The 1948 Gatow air disaster was a
mid-air collision
In aviation, a mid-air collision is an aviation accident, accident in which two or more aircraft come into unplanned contact during flight. Owing to the relatively high velocities involved and the likelihood of subsequent impact with the ground o ...
in the
airspace
Airspace is the portion of the atmosphere controlled by a country above its territory, including its territorial waters or, more generally, any specific three-dimensional portion of the atmosphere. It is not the same as aerospace, which is the ...
above
Berlin
Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...
, Germany that occurred on 5 April, sparking an
international incident {{Refimprove, date=December 2011
An international incident (or diplomatic incident) is a seemingly relatively small or limited action, incident or clash that results in a wider dispute between two or more nation-states. International incidents can ...
. A
British European Airways
British European Airways (BEA), formally British European Airways Corporation, was a British airline which existed from 1946 until 1974.
BEA operated to Europe, North Africa and the Middle East from airports around the United Kingdom. The a ...
(BEA)
Vickers VC.1B Viking airliner
An airliner is a type of aircraft for transporting passengers and air cargo. Such aircraft are most often operated by airlines. Although the definition of an airliner can vary from country to country, an airliner is typically defined as an ...
crashed near
RAF Gatow
Royal Air Force Gatow, or more commonly RAF Gatow, was a British Royal Air Force station (military airbase) in the district of Gatow in south-western Berlin, west of the Havel river, in the borough of Spandau. It was the home for the only k ...
air base, after it collided with a
Soviet Air Force
The Soviet Air Forces ( rus, Военно-воздушные силы, r=Voyenno-vozdushnyye sily, VVS; literally "Military Air Forces") were one of the air forces of the Soviet Union. The other was the Soviet Air Defence Forces. The Air Forces ...
Yakovlev Yak-3
The Yakovlev Yak-3 (Russian: Яковлев Як-3) was a single-engine, single-seat World War II Soviet fighter. Robust and easy to maintain, it was much liked by both pilots and ground crew.Glancey 2006, p. 180. One of the smallest and lighte ...
fighter aircraft. All ten passengers and four crew on board the Viking were killed, as was the Soviet pilot. The disaster resulted in a diplomatic standoff between the United Kingdom and United States on one hand, and the
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...
on the other, and intensified distrust leading up to the
Berlin Blockade
The Berlin Blockade (24 June 1948 – 12 May 1949) was one of the first major international crises of the Cold War. During the multinational occupation of post–World War II Germany, the Soviet Union blocked the Western Allies' railway, road ...
in the early years of the
Cold War
The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because the ...
.
Historical background
The historical backdrop of the air disaster was the intensifying clash over the future of Berlin and Germany. At the end of
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
, the
Allied Powers agreed to divide and occupy
Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
, including the capital Berlin. Through a series of agreements it was decided to divide Germany and Berlin into four sectors; the Americans, British and French shared the
western half of Berlin, while the Soviets occupied
East Berlin
East Berlin was the ''de facto'' capital city of East Germany from 1949 to 1990. Formally, it was the Allied occupation zones in Germany, Soviet sector of Berlin, established in 1945. The American, British, and French sectors were known as ...
. The division of Germany placed Berlin well inside the Soviet
zone of occupation and supplies to West Berlin had to be brought in either overland or by air from the American, British and French zones in the Western half of Germany. Germany was jointly governed by the wartime allies through an
Allied Control Council
The Allied Control Council or Allied Control Authority (german: Alliierter Kontrollrat) and also referred to as the Four Powers (), was the governing body of the Allied Occupation Zones in Germany and Allied-occupied Austria after the end of Wo ...
, which periodically met to co-ordinate events and discuss the future of Germany; while Berlin was jointly governed by the
Allied Kommandatura
The Allied Kommandatura, or often just Kommandatura, also known as the ''Alliierte Kommandantur'' in German, was the governing body for the city of Berlin following Germany's defeat in World War II. The victorious allied powers established cont ...
.
In 1947, a tense diplomatic and military standoff began to unfold between the United States, the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union over the future of Germany. The Americans and Western European allies wanted to include the sectors of Germany which they controlled in the
Marshall Plan
The Marshall Plan (officially the European Recovery Program, ERP) was an American initiative enacted in 1948 to provide foreign aid to Western Europe. The United States transferred over $13 billion (equivalent of about $ in ) in economic re ...
, an economic plan to rebuild Europe after the devastation of the war. The Soviets perceived the Marshall Plan to be the foundation for an anti-Soviet alliance and pressured the Americans, British and French to back down. On 20 March 1948, the Soviet representative walked out of the meeting of the Allied Control Council, and on 31 March 1948, the
United States Congress
The United States Congress is the legislature of the federal government of the United States. It is bicameral, composed of a lower body, the House of Representatives, and an upper body, the Senate. It meets in the U.S. Capitol in Washing ...
approved funding for the Marshall Plan. Soviet troops then began to block the corridor that brought supplies from the western zones of Germany to West Berlin. In response, an increased number of aircraft brought supplies by air from west Germany to
Tempelhof airfield in the American sector and
Gatow airfield in the British sector of Berlin. At the same time Soviet military aircraft began to violate airspace in West Berlin and harass (or what the military called "buzz") flights in and out of West Berlin.
Despite the danger of flying in such conditions, civilian aircraft continued to fly in and out of Berlin.
Flight details
The aircraft involved in the incident was a Vickers 610 Viking 1B with the registration ''G-AIVP''; and had first flown in 1947.
The BEA flight had a four-member crew, all of whom were former members of the
Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...
.
[Delbert Clarks. "Soviet-British Plane Collision Kills 15; Russian Apologizes." ]The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
6 April 1948: pg. 1. There were ten passengers on board, most of whom were British.
[
]
Crash
In the days preceding the incident Soviet military aircraft had been buzzing American and British passenger aircraft while they passed through the western zones of the city.[ The Viking was on a scheduled commercial flight from London via ]Hamburg
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Hamburgian(s)
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to RAF Gatow in the British Sector of Berlin.[ At approximately 2:30pm while the Viking was in the airport's safety area levelling off to land, a Soviet Yak-3 approached from behind.][ Eyewitnesses testified that as the Viking made a left-hand turn prior to its approach to land, the fighter dived beneath it, climbed sharply, and clipped the port wing of the airliner with its starboard wing. The impact ripped off both colliding wings and the Viking crashed inside the Soviet Sector, at , ]Staaken
Staaken () is a locality at the western rim of Berlin within the borough of Spandau.
Geography
Staaken borders on the localities of Spandau proper, Falkenhagener Feld and Wilhelmstadt. In the west it shares border with the Brandenburg municipalit ...
, just outside the British Sector (about northwest of Gatow), and exploded. The Yak-3 crashed near a farmhouse on Heerstrasse just inside the British sector. All the occupants of both aircraft died on impact.
It was also testified that the Yak pilot was doing aerobatics
Aerobatics is the practice of flying maneuvers involving aircraft attitudes that are not used in conventional passenger-carrying flights. The term is a portmanteau of "aerial" and "acrobatics". Aerobatics are performed in aeroplanes and glid ...
prior to the accident; the Soviet Air Force had not informed Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...
air traffic control
Air traffic control (ATC) is a service provided by ground-based air traffic controllers who direct aircraft on the ground and through a given section of controlled airspace, and can provide advisory services to aircraft in non-controlled airs ...
lers at Gatow of its presence. They claimed that the fighter was coming in to land at Dallgow, a nearby Soviet airbase (although examination of the wreckage showed that the undercarriage was still locked up, so this was unlikely).
Allied investigators later concluded that the "collision was caused by the action of the Yak fighter, which was in disregard of the accepted rules of flying and, in particular, of the quadripartite flying rules to which Soviet authorities were parties."[
]
Aftermath
Initially there was a belief that the crash may have been deliberate on the part of the Soviet pilot. General Sir Brian Robertson, the British Military Governor of Germany, immediately went to see his Soviet counterpart, Marshal Vasily Sokolovsky, to protest. Sokolovsky expressed his regret at the incident and assured Robertson that it was not intentional, which Robertson appears to have believed; at any rate, he cancelled his earlier order to provide fighter protection for all British transport aircraft entering or leaving Gatow (the American authorities had issued a similar order, and they too cancelled it).
The British foreign office issued a statement that "A very serious view is taken in London of today's air crash in Berlin." Moreover, British officials felt the Soviet pilot had orders to behave in a provocative manner.[Herbert L. Matthew. "Britain Is Stirred By Plane Incident." '']The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' 6 April 1948. pg. 3.
There was also some controversy as to the actions of the Soviets immediately following the crash. RAF fire engine
A fire engine (also known in some places as a fire truck or fire lorry) is a road vehicle (usually a truck) that functions as a firefighting apparatus. The primary purposes of a fire engine include transporting firefighters and water to an i ...
s and ambulances were sent from Gatow to the Viking crash site and, although initially allowed into the Soviet Zone, were later asked to leave. A few minutes after the crash, Soviet soldiers entered the British Zone and set up a cordon around the crashed fighter. Major-General Herbert, the British Commandant
Commandant ( or ) is a title often given to the officer in charge of a military (or other uniformed service) training establishment or academy. This usage is common in English-speaking nations. In some countries it may be a military or police ran ...
of Berlin, arrived and asked them to leave, but the officer in charge refused. A senior officer arrived later and agreed to the removal of all but a single guard, in return allowing a British guard to be placed over the wreck of the Viking.
Enquiries
A British-Soviet commission of enquiry was set up on 10 April. The Soviet representative, Major-General Alexandrov, refused to hear the evidence of German or American witnesses, claiming that only British and Soviet evidence was relevant and in any case Germans were unreliable. On 13 April the British ended proceedings by saying they were unable to proceed on this basis.
Thereupon a British court of enquiry was convened by General Robertson and held in Berlin on 14–16 April. This found that the crash was accidental, that the fault in the crash was entirely that of the Soviet pilot, and that Captain John Ralph and First Officer Norman Merrington DFC of BEA were not in the slightest to blame for the crash. However, the Soviets announced that the fault was entirely that of the British aircraft, which emerged from low cloud and crashed into the fighter.["The Gatow Air Crash: British Claim Rejected by USSR", '']The Times
''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fou ...
'', 21 May 1948 The British enquiry heard that the Viking was flying at , well below the cloud base of .
Footnotes
References
*Foreign Office
Foreign may refer to:
Government
* Foreign policy, how a country interacts with other countries
* Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in many countries
** Foreign Office, a department of the UK government
** Foreign office and foreign minister
* Unit ...
, ''Report of the Court of Enquiry into the circumstances of the collision between a Viking Airliner and a Soviet Service Aircraft on 5th April 1948'', 1948
*"British Aircraft Down Near Berlin", ''The Times
''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fou ...
'', 6 April 1948
*"The Gatow Air Disaster", ''The Times'', 10 April 1948
{{DEFAULTSORT:Gatow Air Disaster
Aviation accidents and incidents in 1948
Aviation accidents and incidents in Germany
Mid-air collisions
Mid-air collisions involving airliners
Mid-air collisions involving military aircraft
19480405
Gatow Air Disaster, 1948
Accidents and incidents involving the Vickers VC.1 Viking
Aviation in Berlin
Soviet Union–United Kingdom relations
1940s in Berlin
Cold War
April 1948 events in Europe
1948 disasters in Germany