Malév Flight 110

Malév Flight 110 was a scheduled flight from Budapest-Ferihegy Airport to Borispol Airport. On 16 September 1971, the Tupolev Tu-134 (HA-LBD) crashed near Kiev-Borispol Airport, Ukraine, due to poor visibility conditions, killing all 49 passengers and crew on board. The crash of Flight 110 was Ukraine's third worst airplane crash at the time, and is now the 10th worst for the country.

Accident

The flight from Budapest, Hungary had been delayed by more than an hour due to poor weather conditions. The flight eventually took off and reached its destination at Kiev-Borispol Airport in Ukraine; however, the weather conditions had created heavy fog leading to visibility of only 1,800 metres (5,900 ft). These conditions made the crew unable to land on their first attempt. It would have been advised that the plane either return to land at Budapest or at another nearby airport, but the pilot chose to keep circling and try to land at Kiev-Borispol Airport. The airplane also signaled that the plane's generator had failed and had forced the crew to switch to the battery's auxiliary power,however, subsequent investigation found that this was a false signal which could have been rectified but it was not. The crew did inform ground control of this situation but they did not report that it was an emergency according to protocol. In the event of such an emergency, it was recommended for crew to shut down excessive energy consumers like refrigerators, kitchen heaters or cabin lighting in order to allow the airplane to operate on battery power for longer, but this did not occur on Flight 110, so the battery life decreased by half. Protocol was followed to safely lower the aircraft for a final attempt at descent but visibility had reduced even more, to 700 metres (2,300 ft), and the pilot was told incorrect yet crucial information about the conditions. The plane deviated significantly from the advised flight-path and flew over the airport, losing integral radio and radar connection with ground-control. Battery power would have been significantly depleted, likely causing instrument malfunctions and leaving the crew unaware of critical information for a safe landing in the weather conditions. Investigation revealed that the plane sank too low to avoid collision and the right wingtip impacted the ground at a speed of about 550–580 kilometres per hour (300–310 kn; 340–360 mph), causing the aircraft to break into multiple pieces, killing all aboard instantly. It was impossible to identify the victims from the wreckage, however none of the 8 crew members and 41 passengers on board survived. After an investigation, officials determined that the crash was caused by a series of events involving pilot error, mismanagement of the situation by the ground crew, aircraft malfunctions, and poor conditions.

Sources

• https://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=19710916-2
• http://iho.hu/hir/a-kijevi-katasztrofa-titkai
• http://www.bacs-kiskun-leveltar.hu/V3/SP07_mbn/Tanulmanyok/szbe-02t-1.html Archived 2014-03-23 at the Wayback Machine