AVIATION/ MAK REPORTS ON AVIASTAR TU FL1906

The Russian Aviation Interstate Committee (MAK) has released its Final Report into the crash landing of AVIASTAR-TU Flight 1906 on March 22, 2010. On that date, Flight 1906 was on Tupolev TU204 Positioning Flight from Hurghada, Egypt, to Moscow, Russia, with 8 crew members onboard. The Tupolev crash landed in forrested terrain at 2:35am, about 3300 feet short of runway 14R at Moscow Domodedovo Airport. All 8 crew members onboard suffered serious injuries and the Tupolev was destroyed in the incident. Shortly after the crash, MAK reported that there was no distress call from Flight 1906 prior to the crash. All communication between the crew and ATC was normal and there were no reports of any malfunctions or failure.

In its Final Report, MAK concluded that the flight crew conducted an approach to the Airport in below-minima weather conditions for an aircraft with a defective flight control computer system. They failed to execute a go-around when failing to obtain visual contact with the ground. Among the Contributing Factors listed were: Insufficient training of the crew to perform approaches at or near weather minima; Lack of control over the activities of the crew, which led to poor resource management of the Captain; Failure of the flight control computer system, which led to an increase in the allowed weather minima of the aircraft; Failure of Captain to divert to another Airport; Failure of Captain to decide about a missed approach when there was visual contact with the approach lights; Failure of the Co-Pilot to call for a missed approach; Unsatisfactory interaction in the crew, resulting in a descent below safe altitude. MAK went on to say that failure of the autoflight systems and the impossibility to remove that fault together with inadequate training and possible fatigue most likely created mental and emotional stress that prevented the crew from making the best decisions to complete the flight. The full report, in Russian, can be found on the MAK website.