The 1953 Sabena Convair CV-240 crash occurred on 14 October 1953 when a

Sabena The ''Societé anonyme belge d'Exploitation de la Navigation aérienne'' (French; ), better known by the acronym Sabena or SABENA, was the national airline of Belgium from 1923 to 2001, with its base at Brussels National Airport. After its ba ...

Convair CV-240 The Convair CV-240 is an American airliner that Convair manufactured from 1947 to 1954, initially as a possible replacement for the ubiquitous Douglas DC-3. Featuring a more modern design with cabin pressurization, the 240 series made some inro ...

crashed north of

Frankfurt Frankfurt, officially Frankfurt am Main (; Hessian: , " Frank ford on the Main"), is the most populous city in the German state of Hesse. Its 791,000 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located on it ...

West Germany West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 O ...

. None of the 44 people on board survived the incident.

Aircraft

The Convair CV-240-12 involved was built in 1949 with serial number 154 and registration ''OO-AWQ'' and was used by the Belgian airline company Sabena from 1 April 1949 until its destruction in 1953.

Crash

After having arrived from

Salzburg Airport Salzburg Airport , branded as ''Salzburg Airport W. A. Mozart'', is Austria's second largest airport. It serves Salzburg, the fourth-largest Austrian city, and is a gateway to Austria's numerous ski areas. The airport is loc ...

for her stopover, the Sabena flight was scheduled to depart from Frankfurt International Airport bound for Zaventem Airport with 40 passengers and four crew members on board at 15.20 pm on 14 October 1953. However shortly after

takeoff Takeoff is the phase of flight in which an aerospace vehicle leaves the ground and becomes airborne. For aircraft traveling vertically, this is known as liftoff. For aircraft that take off horizontally, this usually involves starting with a ...

, the crew noticed that both engines were losing power. The crew followed the normal procedures and raised the flaps while trying to keep control of their plane. The aircraft ultimately became uncontrollable and stalled, crashing in a wooded area near

Kelsterbach Kelsterbach () is a town in Groß-Gerau district in Hessen, Germany and part of the Frankfurt Rhein-Main urban area. It is located on Frankfurt's southwestern outskirts at a bend on the left bank of the river Main, right where a small brook, ca ...

about two miles north of the airport she departed from. Firefighters and four

ambulances An ambulance is a medically equipped vehicle which transports patients to treatment facilities, such as hospitals. Typically, out-of-hospital medical care is provided to the patient during the transport. Ambulances are used to respond to medi ...

reached the crash scene after following the rising smoke plume but it was quickly discovered that all 44 onboard had perished in the flaming wreckage.

Probable cause

The cause of the crash was determined to possibly be a heavy deposit of

lead Lead is a chemical element with the symbol Pb (from the Latin ) and atomic number 82. It is a heavy metal that is denser than most common materials. Lead is soft and malleable, and also has a relatively low melting point. When freshly cu ...

on the

spark plugs A spark plug (sometimes, in British English, a sparking plug, and, colloquially, a plug) is a device for delivering electric current from an ignition system to the combustion chamber of a spark-ignition engine to ignite the compressed fuel/air ...

in the engines. The investigation states that as the plugs warmed up during

, the metal deposits formed a circuit which ended up short circuiting the plugs causing the fatal

engine failure A turbine engine failure occurs when a turbine engine unexpectedly stops producing power due to a malfunction other than fuel exhaustion. It often applies for aircraft, but other turbine engines can fail, like ground-based turbines used in power ...

and subsequent stalling and crash of the aircraft. It is unknown whether the pilots actions contributed to the crash or if the fatal outcome was unavoidable.

Aftermath

The aircraft was destroyed by the impact and post-crash fire with only pieces of debris scattered around the wooded area. The crash site was documented on film on 21 October by the German press.

References

{{Aviation accidents and incidents in 1953 Sabena accidents and incidents Airliner accidents and incidents caused by engine failure October 1953 events in Europe Aviation accidents and incidents in 1953 1953 in Germany Accidents and incidents involving the Convair CV-240 family Aviation accidents and incidents in Germany