caused a large psycho-emotional load on the crew and affected their ability to calmly counteract the current situation. The crew encountered most of the failures for the first time.
The crew released the wing mechanization by 2°. In this case, only the slats and outer sections of the flaps came out. The release of the internal sections of the flaps, the drives of which were connected to the failed 3rd hydraulic system, did not occur. In turn, this led to the failure of the system for changing the transmission ratio of the mechanical wiring (SCsh) along the RV channel and the absence of an automatic change in the transmission ratio from the steering wheel to the elevator from the cruising value to the takeoff and landing value.
The crew increased the operating mode of engines No. 2 and 4. At the same time, engine No. 4 surged, and debris from the nose cone also entered its air intake, but it did not turn off, but switched to a mode close to flight idle.
The crew then increased the operating mode of engine No. 1 to 58%. This led to vigorously developing sideways slip. By removing the throttle, the engine was switched to PMG mode. The flight continued with a decrease and increase in the amplitude of the aircraft's oscillations along the course.
The PIC gave the command to the experimental engineers to leave the aircraft with parachutes. The command was carried out only by one engineer, who was in the rear cockpit and left the board through the emergency hatch. When he landed on the forest, he was seriously injured.
The flight took place towards the Gostomel airport, where the crew expected to make an emergency landing. In the absence of an indication of the flight speed, it was determined approximately (450 km/h) with the help of an approaching An-22 aircraft, which began to fly on a parallel course. This speed significantly exceeded the landing speed. To reduce it, the PIC gave the command to extend the flaps further. Due to the release of only the outer flaps, which provide a diving moment, with the available elevator deflection of 13° (due to the gear ratio remaining in the cruising position), the full deflection of the steering wheel “towards itself” was not enough to level the flight path and land on a/d Gostomel. The vertical rate of descent increased significantly. The crew was unable to stop the descent. The plane collided with trees up to 30-40 m high, fell into a forest 43 km west of the Gostomel highway, completely collapsed and caught fire. All remaining crew members and experimental engineers on board were killed.
MOSCOW, December 6 – RIA Novosti, Andrey Kots. The huge military aircraft goes into a deep roll, barely leaving the runway. The pilot desperately pulls the control wheel, trying to steer the doomed plane away from residential areas. But "Ruslan" is already completely uncontrollable: hundreds of tons of metal and aviation kerosene fall on the plane at takeoff speed. multi-storey buildings. Twenty years ago, on December 6, 1997, heavy over the aircraft manufacturers' microdistrict in the north of Irkutsk. This tragedy, which became one of the most terrible plane crashes last decades, claimed the lives of 72 people. Its exact cause has not yet been determined. Read about how events unfolded that day in the RIA Novosti article.
Thirty five seconds
Aircraft RA-82005 receives the go-ahead for takeoff from the controller of the experimental airfield Irkutsk-2 at 14:40 local time on December 6, 1997. A fully fueled and loaded aircraft weighs more than 350 tons - 150-180 thousand liters of fuel in the internal tanks, two “naked” 17-ton Su-27UBK fighters for the Vietnamese Air Force in the cargo compartment, eight crew members and 15 passengers. Ahead is a multi-hour flight to Cam Ranh with a landing in Vladivostok. In general, it was a routine flight for the experienced aircraft commander, Lieutenant Colonel Vladimir Fedorov, who had flown 2,800 hours in heavy transport aircraft during his extensive practice. The 12-year-old Ruslan itself does not arouse suspicion, having completed the takeoff-landing cycle 576 times, which is not so much for such an aircraft.
The weather conditions are calm. Air temperature - minus 20, visibility 3000 meters. It couldn't be better. At 14:42, Lieutenant Colonel Fedorov smoothly pushes the engine control lever away from himself. An-124, gradually picking up speed, runs along the takeoff. The liftoff occurs at the calculated point at a distance of 1900 meters from the start of the takeoff run. And then some kind of devilry begins.
Immediately after takeoff, the third engine begins to sneeze with splashes of flame. Exactly three seconds later it stalls. It’s too late to abort the flight—the so-called “decision time” point is far behind. Six seconds later, at an altitude of 22 meters, the second engine stops. And almost immediately - the first one. The crew manages to inform the dispatcher about the failure of the two left engines. Vladimir Fedorov orders his subordinates to restart at least one of them... and at this point the connection is interrupted. The plane, flying on one engine, falls sharply to the left. "Ruslan" hits a wooden two-story house with its wing, turns around and crashes into a five-story brick building, hitting the one next to it. orphanage. From the moment the An-124 takes off from the runway until the crash, exactly 35 seconds pass.
Scary Saturday
The sixth of December in 1997 fell on a Saturday. Residents of doomed houses go about their business. Someone is watching TV, someone is preparing dinner, someone is walking in the yard with the dog. And someone, as eyewitnesses later said, was cheerfully celebrating their wedding. The usual life of dozens of people turns into hell in a matter of seconds. The impact of the main part of the fuselage is taken by residential building No. 45 on Grazhdanskaya Street. One and a half hundred tons of aviation kerosene - this is the equivalent of two railway tanks - instantly ignites and immediately engulfs a five-story building with wooden barracks nearby. After the fall, the tail of the plane separates, crashes into house number 120 on Mira Street and completely cuts off all the balconies from the facade.
The first teams of firefighters arrive at the scene of the disaster almost instantly. There is no time to deploy heavy equipment - rescuers are running to burning houses with light stairs in order to have time to save the residents who ran out onto the balconies in panic. Not everyone can be rescued: 49 Irkutsk residents, including 14 children, die in the fire.
Extinguishing the burning fuel and clearing the rubble continued for more than a day and a half. House No. 45 on Grazhdanskaya Street and four wooden apartment barracks were demolished immediately after the incident. Almost 70 families left homeless had to be resettled. Now the Church of the Nativity of Christ stands on the site of the tragedy. And house number 45 on Grazhdanskaya Street cannot be found on any map today - local authorities have not decided to assign this fatal number to another building.
No one is guilty
We will never know what happened in the An-124 cockpit in those seconds. Both flight recorders found themselves in the very epicenter of the fire and burned out almost completely. From the very beginning, the investigation lost its main sources of information. According to the official version, the cause of the crash was the sequential shutdown of the plane's three engines during takeoff and climb. It was not possible to find out why this happened either using objective control means or experimentally. Experts said one of the possible reasons was the large overload of the aircraft. At the same time, experts have repeatedly expressed their opinion about the design shortcomings of the D-18T engines manufactured by the Ukrainian Motor Sich OJSC.
Other assumptions were also voiced. In particular, in 2009, the general designer of the Zaporizhzhya Machine-Building Design Bureau "Progress" (an enterprise that develops engines for the An-124), Fyodor Muravchenko, came out with his version of the causes of the disaster. Based on his research, experiments and theoretical calculations, he came to the conclusion that the catastrophic situation was caused by the increased water content in aviation fuel and, as a consequence, the formation of ice that clogged the fuel filters. This, according to Muravchenko, caused the engines to surge and then stop.
The pilots also expressed their opinions. In particular, test pilot first class Colonel Alexander Akimenkov suggested that the engine failure was probably due to a radiotelephone call made by one of the passengers on board. As a result, the aircraft's electronics could fail. Be that as it may, it is not possible to confirm this today. The real reasons for the crash of RA-82005 will remain one of the main mysteries of aircraft accidents in recent decades.
It is worth noting that heavy long-range transport aircraft An-124 have proven themselves to be reliable and unpretentious aircraft. Over 30 years of operation, 55 vehicles of this type were built. Before the Irkutsk tragedy, the Ruslans crashed only twice - and both times due to crew error.
Date of the plane crash: 10/08/1996
Time of plane crash: 10:50
Country of crash: Italy
Location of the plane crash: near Turin
Aircraft type: An-124-100
Aircraft registration: RA82069
Airline company name: Aeroflot - Russian International Airlines
Chronology of events:
Turin airport runway length in view repair work was lowered from 3300 to 2350 m (the entrance end was moved 950 m further), which the crew knew about. Also, due to repair work, the course and glide path system operated only in localizer mode. Weather conditions could be considered poor, but they still exceeded the airport minimum - runway visibility - 1500 m in light rain and low cloud conditions. There were two commanders in the cockpit, one of whom acted as co-pilot. After leaving the clouds, the plane passed the end of the runway earlier than the crew expected, and at an altitude that was higher than calculated. Believing that there was not enough remaining runway for a safe landing, the co-pilot insisted on a missed approach when the commander decided to land. The plane flew over the runway in a descent. The co-pilot finally convinced the commander, and at the moment when there was no more than a meter left between the runway surface and the landing gear wheels, the commander began a go-around. But due to design flaws in the engine control system and the commander’s error in the action plan for bringing the engines into operation, only one engine reached takeoff mode. The plane was unable to gain altitude. Approximately 1 km from the runway, at a height of 25 m, it touched trees above the level of the airfield. Then he touched the roof of a two-story house in the town of San Francesco al Campo, fell to the ground, collided with a farm building on his nose and caught fire. The plane was flown to Turin to pick up several Ferrari cars and deliver them to Brunei.
The plane was owned by Ajax Airlines, but was operated by Aeroflot.
Information about the victims:
There were a total of 23 people on board: 23 crew members. There were 2 people on the ground. A total of 4 people died: 2 crew members, 2 people on the ground.
Details of the plane crash:
Flight phase: missed approach
Identified causes of the plane crash: crew error, design flaws
Aircraft details:
Aircraft make: An-124-100
Aircraft ID: RA-82069
Country in which the aircraft was registered: Russia
Aircraft production date: 1993
Flight details:
Flight type: Ferry
Aviation company: Aeroflot - Russian International Airlines
Country in which the aviation company was registered: Russia
Flew from: Moscow (Sheremetyevo)
Flew to: Turin
Starting point: Moscow (Sheremetyevo)
Final destination: Turin
Details:
Conclusions of the commission that investigated the plane crash
Insufficient training and poor crew communication. Poor planning for approach, delay in go-around decision.
Design flaws of the engine control system.
Additional information:
Crew details:
Alexander Ugryumov - co-pilot/PIC
