- Lauda Air Flight 004
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Lauda Air Flight 004 Accident summary Date 26 May 1991 Type In-flight uncommanded deployment of thrust reverser Site Phu Toei National Park, Amphoe Dan Chang, Suphanburi Province, Thailand Passengers 213 Crew 10 Injuries 0 Fatalities 223 (all) Survivors 0 Aircraft type Boeing 767-3Z9ER Aircraft name Mozart Operator Lauda Air Tail number OE-LAV Flight origin Kai Tak Airport, Hong Kong Last stopover Don Mueang International Airport, Bangkok, Thailand Destination Vienna International Airport, Vienna, Austria 
A similar Lauda Air Boeing 767-300
Lauda Air Flight 004 memorialLauda Air Flight 004 was an international passenger flight that crashed due to a thrust reverser deployment of the number 1 engine in flight.
Contents
History of the flight
On 26 May 1991, at 23:02 local time, Flight NG004 (originating from Hong Kong's Kai Tak Airport), a Boeing 767-3Z9ER, registration OE-LAV, ship name Mozart, took off from Old Bangkok International Airport (Don Mueang International Airport) for its flight to Vienna International Airport with 213 passengers and 10 crew, under the command of Captain Thomas J. Welch (American) and First Officer Josef Thurner (Austrian).
At 23:08, Welch and Thurner received a visual warning indicating that a possible system failure would cause the thrust reverser on the number 1 engine to deploy in flight. Having consulted the aircraft's Quick Reference Handbook, they determined that it was "just an advisory thing" and took no action.[1]
At 23:17, the thrust reverser on the number 1 engine deployed while the plane was over mountainous jungle terrain in the border area between Suphanburi and Uthai Thani provinces, Thailand. Thurner's last recorded words were, "Oh, reverser's deployed!".[2][3]
The 767 stalled in mid-air and disintegrated at 4,000 feet (1,200 meters). Most of the wreckage was scattered over a remote forest area roughly 1 km2 in size, at an elevation of 600 m above sea level, in what is now Phu Toei National Park, Suphanburi. The wreckage was at 14.44 degrees north and 99.26 east. The wreckage site is about three nautical miles north northeast of Phu Toey, Huay Kamin, Dan Chang District, Suphan Buri Province.[4]Hikers arrived at the crash site and took footage of the wreckage.
None of the 223 passengers and crew aboard the airliner survived. It was the first fatal crash of a Boeing 767. The accident remains the deadliest aviation disaster on Thai soil to date, and the deadliest 767 crash. Rescuers found the body of Welch still in the pilot's seat.[5] After the accident, scavengers collected electronics and jewellery.[6] About one quarter of the airline's carrying capacity vanished as a result of the crash.[7]
Upon hearing of the crash, Niki Lauda, retired Formula 1 race driver and owner of the airline, travelled to Thailand. He examined the wreckage and concluded that the largest fragment was about 5 metres (16 ft) by 2 metres (6.6 ft), "about half the size of the largest piece in the Lockerbie crash." [8] As evidence started to point towards the thrust reversers as the cause of the accident, he made simulator flights at Gatwick Airport which appeared to show that deployment of a thrust reverser was a survivable incident. Lauda said that the thrust reverser could not be the sole cause of the crash.[9] The accident report states that the "flightcrew training simulators yielded erroneous results"[10] and stated that recovery from the loss of lift from the reverser deployment "was uncontrollable for an unexpecting flight crew".[11] The incident led Boeing to modify the thrust reverser system to prevent similar occurrences.[12]
Aviation writer Macarthur Job has noted that, "had that Boeing 767 been of an earlier version of the type, fitted with engines that were mechanically rather than electronically controlled, then that accident could not have happened." [2]
At the crash site, which is accessible to national park visitors, a shrine was later erected to commemorate the victims.[13] Another memorial and cemetery is located near Ban Tha Sadet, some 90 km away in Amphoe Mueang Suphanburi.[14]
Passengers
The passengers were of 83 nationalities. The passengers and crew included 83 Austrians. Of the passengers, 125 had boarded in Hong Kong, while the rest boarded in Bangkok.[15]
Notable victims
- Donald McIntosh, a 43-year old British senior United Nations anti-drug official posted in Bangkok. His death caused Austrian newspapers to post initial speculation stating that people bombed the airplane to kill him; a UN spokesperson said that he was not on a secret mission and could not have been a target of an assassination.[5][15]
- Pairat Decharin, the governor of Chiang Mai Province, and his wife.[5][16]
See also
- Azza Transport Flight 2241
- TAM Flight 402
Notes
- ^ Accident description at the Aviation Safety Network
- ^ a b Job, Macarthur (1996). Air Disaster Volume 2, Aerospace Publications, ISBN 1-875671-19-6: pp.203-217
- ^ Accident Report, Appendix A, page 55
- ^ Accident Report
- ^ a b c "UN drug man 'not Thai bomb target'." The Independent. Thursday 30 May 1991.
- ^ Johnson, Sharen Shaw. "Scavengers complicate crash probe." USA Today. 29 May 1991. News 4A.
- ^ Traynor, Ian. "Lauda's driving ambition brings triumph and disaster in tandem." The Independent. 28 May 1991.
- ^ "Looting may have hidden clues to crash." The Advertiser. Thursday 30 May 1991.
- ^ New York Times - 'Owner Rejects Thrust as Cause of Air Crash'
- ^ Accident Report, section 2.3, page 21
- ^ Accident Report, section 3.1, 9, page 41
- ^ Lane, Polly; Acohido, Byron. "Boeing Tells 757 Owners To Replace Part -- Faulty Thrust-Reverser Valve Blamed In 767 Accident That Killed 223". The Seattle Times. http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=19910909&slug=1304510. Retrieved 2009-06-23.
- ^ Paknam Web - Phu Toei National Park
- ^ Paknam Web - Lauda Air Cemetery
- ^ a b Traynor, Irian, Nick Cumming-Bruce, and Steve Vines. "Crash teams investigate plane blast." The Independent. 28 May 1991.
- ^ Study In Thailand: Religion-Psychical Orientation (Pairat Decharin Briefly Mentioned)
References
- Accident Report - Lauda Air Flight 004 (Archive) - Aircraft Accident Investigation Committee, Ministry of Transport and Communications Thailand, Prepared for World Wide Web usage by Hiroshi Sogame (十亀 洋 Sogame Hiroshi), a member of the Safety Promotion Committee (総合安全推進) of All Nippon Airways
External links
- "การสอบสวนอากาศยานประสบอุบัติเหต" Department of Civil Aviation (Thai)
- Last flight of the Mozart (Der Todesflug der Mozart, German)." - Austrian Wings - Austrias Aviation Magazine
- PlaneCrashInfo.Com - Lauda Air Flight 004
- Grand Prix Hall of Fame - Biography on Niki Lauda (Contains information about Flight 004)
May 26 Lauda Air Flight 004
Jul 10 L'Express Airlines Flight 508
Jul 11 Nigeria Airways Flight 2120
Aug 16 Indian Airlines Flight 257Sep 11 Continental Express Flight 2574
Nov 20 Azerbaijani helicopter shootdown
Dec 27 Scandinavian Airlines Flight 751
Dec 29 China Airlines Flight 358Incidents resulting in at least 50 deaths shown in italics. Deadliest incident shown in bold smallcaps.Categories:- Airliner accidents and incidents caused by mechanical failure
- Aviation accidents and incidents in 1991
- Aviation accidents and incidents in Thailand
- Accidents and incidents involving the Boeing 767
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