Aeroflot Flight 821 was a scheduled domestic passenger flight operated by

Aeroflot-Nord Smartavia, formerly known as Nordavia (until March 2019), is a Russian low-cost airline with its head office in Arkhangelsk, Russia. It mainly operates scheduled domestic and regional services. Its main bases are Arkhangelsk Airport, Pulkovo Airp ...

in a service agreement with Aeroflot and as its subsidiary. On 14 September 2008, the aircraft operating the flight crashed on approach to

Perm International Airport Perm International Airport (russian: Международный аэропорт Пермь) is an international airport located at Bolshoye Savino, southwest of the city of Perm, Russia. It is the only airport in Perm Krai with scheduled com ...

at 5:10 local time ( UTC+06). All 82 passengers and 6 crew members were killed. Among the passengers who were killed was Russian Colonel General

Gennady Troshev Gennady Nikolayevich Troshev (russian: Геннадий Николаевич Трошев) (14 March 1947 – 14 September 2008) was a Russian Colonel General in the Russian military and formerly the commander of the North Caucasus Military Distr ...

, an adviser to the

President of Russia The president of the Russian Federation ( rus, Президент Российской Федерации, Prezident Rossiyskoy Federatsii) is the head of state of the Russian Federation. The president leads the executive branch of the federal ...

who had been the commander of the North Caucasus Military District (including Chechnya) during the

Second Chechen War The Second Chechen War (russian: Втора́я чече́нская война́, ) took place in Chechnya and the border regions of the North Caucasus between the Russian Federation and the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria, from August 1999 ...

. A section of the

Trans-Siberian Railway The Trans-Siberian Railway (TSR; , , ) connects European Russia to the Russian Far East. Spanning a length of over , it is the longest railway line in the world. It runs from the city of Moscow in the west to the city of Vladivostok in the ea ...

was damaged by the crash. Flight 821 is the deadliest accident involving a Boeing 737-500, surpassing the 1993 crash of

Asiana Airlines Flight 733 Asiana Airlines Flight 733 (OZ733, AAR733, registration HL7229) was a domestic Asiana Airlines passenger flight from Seoul-Gimpo International Airport (SEL at the time, now GMP) to Mokpo Airport (MPK), South Korea. The Boeing 737 crashed on July ...

, and was the second-deadliest aviation incident in 2008, behind

Spanair Flight 5022 Spanair Flight 5022 was a scheduled domestic passenger flight from Barcelona–El Prat Airport to Gran Canaria Airport, Spain, via Madrid–Barajas Airport that crashed just after take-off from runway 36L at Madrid Airport at 14:24 CES ...

. The primary cause of the crash was that both pilots had lost

spatial orientation In geometry, the orientation, angular position, attitude, bearing, or direction of an object such as a line, plane or rigid body is part of the description of how it is placed in the space it occupies. More specifically, it refers to the imagin ...

due to their inexperience with the Western type of

attitude indicator The attitude indicator (AI), formerly known as the gyro horizon or artificial horizon, is a flight instrument that informs the pilot of the aircraft orientation relative to Earth's horizon, and gives an immediate indication of the smallest o ...

on the aircraft. Lack of adequate rest, poor

crew resource management Crew resource management or cockpit resource management (CRM)Diehl, Alan (2013) "Air Safety Investigators: Using Science to Save Lives-One Crash at a Time." Xlibris Corporation. . http://www.prweb.com/releases/DrAlanDiehl/AirSafetyInvestigators/ ...

, and alcohol consumption by the captain also contributed to the accident. This air disaster led to Aeroflot-Nord rebranding as Nordavia, effective on 1 December 2009, and later to

Smartavia Smartavia, formerly known as Nordavia (until March 2019), is a Russian low-cost airline with its head office in Arkhangelsk, Russia. It mainly operates scheduled domestic and regional services. Its main bases are Arkhangelsk Airport, Pulkovo Air ...

in 2019.

Accident

The Boeing 737-505, registration VP-BKO, an aircraft belonging to the Aeroflot subsidiary

but operating as Aeroflot flight SU821 from Moscow's

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 ...

Perm Perm or PERM may refer to: Places *Perm, Russia, a city in Russia ** Permsky District, the district **Perm Krai, a federal subject of Russia since 2005 **Perm Oblast, a former federal subject of Russia 1938–2005 **Perm Governorate, an administra ...

(Russia) crashed into a railway line southwest of Perm 5:10 AM local time (or 13 September 2008, 23:10 UTC). The weather at the time of accident was rainy (unbroken clouds at , light rain). According to an interview given by the air traffic controller shortly after the disaster, the crew did not respond correctly to ATC commands: after going around, it turned eastward instead of turning westward. However, the crew reported no emergency onboard and confirmed all commands given by ATC. At 5:10 AM, radio contact with the plane was lost; minutes later it crashed on the outskirts of Perm. Aeroflot-Nord officially stated that: "The Boeing-737 carried 82 passengers on board – including 7 children – and 6 crew. All passengers and crew were killed. As the plane was coming in for landing, it lost communication at a height of and air controllers lost its blip. The airplane was found within Perm's city limits completely destroyed and on fire." Investigator Vladimir Markin said that "there were 82 passengers plus a baby and 5 crew on board, and by preliminary information, they are all dead as the airplane fell into a

ravine A ravine is a landform that is narrower than a canyon and is often the product of streambank erosion.RIA Novosti however reported that "it was possible that three people who bought a ticket for the ill-fated flight 821 to Perm did not get on board." Both flight recorders were found and successfully decoded. The airline stated "it pledged to pay compensation on obligatory accident insurance in full, which would make up to 2 million

rubles The ruble (American English) or rouble (Commonwealth English) (; rus, рубль, p=rublʲ) is the currency unit of Belarus and Russia. Historically, it was the currency of the Russian Empire and of the Soviet Union. , currencies named ''rub ...

per victim." The crash damaged and shut down a section of the

; rail traffic was temporarily re-routed via

Chusovaya The Chusovaya (russian: Чусова́я) is a river flowing in Perm Krai, Sverdlovsk Oblast and Chelyabinsk Oblast of Russia. A tributary of the Kama, which in turn is a tributary of the Volga, it discharges into the Chusovskoy Cove of the Ka ...

station, and was restored by the evening of 14 September. The aircraft was

leased A lease is a contractual arrangement calling for the user (referred to as the ''lessee'') to pay the owner (referred to as the ''lessor'') for the use of an asset. Property, buildings and vehicles are common assets that are leased. Industrial ...

by Aeroflot-Nord from Dublin-based Pinewatch Limited from July 2008 to March 2013. It was reported that its engines caught fire at an altitude of . Eyewitness reports stated that the plane was visibly on fire prior to crashing, and hit the ground at a 30–40-degree angle. However, the low clouds (at ) must have prevented any witnesses from seeing the plane for more than a few seconds and the report was subsequently discounted by the accident enquiry (see below). The final enquiry report stated that "after the base turn, approaching the landing course at with both autopilot and autothrottle disengaged, the aircraft started climbing up to , rolled 360° over the left wing and collided with the ground".

Aircraft

The aircraft involved in the crash was originally ordered by

Braathens Braathens ASA, until 1997 Braathens South American & Far East Airtransport A/S and trading as Braathens SAFE, was a Norwegian airline which operated from 1946 until it merged with Scandinavian Airlines (SAS) in 2004 to become SAS Braathens. ...

, but never operated by them and was quickly sold shortly after delivery to

China Southwest Airlines China Southwest Airlines (CSWA, ) was an airline with its head office on the property of Chengdu Shuangliu International Airport in Shuangliu County, Chengdu, Sichuan, People's Republic of China. On 28 October 2002, China Southwest Airlines was ...

, whose subsidiary

Xiamen Airlines XiamenAir, also known as Xiamen Airlines, is a Chinese passenger airline based in Xiamen, Fujian Province. The airline operates scheduled passenger flights out of Xiamen Gaoqi International Airport and, to a lesser extent, Beijing Daxing Interna ...

operated it from September 1992 to March 1993. The 737 was then operated by China Southwest Airlines itself until the airline merged with

, who operated the aircraft from 2003 until it was stored in March 2008 and was returned to Pinewatch Limited. Aeroflot-Nord then leased the aircraft and had operated the airframe from 29 May 2008 until its hull loss.

Crew

According to early claims of

representatives, the crew was described as very experienced and one of the best in the company. Captain Rodion Mikhailovich Medvedev (; age 34) had a flight record of 3,689 hours (including 1,190 hours on the Boeing 737) while First Officer Rustam Rafailovich Alaberdin (; age 43) had 8,713 hours, though only 219 of them were on the Boeing 737. Later it was revealed that Medvedev's flight record as a captain was 452 hours along with Allaberdin's low experience of piloting the Boeing 737. For the most part of their careers Medvedev and Allaberdin had piloted the

Tupolev Tu-134 The Tupolev Tu-134 (NATO reporting name: Crusty) is a twin-engined, narrow-body jet airliner built in the Soviet Union for short and medium-haul routes from 1966 to 1989. The original version featured a glazed-nose design and, like certain ot ...

and Antonov An-2 respectively. Gennady Kurzenkov, head of the State Aviation Inspection Service, stated that the flight crew submitted falsified documents to the airline showing that they had passed preflight courses.

Casualties

Notable deaths

, Colonel General in the

Russian military The Armed Forces of the Russian Federation (, ), commonly referred to as the Russian Armed Forces, are the military forces of Russia. In terms of active-duty personnel, they are the world's fifth-largest military force, with at least two m ...

, formerly the commander of the

North Caucasus Military District The North Caucasus Military District was a military district of the Russian Armed Forces, which became in 2010 the Southern Military District and lately also included the Black Sea Fleet and Caspian Flotilla. It comprised the Republic of Adygeya, ...

(including Chechnya) during the

and adviser to the

Investigation

Russia's Air Accident Investigation Commission of the

Interstate Aviation Committee The Interstate Aviation Committee (IAC; russian: Межгосударственный авиационный комитет, МАК) is an executive body of the Civil Aviation and Airspace Use Council of the Commonwealth of Independent States ( ...

led the investigation, with US assistance from the National Transportation Safety Board, the

Federal Aviation Administration The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is the largest transportation agency of the U.S. government and regulates all aspects of civil aviation in the country as well as over surrounding international waters. Its powers include air traffic ...

, and

Boeing The Boeing Company () is an American multinational corporation that designs, manufactures, and sells airplanes, rotorcraft, rockets, satellites, telecommunications equipment, and missiles worldwide. The company also provides leasing and p ...

. As the aircraft was registered in Bermuda, that government was represented by the UK's

Air Accidents Investigation Branch The Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB) investigates civil aircraft accidents and serious incidents within the United Kingdom, its overseas territories and crown dependencies. It is also the Space Accident Investigation Authority (SAIA ...

, with two senior inspectors sent to participate under the Memorandum of Agreement. The AAIB team had representatives from the Bermudian Department of Civil Aviation as advisors. The engines were made in France, so that state was represented by the

Bureau of Enquiry and Analysis for Civil Aviation Safety The Bureau of Enquiry and Analysis for Civil Aviation Safety (BEA, ) is an agency of the French government, responsible for investigating aviation accidents and incidents and making safety recommendations based on what is learned from those inve ...

(BEA). According to the data in flight recorders, the engines did not catch fire and continued working until the impact. The latest official reports are published in Russian on the Air Accident Investigation Commission website. An English translation of the final report is available at the United Kingdom

website; the AAIB states that it is not an official English translation. The final investigation report stated the following reasons for the crash: * The immediate cause of the accident was the loss of spatial orientation by the crew and chiefly by the Captain, who was piloting the aircraft during the landing phase. The plane banked left, overturned and went into a rapid descent. The loss of spatial orientation occurred in the night, while flying in the clouds, with autopilot and autothrottle switched off. Poor

and insufficient training for using the Western type of

s contributed to the accident. The pilots had previously flown

and Antonov An-2 with a different type of attitude indicator (where the bank angle is shown by the movements of an aircraft symbol, and the indicator's background does not turn left or right). *Inadequate practices by Aeroflot-Nord in managing and operating the Boeing 737 aircraft. *The aircraft had been flown for a long time with a throttle problem. The pilots had a higher workload because they had to operate the throttle levers for the left and right engines independently. *Forensic examination found alcohol in the captain's tissue, with different sample groups suggesting a blood alcohol level of either around 0.05% or around 0.11%

abv Alcohol by volume (abbreviated as ABV, abv, or alc/vol) is a standard measure of how much alcohol (ethanol) is contained in a given volume of an alcoholic beverage (expressed as a volume percent). It is defined as the number of millilitres (mL) o ...

. He also did not have adequate rest before the flight.

Lawsuit

On 1 October 2008, the mother of a 27-year-old female passenger who died in the accident sued Aeroflot and Moskva Insurance Company for 7.7 million rubles (approximately US$300,000) in

punitive damages Punitive damages, or exemplary damages, are damages assessed in order to punish the defendant for outrageous conduct and/or to reform or deter the defendant and others from engaging in conduct similar to that which formed the basis of the lawsuit. ...

ATC communications before the crash

A recording of the conversation between ATC and Flight 821 was published online. According to the final investigation report, the captain, who was making the communications, was 'mildly intoxicated', and this can be heard in the audio. Irek Birbov, the air traffic controller on duty at the time of the incident, said that on final approach the aircraft was too far right of the localizer. He advised the captain to change heading. Furthermore, instead of descending to land, the plane then went up. The controller requested Flight 821 to check the altitude: "According to my data, you are climbing. Confirm current altitude ." The aircraft should have been at an altitude of at that time to descend further . The pilot replied "Roger, we are descending" and initiated a climb to about 1200 m, at which point he could no longer catch the

glideslope Instrument landing system glide path, commonly referred to as a glide path (G/P) or glide slope (G/S), is "a system of vertical guidance embodied in the instrument landing system which indicates the vertical deviation of the aircraft from its o ...

. The controller instructed the pilot to turn right and go around. The captain acknowledged but failed to comply. Instead, he turned left and asked to continue his approach. The controller asked whether everything was all right with the crew; the pilots confirmed that it was. The controller then insisted on a

go-around In aviation, a go-around is an aborted landing of an aircraft that is on final approach or has already touched down. A go-around can either be initiated by the pilot flying or requested by air traffic control for various reasons, such as an unst ...

, instructing them to switch to another ATC frequency. The pilots, however, never contacted the other ATC and started to descend quickly. When they were at about , the controller radioed the plane to maintain . In response, the pilots' final radio transmission was "Aaa (expletive)!" A moment later the controller saw an explosion.

In popular culture

The accident was featured in the 19th season of the TV series '' Mayday''. The episode is titled "Lethal Limits".

References

External links

Investigation
!-- the English version erroneously states that there were 0 fatalities. --> *
Final accident report
– Unofficial English translation – Hosted by the

(AAIB)
Archive

Investigation
*
Final report

Archive
– the Russian version is the report of record.

Aeroflot news archiveArchive

Aeroflot page listing passengers of the flightArchive

АЭРОФЛОТ-НОРД ПРИНОСИТ ГЛУБОКИЕ СОБОЛЕЗНОВАНИЯ РОДСТВЕННИКАМ ПОГИБШИХ
" EROFLOT-NORD BRINGS DEEP CONDOLENCIES TO THE RELATIVES OF THE DEADAeroflot Nord. 14 September 2008. – Aeroflot Nord press release about the accident
Archive
* * {{Aviation accidents and incidents in Russia Aviation accidents and incidents in 2008 Aviation accidents and incidents in Russia Airliner accidents and incidents caused by pilot error 821 2008 disasters in Russia Accidents and incidents involving the Boeing 737 Classic Perm, Russia September 2008 events in Europe