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Plane with 28 on board crashes in Russian Far East

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I'm sorry to say, Tupolevs and Antonovs are not the safest aircraft to fly in. I once had to fly from Munich to Belgrade in a similar Russian-made propeller plane, and after we were all seated, they made all the passengers in the last three rows get up and move into vacant seats forward "to balance the airplane". If an airplane that weighs hundreds of tonnes is so sensitive that one tonne of humans would unbalance it, I am not confident in the flying characteristics of said aircraft.

3 ( +9 / -6 )

Not good. Praying that somehow they are all found alive and well.

-2 ( +2 / -4 )

Sadly Reuters already confirmed the plane crashed into the sea :(

0 ( +1 / -1 )

According to this article on RT too. Still hoping…

https://www.rt.com/russia/528454-plane-missing-far-east-kamchatka/

-1 ( +0 / -1 )

Would you board such a thing, from 1982, Russian, a profit greedy aviation company boss from there tells you it’s technically sound, an incident with drunken pilots on the same route occurred some years ago…, would you? It’s obviously safer to swim the distance naked and through the icy sea there. lol

-3 ( +6 / -9 )

Getting reports of wreckage found, but no survivors... :(

1 ( +2 / -1 )

Oops, I now see that the article has been updated. Apologies.

3 ( +4 / -1 )

Russian airlines and their aircraft are not world renowned for their maintenance or safety.

Wild speculation of the day, wonder if the head of government for Palana got on the wrong side of the Russian Mafia or an oligarch, much the same thing!

2 ( +5 / -3 )

Sad, I hope they inspect their planes better to ensure passenger safety.

-1 ( +0 / -1 )

Given the rate of air accidents, I think Russians were not meant to fly,

0 ( +2 / -2 )

Apparently the human factor was the cause, though it seems that the plane itself was very dated, too..

Given the rate of air accidents, I think Russians were not meant to fly

Check the stats, you would be surprised

https://www.statista.com/statistics/262867/fatal-civil-airliner-accidents-since-1945-by-country-and-region/

-2 ( +0 / -2 )

the plane “practically crashed into a sea cliff,” which wasn't supposed to be in its landing trajectory.

lol Are you serious?? A sea cliff "wasn't supposed to be in it's landing trajectory"??

It's like the tanker whose front fell off.

-1 ( +0 / -1 )

I'm sorry to say, Tupolevs and Antonovs are not the safest aircraft to fly in. I once had to fly from Munich to Belgrade in a similar Russian-made propeller plane, and after we were all seated, they made all the passengers in the last three rows get up and move into vacant seats forward "to balance the airplane". If an airplane that weighs hundreds of tonnes is so sensitive that one tonne of humans would unbalance it, I am not confident in the flying characteristics of said aircraft.

I'm a former military pilot with a commercial and instrument rating for civil aviation. Weight and balance considerations apply to every airplane regardless of size or national origin. Too many passengers in the rear and empty seats up front are asking for trouble on any airplane. An airplane only has so much nose down trim available. On a smaller airplane like the AN-26 or Beech King Air that is a normal consideration. Abroad in austere conditions I have had to stand on a bathroom scales holding my luggage while the co-pilot added up the weight on a hand calculator. When they hit their max weight for the conditions (altitude, temperature, humidity and atmospheric pressure all affect performance with high hot and humid being the worst) that was the last passenger. This was boarding a US made aircraft. There have been occasions we had to leave our luggage behind to be brought in by a follow up airplane because we were needed at the job site now. The luggage could come later. This is what flying smaller aircraft in austere conditions is like. In any event the cause of the mishap appears to be weather related and not an over loaded or unbalanced aircraft. The AN-26 is a good robust airplane that if it suffers from anything it suffers from being owned mostly by crummy airlines that don't maintain them well or recruit good pilots. The airplane itself is fine.

6 ( +7 / -1 )

Apparently the human factor was the cause, though it seems that the plane itself was very dated, too..

Age doesn't matter in and of itself. What matters are how many hours are on the airframe and how well maintained it is. Most of the C-5 fleet is older than this Antonov but because they are not heavily utilitzed the fleet has decades of service left in them. I once flew on what at the time was the highest hour airliner in US service, a Continental Air Micronesia 727 set up with 40 degree flaps, fenders on the landing gear and screens over air inlets and landing lights so they could land it on short coral runways of small atolls in the Pacific. It was superbly well maintained. A company I flew for had the highest hour helicopter in the world at the time, an old Boeing Vertol BV107 with over 50,000 hours. It flew like a new aircraft because the company had such good maintenance. Our lowest time helo had 17,000 hours, which is well beyond what the US military considers "safe", lol. I flew the same helo in the US military with well under 10,000 hours and due to less aggressive maintenance they didn't have the nice tight flight controls of the same aircraft my civilian employer had. Maintenance matters more than hours or age. A well maintained AN-26 is a fine aircraft.

5 ( +6 / -1 )

As above, they seem to have been somewhat off-course. There were reports of fog in the area.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

lol Are you serious?? A sea cliff "wasn't supposed to be in it's landing trajectory"??

Google Maps the town and see for yourself. It's not much of a town and not much of an airport. Single runway not very long, no parallel taxiway so the airplane has to turn around after landing and taxi back down the runway to the terminal. There are mountains to the west and the Sea of Okhotsk to the immediate east. There are tall cliffs above the ocean and a bit of a headland as you approach the runway from the east. If the plane was low and in the goo it could hit the cliffs. The only landing aid is a nondirectional beacon, the least precise NAVAID there is. No VOR and no published GPS approach either.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

A quick browse of aviation websites to learn the specifics of the instrument approach to Palana shows that there have been several crashes there where pilots made major mistakes flying that NDB approach and hit nearby Mount Pyatibratka.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

@wipeout, @desert tortoise

Yes, I realize, but it's ridiculous to suggest that a cliff may or may not have been in it's trajectory. Close, perhaps, but not IN the trajectory.

Anyway, RIP.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

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