On 25 August 2010, a

Let L-410 Turbolet The Let L-410 Turbolet is a twin-engine short-range transport aircraft, manufactured by the Czech aircraft manufacturer Let Kunovice (named Aircraft Industries since 2005), often used as an airliner. The aircraft is capable of landing on short an ...

passenger aircraft of

Filair Filair was an airline based in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It operated from N'Dolo Airport in Kinshasa. The airline was on the list of air carriers banned in the European Union, as well as all airlines regulated by the authorities in ...

crashed on approach to

Bandundu Airport Bandundu Airport is an airport serving Bandundu, capital of the Kwilu Province in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The Bandundu non-directional beacon (Ident: BAN) is located on the field. Airlines and destinations Passenger Cargo * ...

in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, killing all but one of the 21 people on board. The accident was reportedly the result of the occupants rushing to the front of the aircraft to escape from a

crocodile Crocodiles (family (biology), family Crocodylidae) or true crocodiles are large semiaquatic reptiles that live throughout the tropics in Africa, Asia, the Americas and Australia. The term crocodile is sometimes used even more loosely to inclu ...

smuggled on board by one of the passengers. The move compromised the aircraft's balance to the point that control of the aircraft was lost.

Accident

The aircraft was operating a round-robin domestic flight from

Kinshasa Kinshasa (; ; ln, Kinsásá), formerly Léopoldville ( nl, Leopoldstad), is the capital and largest city of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Once a site of fishing and trading villages situated along the Congo River, Kinshasa is now one o ...

, Democratic Republic of the Congo, stopping at Kiri,

Bokoro Bokoro ( ar, بوكورو) is a town in Chad Chad (; ar, تشاد , ; french: Tchad, ), officially the Republic of Chad, '; ) is a landlocked country at the crossroads of North and Central Africa. It is bordered by Libya to the north, Su ...

, Semendwa and Bandundu. At 13:00

local time Local time is the time observed in a specific locality. There is no canonical definition. Originally it was mean solar time, but since the introduction of time zones it is generally the time as determined by the time zone in effect, with daylight s ...

(12:00 UTC), while on final approach to

, the aircraft crashed into a house approximately short of the runway. According to most sources, no one was injured on the ground. 19 people were killed instantaneously, with two survivors being taken to hospital- one of whom later died from their injuries. Of the 21 people on board, only one, a passenger, survived. Most of the dead were Congolese. There was no post-impact fire, a circumstance that led to initial speculation that the aircraft may have suffered

fuel exhaustion In an internal combustion engine, fuel starvation is the failure of the fuel system to supply sufficient fuel to allow the engine to run properly, for example due to blockage, vapor lock, contamination by water, malfunction of the fuel pump or in ...

Aircraft

The aircraft involved was a 1991-built

, with Congolese registration 9Q-CCN, construction number 912608. It normally carries up to 19 passengers. The aircraft involved was previously registered ES-LLB, and was operated by

Airest Airest (AS Airest) is an Estonian-owned airline that started in January 2002, operating regular cargo and charter passenger flights. Company Airest (Airest Inc) is an Estonian private aviation company engaged in commercial cargo air transp ...

, an

Estonia Estonia, formally the Republic of Estonia, is a country by the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, a ...

n airline, until 2007, and was stored until Filair bought it in 2009.

Investigation

The Congolese

Ministry of Transport A ministry of transport or transportation is a ministry responsible for transportation within a country. It usually is administered by the ''minister for transport''. The term is also sometimes applied to the departments or other government age ...

opened an investigation into the accident. There was no confirmation that fuel shortage caused the crash. The only survivor of the crash stated to the investigators that a crocodile smuggled in a duffel bag by one of the passengers had escaped shortly before landing, sparking panic among the passengers. The flight attendant rushed towards the cockpit, followed by all passengers, and the resulting shift in the aircraft's

centre of gravity In physics, the center of mass of a distribution of mass in space (sometimes referred to as the balance point) is the unique point where the weighted relative position of the distributed mass sums to zero. This is the point to which a force may ...

led to an irrecoverable loss of control. The crocodile reportedly survived the crash but was killed by a blow from a machete.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Filair Let L-410 crash, 2010 Aviation accidents and incidents in the Democratic Republic of the Congo Aviation accidents and incidents in 2010 Accidents and incidents involving the Let L-410 Turbolet Filair Let L-410 Crash, 2010 August 2010 events in Africa 2010 disasters in the Democratic Republic of the Congo

Accident

Aircraft

Investigation

See also

References