Air crash in Rostov on March 19, 2016: reasons and investigation

The tragedy in Rostov-on-Don happened on the night of 18 to 19 March 2016. Airliner "Boeing-737" crashed during the approach to landing. The plane carried out a regular flight from the United Arab Emirates.

The crew tried to land in difficult weather conditions for two hours, but failed. Everyone died. On board there were 62 people. The investigation of the plane crash in Rostov is conducted by the Interstate Aviation Committee in conjunction with specialists from the UAE, Russia, France and the United States.

Board № 981

The plane, crashed in Rostov-on-Don, belonged to the company Fly Dubay. This is a national LUKoster from the UAE. She is led by Sheik Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum, 57, who owns another well-known airline, Emirates Airline.

In turn Fly Dubay has been working since 2009, carrying out regular and charter flights to almost 50 countries in a hundred directions. Including in 10 Russian cities. In Rostov-on-Don - twice a week for the past three years. The balance of the company was only "Boeing".

It is worth noting that the carrier was distinguished by high safety performance. Before there was an air crash in Rostov-on-Don, the company did not have a single incident with human casualties. After the tragedy, the airline pilots on condition of anonymity admitted to foreign media that they often experienced overtaxity, as the work schedule was too saturated, and it was not possible to fully rest.

Boeing 737

The crashed Boeing was a fairly new aircraft. It was built in the US in 2011 specifically for the company Fly Dubay. The aircraft was equipped with two turbofan engines. At the time of the accident, it spent over 21,000 hours in the air, having performed more than 9,000 cycles on a take-off system. The airliner was never required to repair, maintenance was carried out on time and without problems. The last time was two months before the disaster.

At the same time the plane was not overcrowded: the liner was designed to carry 189 passengers, on the same day there were only 55 people on board, not counting the crew members. The fuel should have been enough for 8 and a half hours flight, the plane stayed in the air for no more than 6 hours.

Crew composition

The ship's pilot was commanded by 38-year-old Aristos Socratus, a native of Cyprus. In his practice, almost 6 thousand flight hours. It should be noted that in Fly Dubay, as in most other airlines, they did not appoint a pilot who did not fly 5,000 hours.

As commander of the ship, Socratus worked for a year and a half. At the same time on the eve of a plane crash in Rostov he filed a resignation letter. According to colleagues, this was due to overwork and heavy loads in Fly Dubay. Less than a month after the tragedy, his firstborn was born in his family.

The second pilot was the 37-year-old Spaniard Alejandro Alava Cruz. He also had almost 6,000 hours of flight practice. Both pilots sat in Rostov is not the first time.

Also among the crew were five flight attendants - natives of Russia, Kirghizia, Colombia, Spain and the Seychelles.

Weather

The causes of the crash in Rostov, many associated with the weather, they were difficult that night. The wind speed at the surface of the earth reached 13 meters per second, with gusts - up to 18. Visibility - about 7 kilometers, there was a slight rain shower. At an altitude of 900 meters to one and a half kilometers there was a moderate icing.

At the same time, as specialists note, the weather conditions as a whole were complex, but they should not have prevented a normal landing.

Flight

The plane flew from Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates, at 21.45 local time and was supposed to be at the airport in Rostov at 1.20 in Moscow. However, the flight was delayed for half an hour, and the approximate landing time was postponed. Among the spare airfields for the board, there were sites in Krasnodar and Volgograd.

The flight itself passed without incident. At 1.30 the pilots started manual piloting, the aircraft first attempted to land. Less than half an hour before, two other airlines landed in Rostov. At an altitude of 340 meters, the crew received a warning from the aircraft's safety systems about a dangerous wind on the runway. Information about this was conveyed to dispatchers on the ground and decided to stop approaching the landing.

For two hours the crew waited for improvement of weather conditions in 60 kilometers from Rostov-on-Don. Approximately at the same time in Rostov tried to land the liner of the company "Aeroflot", but after several unsuccessful attempts decided to board a spare airfield in Krasnodar.

Second attempt

In 3.23 Flight No. 981 asked dispatchers permission to re-land and began to decline. At an altitude of 600 meters from the ground, the crew disengaged the automatic control and continued to work in manual mode. At 3.40 the aircraft was at an altitude of 220 meters, 4 and a half kilometers from the beginning of the runway. Boeing increased speed and proceeded to climb. Approximately a thousand meters from the earth, the liner fell sharply and crashed into the ground.

Rostov dispatchers immediately reported the tragedy in the Ministry of Emergency Situations. The rescue operation began. It was attended by 840 people and more than 100 pieces of equipment.

On the video and photo of a plane crash in Rostov it is seen that the plane crashes into the ground at a very steep angle. Based on the small radius of the debris scattering, experts conclude that the plane crash in Rostov occurred at a high speed. In a collision with the earth, more than 300 square meters of runway was destroyed, Rostov airport was closed until 21 March.

Victims of the disaster

Those who died in a plane crash in Rostov are citizens of 9 states: Russia, Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, India, Uzbekistan, Cyprus, Seychelles, Spain and Colombia. A total of 62 people, 7 of them - crew members. Four dead are children.

Almost all victims of the plane crash are Russian citizens flying from vacation from the UAE. Almost all were customers of the country's popular travel company.

There was also a happy salvation. Russian Elvar Isayeva was late for a transfer from the hotel to the airport and did not have time for the ill-fated flight. As it turned out later, on the eve she celebrated her birthday with her friend, because of what she returned late to the hotel. Later, she safely flew from Dubai.

Rescuers in the course of the investigation found almost 5,000 fragments of bodies of the dead. Identification of the remains took about two months.

Families of the victims received compensation - one million rubles each. The leadership of the Rostov region declared mourning for the victims, whose lives were interrupted by a plane crash in Rostov-on-Don. The dead were citizens of different countries, so they grieved that day not only in Russia.

Initiation of investigation

The establishment of the cause of the crash in Rostov-on-Don took up the IAC. Experts from the United Arab Emirates, the United States (where the plane was going) and France (the engine developing country) were also attracted. To assess the actions of pilots, test pilots from Russia, the United States and the United Arab Emirates were involved.

The Investigative Committee decided to open a criminal case. In the early days it was believed that the plane crash in Rostov could occur for several reasons, among them the wrong actions of the crew, a technical malfunction and weather conditions were called. The probability of the terrorist attack was ruled out almost immediately, since traces of explosives were not found on the site of the crash.

Careful investigation

The course of the investigation was closely watched by the relatives of the deceased and experts. Already the next day, experts examined the scene of the incident and plotted the tragedy. Both black boxes were found in a satisfactory condition. Two days after the tragedy, the collection of fragments of the aircraft was completed, and they began to lay them out in the hangar.

This work was completed by April 8. Also, a selection was made of the aggregates for studies of the efficiency of all airliner systems. The decoding of the flight recorders and the translation of the crew's conversations with dispatchers from English and Spanish into Russian have been completed. However, the experts did not provide a full transcript of the talks, referring to international rules.

The work of the IAC

According to the conclusion of the IAC, the plane crash in Rostov on March 19, 2016 did not result from the failure of any aircraft systems or its malfunctions. At the time of departure from the UAE, he was technically sound.

The pilots had the necessary professional training and all the documents. It is also established that the meteorological equipment at the Rostov airport worked properly. The actual weather was in line with the forecasts. Radio was also working without interruptions. Therefore, the human factor came to the forefront among the causes of the tragedy.

Causes of the disaster

As a result of the investigation, the commission established a fairly accurate chronology of the events of the day when the plane crash occurred in Rostov.

During the second attempt to land at an altitude of about 200 meters, the liner pilots independently decided to interrupt the maneuver and begin climbing. Apparently, this decision was made because of reports of a wind shear near the runway. This is a natural phenomenon, dangerous for aircraft during landing and take-off.

At an altitude of 580 meters, the ship's commander turned the helm "on himself", thereby causing the nose of the aircraft to rise, which ultimately led to the lowering of the nose and the dive of the airliner.

According to the conclusion of the IAC experts, it was this sequence of actions that led to the fact that Boeing, having started gaining altitude, suddenly began to decline sharply. At the same time he was at an altitude of about 1000 meters above the ground. In the future, all the actions of the crew did not allow to prevent the tragedy, experts believe that the plane crash in Rostov was inevitable.

In this case, the motives for the action of the pilots in the report are not explained in detail. Only noted that these conclusions are not final, in the future, experts will study the psychological and physical condition of all crew members, primarily pilots. What is especially important, given the revealed facts of non-compliance in the airline regime of work and leisure employees.

The preliminary report concludes with recommendations to all airlines to arrange for additional pilots of civilian airliners to study the sequence of actions when going into the second round in different weather conditions. The final report has not yet been prepared by the commission.