Austrian Airlines Flight 901 was a flight from
Vienna
en, Viennese
, iso_code = AT-9
, registration_plate = W
, postal_code_type = Postal code
, postal_code =
, timezone = CET
, utc_offset = +1
, timezone_DST ...
, Austria to Moscow, USSR (now Russia) via
Warsaw
Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is officia ...
, Poland. On the night of 26 September 1960 the aircraft operating the flight, a
Vickers Viscount
The Vickers Viscount is a British medium-range turboprop airliner first flown in 1948 by Vickers-Armstrongs. A design requirement from the Brabazon Committee, it entered service in 1953 and was the first turboprop-powered airliner.
The Visc ...
, crashed near Moscow while on its approach to land, killing 31 of the 37 passengers and crew on board.
Aircraft
The aircraft was a
Vickers Viscount 837 four-engined turboprop airliner
registered ''OE-LAF''.
The aircraft had first flown on 10 February 1960 and had been delivered new to
Austrian Airlines
Austrian Airlines AG, often shortened to Austrian, is the flag carrier of Austria and a subsidiary of the Lufthansa Group. The airline is headquartered on the grounds of Vienna International Airport in Schwechat where it also maintains its hub ...
about two weeks later, seven months before the crash.
Accident
The aircraft departed Warsaw with six crew and 31 passengers on board. The flight was on approach to land on runway 07 at
Sheremetyevo International Airport
Sheremetyevo Alexander S. Pushkin International Airport ( rus, links=no, Международный аэропорт Шереметьево имени А. С. Пушкина, p=ʂɨrʲɪˈmʲetʲjɪvə ''Mezhdunarodny aeroport Sheremetyevo imen ...
in the northern outskirts of Moscow when it crashed in a rural area short of Sheremetyevo's runway near the town of Krukovo.
Airliner, 37 aboard, down
/ref>
Investigation
The investigation determined that the crew thought that the aircraft was higher than it was and that it flew into trees during its approach and crashed. Investigators found that the captain's altimeter
An altimeter or an altitude meter is an instrument used to measure the altitude of an object above a fixed level. The measurement of altitude is called altimetry, which is related to the term bathymetry, the measurement of depth under water. The m ...
(the left-hand altimeter) was adjusted to show a different altitude to the copilot's altimeter. The left altimeter's barometric sub-scale had been set to a pressure that would have resulted in it reading zero feet on the ground at Sheremetyevo. However, the sub-scale on the copilot's altimeter was set to a pressure that would have resulted in it reading the airport's height above mean sea level
Height above mean sea level is a measure of the vertical distance (height, elevation or altitude) of a location in reference to a historic mean sea level taken as a vertical datum. In geodesy, it is formalized as ''orthometric heights''.
The com ...
when on the ground at Sheremetyevo. This was against the airline's operating procedures, but the investigation could not determine the reason for the discrepancy.[Vickers Viscount 837 OE-LAF accident synopsis](_blank)
retrieved 29 January 2013
Sources
Notes
Bibliography
*
External links
*
{{coord, 56.0026, N, 37.0960, E, source:wikidata, display=title
Accidents and incidents involving the Vickers Viscount
Aviation accidents and incidents in the Soviet Union
Aviation accidents and incidents in 1960
Airliner accidents and incidents involving controlled flight into terrain
Airliner accidents and incidents with an unknown cause
1960 in the Soviet Union
Austria–Soviet Union relations
Transport disasters in Moscow
September 1960 events in Europe
1960 disasters in the Soviet Union