June 30 went down in history as the day of the fall of the Tunguska meteorite in 1908. However, few people know that it is on this date that the largest air accidents in history occur.
DC-6 crashed near Fort Collins. Saturday 06/30/1951
A Douglas DC-6 passenger plane of the American airline United Air Lines was operating a passenger flight from Salt Lake City to Denver, when it crashed into a mountain west-southwest of Fort Collins during landing approach and completely collapsed, killing 50 people. In terms of the number of victims, this is the largest aviation disaster in the history of the state of Colorado.
Clash over the Grand Canyon. Saturday 06/30/1956
A United Airlines Douglas DC-7 (flight UA718 Los Angeles-Chicago) and a Lockheed L-1049-54-80 Super Constellation of Trans World Airlines (flight TWA002 Los Angeles-Kansas City) collided over the Grand Canyon, resulting in the death of all 128 people in them (70 on L-1049 and 58 on DC-7).
In the history of civil aviation, this was the first plane crash in which more than a hundred people died. The disaster received wide response, as a result of which serious changes were made to the organization of air traffic control in the country.
Tu-104 crash near Krasnoyarsk. Saturday 06/30/1962
The Aeroflot Tu-104 was on a passenger flight from Irkutsk to Omsk, but after an hour of flight, it went into a steep descent and crashed in the Berezovsky district of the Krasnoyarsk Territory two and a half minutes later. At the same time, 84 people died. At that time, it was the largest air crash in the Soviet Union.
The catastrophe of the manned spacecraft “Soyuz-11”. Wednesday 06/30/1971
On the night of June 30, 1971, the crew of the Soyuz-11 spacecraft set a world space record. For the first time in history, having docked to the world’s first long-term orbital station Salyut-1, cosmonauts Georgy Dobrovolsky, Vladislav Volkov and Viktor Patsaev were able to go to it and work there for more than three weeks – 23 days, 18 hours, 21 minutes, 43 seconds. Having completed the entire planned program, they returned to the descent vehicle and undocked from the station.
The astronauts died during their return to Earth due to depressurization of the descent vehicle at high altitudes. The design of the ship did not provide spacesuits for the crew.
Tu-134 crash in Amman. Saturday 06/30/1973. Solar eclipse
The aircraft was supposed to operate flight SU-512 on the route Amman – Beirut – Yerevan – Moscow. A total of 78 passengers were on board: 66 adults and 12 children. At the time of takeoff, the aircraft skidded off the runway and crashed with its nose into a one-story residential building made of reinforced concrete, stopped, and collapsed. The navigator, radio operator, and seven people in the house (three adults and four children) were killed. Passengers received minor or no injuries.
According to the results of research by the Institute of Biomedical Problems, it was concluded that a solar eclipse could also be the cause of violations in the actions of pilots since a change in the strength of illumination has a negative effect.
Il-62 accident in Yakutsk. Saturday 06/30/1990
Aeroflot Il-62M crashed during landing, as a result of which 6 people were injured. The cause of the crash is a flight attendant’s mistake.
Tu-154 accident in St. Petersburg. Monday. 07/30/2008
The aircraft was operating a domestic passenger flight SU-846 from St. Petersburg to Moscow. Its crew consisted of 9 people. There were 103 passengers on board, including 2 children. At 15:48, takeoff was started when, at a speed of about 60 km / h, the crew of the aircraft felt a strong blow, after which the revolutions in the first (left) engine dropped to zero. Recognizing the engine failure, the crew immediately aborted the takeoff.
When checking the left engine, it was found that the disc of the first stage of the low-pressure compressor was destroyed in it when it reached the nominal model. Because the automatic fire extinguishing system worked promptly, there was no fire in the event of an engine failure. None of the 112 people on board were hurt; the plane itself was put on a reserve site at Pulkovo airport.
After the incident in St. Petersburg, Aeroflot decided to start decommissioning all Tu-154 aircraft remaining in its fleet from the last quarter of 2008, replacing them with Airbus A320 family aircraft, fully completing this transition by 2010.
A310 crashed near Moroni. Tuesday. 06/30/2009
A Yemenia Airbus A310-324 was flying IY 626 from Sana’a to Moroni; this flight continued the flight from Marseille. At 01:53 local time, the aircraft crashed while landing at Moroni in adverse weather conditions. On board were 153 people (142 passengers and 11 crew members), only one survived – 13-year-old passenger Baya Bakari.