Pakistan International Airlines Flight 705 (PK705) was a

Boeing 720 The Boeing 720 is an American narrow-body airliner produced by Boeing Commercial Airplanes. Announced in July 1957 as a 707 derivative for shorter flights from shorter runways, the 720 first flew on November 23, 1959. Its type certificate was ...

airliner that crashed while descending to land at

Cairo International Airport Cairo International Airport (; ''Maṭār El Qāhira El Dawly'') is the principal international airport of Cairo and the largest and busiest airport in Egypt. It serves as the primary hub for Egyptair and Nile Air as well as several other ...

on 20 May 1965. Of the 121 passengers and crew on board, all but 6 were killed.

Accident

Flight 705 on 20 May 1965 was an inaugural flight between Karachi, Pakistan and London, United Kingdom and was carrying distinguished guests and journalists among the 114 passengers. The aircraft was scheduled to stop at Dhahran in Saudi Arabia, Cairo and then Geneva before completing its journey to London. As the aircraft was on final approach to

, the pilot reported problems with the flaps; shortly thereafter, the aircraft crashed southeast of the airport and broke up as it exploded into flames. Six of the passengers were thrown clear of the wreckage, but everyone else on board was killed. Among the dead was the Chinese aircraft designer

Huang Zhiqian Huang Zhiqian (; 24 January 1914 – 20 May 1965) was a Chinese aircraft designer. He served as Chief Designer of the Shenyang Aircraft Design Institute and was in charge of designing the Shenyang J-8, China's first high-speed, high-altitude in ...

, who was chief designer of the fighter jet

Shenyang J-8 The Shenyang J-8 ( Chinese: 歼-8; NATO reporting name: Finback) is an interceptor aircraft developed by the 601 Institute (Shenyang) in the People's Republic of China (PRC). It was conceived in the early 1960s as a low-risk program based on e ...

Aircraft

The aircraft was a Boeing 720-040BThe aircraft was a Boeing 720B model; at the time this aircraft was built, Boeing assigned a unique code for each company that bought one of its aircraft, which was applied as an

infix An infix is an affix inserted inside a word stem (an existing word or the core of a family of words). It contrasts with ''adfix,'' a rare term for an affix attached to the outside of a stem, such as a prefix or suffix. When marking text for int ...

to the model number at the time the aircraft was built, hence "720-040B". with the

registration Register or registration may refer to: Arts entertainment, and media Music * Register (music), the relative "height" or range of a note, melody, part, instrument, etc. * ''Register'', a 2017 album by Travis Miller * Registration (organ), th ...

''AP-AMH'' and manufacturer's serial number 18379; it was first flown on 19 October 1962 and delivered to

Pakistan International Airlines Pakistan International Airlines ( ur, ; abbreviated PIA, ur, ) is an international airline that serves as the national flag carrier of Pakistan under the administrative control of the Secretary to the Government of Pakistan for Aviation. It ...

on 7 November 1962. At the time of the accident the aircraft had flown 8378 hours.Pither 1998, p. 213

Investigation

On 26 May, local police reported that a transistor radio had been found in the wreckage of the aircraft with jewellery valued at $120,000 hidden in it. The probable cause of the crash was that "the aircraft did not maintain the adequate height for the circuit and continued to descend until it contacted the ground. The reason for that abnormal continuation of descent is unknown."ICAO Circular 88-AN/74 (113–117)

Notes

References

External links

PIA Flight 705 on History of PIA
{{Pakistan International Airlines Aviation accidents and incidents in 1965 Airliner accidents and incidents with an unknown cause Airliner accidents and incidents involving controlled flight into terrain Aviation accidents and incidents in Egypt

705 __NOTOC__ Year 705 ( DCCV) was a common year starting on Thursday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. The denomination 705 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era ...