Most Baby Boomers today can tell you precisely where they were and what they were doing the day John F Kennedy was shot down in Dallas in 1963. Similarly, those who remember a black day in December 1988 will remember where they were the day a Pan American airliner crashed into the quiet Scottish village of Lockerbie. While the Libyan government eventually owned up to being behind the incident, the Pan Am Flight 103 air crash investigation ruled that the airline had been guilty of wilful misconduct. They had not matched up every piece of baggage with its rightful owner prior to take-off from Frankfurt Airport.
There had been no prior indication of trouble with the aircraft before it left Frankfurt. Bombs are a recurring nightmare for everyone in the commercial aviation industry. Most bombs tend to be hidden inside luggage in the hold.
Bombs are not the only lethal menace with which the industry has to deal. There is a far more deadly enemy that cannot be risk-managed out of the picture. Since 1940, there has not been a decade gone by when at least one passenger craft has not been shot down by heavy artillery.
The cause of a 2007 Balad crash which involved an Antonov An-26 airliner, leaving 34 people dead and one seriously injured, remains in dispute. The incident occurred when the plane was attempting to land at an American military base in Balad, Iraq. While the official explanation is that the plane went down in bad weather, there are those who claim it was shot down by a missile.
One really nasty incident took place over three days in September 1993. One Transair Georgia airliner after another was shot down by SAMs (surface-to-air missiles) on September 21, 22 and 23. The first one, a flight from Sochi carrying 22 passengers and 5 crew, ended up in the Black Sea. All souls aboard perished. The next day, an airliner carrying Georgian soldiers, crashed on the runway after being shot down. The final episode in the trilogy ended with the death of a crew member when the plane was struck by a mortar or some other type of artillery.
In 1994, American military forces were accused of shooting down an Iranian Air Force plane carrying embassy staff. All 13 crew and 19 passengers were killed. Also in 1994, the presidents of Rwanda and Burundi were killed in a crash near the capital of Rwanda. Rocket fire was blamed for bringing the plane down.
In 1980, a DC-9-10/15 series airliner was plunged into the Tyrrhenian Sea near the island of Ustica, off the Italian coast of Naples. The then-president of Italy accused the French of killing all 81 passengers. It was not until 2013 that an Italian court ruled conclusively that the craft had been shot down by a missile.
The earliest recorded incident of a civilian passenger airliner being shot down was Finnish civilian transport and passenger plane on its way from Tallinn, Estonia, to Helsinki in Finland, on June 14, 1940. This was three months after the Winter War. The aircraft was intercepted and shot down by two Soviet torpedo bombers.
There had been no prior indication of trouble with the aircraft before it left Frankfurt. Bombs are a recurring nightmare for everyone in the commercial aviation industry. Most bombs tend to be hidden inside luggage in the hold.
Bombs are not the only lethal menace with which the industry has to deal. There is a far more deadly enemy that cannot be risk-managed out of the picture. Since 1940, there has not been a decade gone by when at least one passenger craft has not been shot down by heavy artillery.
The cause of a 2007 Balad crash which involved an Antonov An-26 airliner, leaving 34 people dead and one seriously injured, remains in dispute. The incident occurred when the plane was attempting to land at an American military base in Balad, Iraq. While the official explanation is that the plane went down in bad weather, there are those who claim it was shot down by a missile.
One really nasty incident took place over three days in September 1993. One Transair Georgia airliner after another was shot down by SAMs (surface-to-air missiles) on September 21, 22 and 23. The first one, a flight from Sochi carrying 22 passengers and 5 crew, ended up in the Black Sea. All souls aboard perished. The next day, an airliner carrying Georgian soldiers, crashed on the runway after being shot down. The final episode in the trilogy ended with the death of a crew member when the plane was struck by a mortar or some other type of artillery.
In 1994, American military forces were accused of shooting down an Iranian Air Force plane carrying embassy staff. All 13 crew and 19 passengers were killed. Also in 1994, the presidents of Rwanda and Burundi were killed in a crash near the capital of Rwanda. Rocket fire was blamed for bringing the plane down.
In 1980, a DC-9-10/15 series airliner was plunged into the Tyrrhenian Sea near the island of Ustica, off the Italian coast of Naples. The then-president of Italy accused the French of killing all 81 passengers. It was not until 2013 that an Italian court ruled conclusively that the craft had been shot down by a missile.
The earliest recorded incident of a civilian passenger airliner being shot down was Finnish civilian transport and passenger plane on its way from Tallinn, Estonia, to Helsinki in Finland, on June 14, 1940. This was three months after the Winter War. The aircraft was intercepted and shot down by two Soviet torpedo bombers.
0 comments:
Post a Comment