- Air Inter Flight 148
Infobox Airliner accident|name=Flight IT-148
Date=January 20 1992
Type=Controlled flight into terrain
Site=Strasbourg France
Passengers=90
Crew=6
Fatalities=87
Injuries=9
Aircraft Type=Airbus A-320 -111
Operator=Air Inter Air Inter Flight 148 was a scheduled airline flight on
January 20 ,1992 that crashed in theVosges Mountains while circling to land atStrasbourg Airport . 87 of the 96 onboard were killed.Flight 148 departed Satolas Airport (now known as
Saint-Exupéry International Airport ) inLyon ,France at 5:20pm. While being vectored for a VOR DME Approach to Runway 05 at Strasbourg it crashed in the Mountains at a height of only 2600 feet. The pilots had no warning of the imminent impact as the aircraft was not fitted withGPWS .Flight 148 was the third of a series of crashes caused by what was believed to be pilots unfamiliarity with the
Airbus A320 sophisticated computer system. (SeeAir France Flight 296 andIndian Airlines Flight 605 .) It is believed the cause of the crash is that the pilots inadvertently left the autopilot in Vertical Speed mode (instead of Flight Path Angle mode) and then entered "33" – for 3.3° descent angle (which was actually interpreted as a rate of descent of 3,300 feet per minute).
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