So these are plane crashes from around the world, but it's only for the countries that had a true crime case, if you don't see a plane crash in here, check my True crime from around the world book.
Warning, this book contains plane crashes and the a...
This plane crash takes us to the European country of Poland, which is located next to the following countries: Germany, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania and Russia.
WARNINGS OF A PLANE CRASH
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Pictured above is the accident aircraft, photographed in October 1986.
LOT Polish Airlines Flight 5055 was a scheduled international passenger flight from Warsaw to New York City. In the late-morning hours of the 9th of May 1987, the Ilyushin Il-62M operating the flight crashed in the Kabaty Woods nature reserve on the outskirts of Warsaw around 54 minutes after departure. All 183 passengers and crew on board were killed in the crash, making it the deadliest accident involving an Ilyushin Il-62, and the deadliest aviation disaster in Polish history.
The accident was determined to have been caused by the disintegration of an engine shaft due to faulty bearings. This led to a catastrophic failure of the two left engines and then an onboard fire, both of which eventually destroyed all flight-control systems.
The aircraft was a 186-seat Ilyushin Il-62M built in the third quarter of 1983, registered SP-LBG (Sierra Papa- Lima Bravo Golf) and named after Tadeusz Kościuszko, a Polish military leader and national hero. The Il-62 has four tail-mounted engines, with two on the left side (numbers 1 and 2) and two on the right side (numbers 3 and 4). The proximity of the two pairs of engines would prove critical during the accident sequence.
All of the crew members were Polish. The captain, Zygmunt Pawlaczyk, was 59 years old, with 19,745 flight hours' experience (5,542 on Ilyushin Il-62s), and a captain of the type from 11 May 1978. The first officer, Leopold Karcher, was aged 44. The remaining flight crew were flight engineer Wojciech Kłossek, aged 43; flight navigator Lesław Łykowski, aged 47; a 43-year-old radio operator, Leszek Bogdan; and Ryszard Chmielewski, a 53-year-old trainer of flight engineers on a routine observation of Kłossek's progress. Five flight attendants were on board; one was stationed in the technical cabin bay, between the engines, and probably either lost consciousness and burned in the fire or was sucked out of the aircraft after decompression; her body was never found despite an extensive search.
Of the 172 passengers on board, 155 were from Poland, while the other 17 were from the United States.
The flight to San Francisco via New York City took off from runway 33 at Okęcie Airport (IATA: WAW, ICAO: EPWA) at 10:18 AM CET. The crew was cleared to climb to 31,000 ft (9,400 m), on a course set to Grudziądz VHF omnidirectional range (VOR), which was reached at 26,500 ft (8,100 m). Soon after Flight 5055 took off from Warsaw, the crew was instructed by air traffic control (ATC) to climb to an altitude of 18,000 ft (5,500 m) as quickly as possible:
- 10:26am, Flight 5055: Well, we go to New York, possibly we'll be able to get to flight level 180... (tongue-in-cheek)
- 10:26am, Approach Control: Gentlemen! You won't make it. You have about 5 km (3.1 mi) to the TMN [Tango-Mike-November beacon]. I told you that clearance was set for 180 or higher. Military planes are training there. I have no communication with them to allow separation.
