Air Ferry DC-4 Crash 3 June 1967
 

Hi All

I've just been doing some family history research and have found a (distant) cousin who was killed in the Air Ferry DC-4 crash in the Pyrenees on 3 June 1967, the day before the BMA Argonaut crashed at Stockport. I've tried to find some information on line about this accident but without much luck, apart from type and date, and so I was wondering if anybody out there may be able to point me towards anything else.

Thanks

Anthony

Accident
languages: Statuts:
Date: 03 JUN 1967
Heure: 21:06 UTC
Type/Sous-type: Douglas C-54A-1-DC
Operator: Air Ferry
Immatriculation: G-APYK
Numéro de série: 10279
Année de Fabrication: 1944
Heures de vol: 42663
Equipage: victimes: 5 / à bord: 5
Passagers: victimes: 83 / à bord: 83
Total: victimes: 88 / à bord: 88
Dégats de l'appareil: Perte Totale
Lieu de l'accident: Mont Canigou (France)
Phase de vol: En vol
Nature: Charter International
Aéroport de départ: Manston-Kent International Airport (MSE/EGMH), Royaume Uni
Aéroport de destination: Perpignan Airport (PGF)
Détails:
The DC-4 had been cleared to descend from FL70 when it struck a mountain at an altitude of 4000 feet.
PROBABLE CAUSE: "The Commission is of the opinion that the accident occurred following a collision with the mountainside, which resulted directly from a series of errors on the part of the crew (failure to use all the means of radio navigation available in the aircraft, error in dead reckoning, descent starting from a point which had been inadequately identified, failure to observe the safe altitudes fixed on the company's flight plan and, perhaps, mistakes in identification by visual reference to the ground.) This irrational conduct of the flight can be explained by the phenomena due to intoxication by carbon monoxide coming from a defective heating system.
Finally, it should be stressed that the misunderstandings which occurred between the aircraft and the Perpignan controller, as a result of language difficulties and in particular the non-existence of any standard phraseology, and also the failure to check the aircraft's magnetic bearing by means of the D/F equipment during the communication at 20.55hrs, may have constituted additional aggravating circumstances."
Sources:
ICAO Circular 107-AN/81 (55-69); Flight International 12.12.1969 (p.969)
http://aviation-safety.net/photos/ai...-P-d-1-500.jpg
http://aviation-safety.net/database/...0603-1&lang=fr

This accident has also been discussed previously on Pprune. Worth a website wordsearch.

Thanks Tigermate

As you suggested I searched on PPRUNE and found some more info, think I might try the newspapers of the time as well.

Best Regards

Anthony

interesting,
re the picture shown
in the background is a BMA argonaut...

which is the type which crashed the morning after

Air ferry DC-4 accident.
 

WAMWIG,

I was flying for Air Ferry at the time. You will find a good report in "The Last Of the Pistons" written by Malcolm Finnis.

Speedbird48.

robbie arrieula
 

hi there - i live in australia and have recently come across a lady who lost both parents and her husbands parents in the air ferry crash - june 3, 1967, Mt Canigou i am actually meeting her tonight! can you give me any idea at all where the memorial site for this crash may be. she has been trying to find out and i have spent hours on the internet and making calls to france but nobody seems to know. where did you find the other info on pprune?
hope you can help
thanks
robbie

Air Ferry DC-4 accident.
 

Hi Robb,

Sorry to hear your friends family that were lost on 'YK.

As you correctly say the aircraft hit Mt. Canigou, which is 9,137ft high, at and altitude of about 3800ft at 21-06hrs. It flew over a village called Prades about 3 or 4 mins. earlier. The thoughts at the time were that the cockpit heater had developed a crack and let Carbon Monoxide into the cockpit. the crews radio calls, that here taped, sounded as if they were intoxicated, which they were not, but Carbon Monoxide poisoning will give a similar effect.

The aircraft hit the mountain just about 1/2 mile above the village of Py which had 146 residents. The mayor at the time was a Rene Pedeil and his secretary was Mlle Calvet.

I know of no memorial, but that does not say that there isn't one.

The author of the book, Twilight of the Pistons, (I got it wrong in the earlier post) Malcolm Finnis is still around, and lives in Eastbourne, East Sussex., He may have better information. I can e-mail him if you wish??

Air Ferry had several Australian Stewardesses at the time, and I am still in touch with one of them who lives in Sydney, although the girls on YK were English.

If I can help any further please PM me.

Speedbird 48.

Although I had no link with either incident, I believe that the Air Ferry accident and the British Midland accident marked a shift in the post-war development of the independent airline sector in the UK. The press made much of the fact that these were both elderly "charter" airliners, the strong implication being that independent airlines ran old, unairworthy aircraft on unscheduled operations.

It was after these incidents that the independent airlines realized that the public were clamouring for jet aircraft, and when jets were introduced to package holiday flights, the brochures made much of "Direct Jet flights".

With two incidents occurring on consecutive days, both involving "old" piston engined types, the groundswell of opinion was very strong. Not long after these events, the independent airlines started ordering jet aircraft, and it wasn't too long before tour operators demanded jet aircraft.

Within 2-3 years, refuelling stops at Perpignan and elsewhere had ceased, and the piston engined fleets were replaced by modern One-Elevens, Comets and 737s. By the early 70s, piston aircraft were almost unheard-of on Inclusive Tour flights.

yes lgs6753 very interesting
not many old piston props did I/T flights after 1970's (early)

the last ones were SAM dc-6 from italy and inex adria dc-6 and BIAS dc-6
i often saw them at gatwick
i dont think spantax brought the dc-7's in much after that

cant remember much else lol
no doubt someone here can remind us (please;))

ken fielding has some great pics on his photo site at MAN and LGW from the period

turboprops were still used til early 80's
i remember at BMA we used the viscount to PMI and MAH on night flights from LPL and BHX til about 1981 i think !

i flew to PMI on one from LPL on a friday night and the skipper came down to chat to all the pax and then had his dinner in the back row of the cabin !

took about 5 hours 45 i think to fly there !

Thanks Speedbird48

I shall have to get a copy of Malcolm's book before they all go then!

Robb. Hope the meeting went ok

Thanks for everybodys help on this

Best regards

Anthony

adds
 

i just got the book off ebay thanet books and its excellent!!

r eal good read
u can get it there
hope it helps

typo
 

the book is wonderful

Air Ferry DC4 Accident.
 

Hi rog747,

Glad you are enjoying the book. Malcolm Finnis did a great job putting it together. He has done another one for Invicta, the other airline at Manston.

It give a good insight to the way things were in those days, including the very sad accidnets.

He even saw fit to put my picture in it in several places??

Speedbird 48.

air ferry DC - 4 accident
 

thanks so much speedbird48,
i think this will help my friend alot - the names of the villages in particular as she had originally thought that the accident happened near pau which is on the western side of the pyrenees, but maybe she was thinking of Py. i will pass this on asap,
thanks again
robb

air ferry DC-4 accident
 

thanks again Anthony,
the meeting went just fine and i will no doubt see her again soon. she was very pleased to finally find some info on the crash. unfortunately her husband passed away just before christmas so she won't be able to share it with him but she is now on a mission to find out if the memorial still exists and i think she is registering on this site. i will ask her if she would like a copy of the book
cheers
robb

Ar Ferry DC4 Accident.
 

With the help of Pprune, I am glad I was able to help you two guys and your friends just a little.

Very sad times when they happened. I rolled into the Operations office door not knowing that there had been an accident, and my humor was not appropriate. I remember the dirty looks very well.

Just to spread the thread a little.

I was also involved in the Stockport accident by default. I left on the above trip to Palma, Majorca where we had a slight problem with a distributor on #4 engine. The seal had allowed oil to get in, and oil and electric don't mix!! We took it off, washed it out with gas and departed for an uneventful flight and it was written up when we got to Manston where they changed the distributor.

Many months later I came in for a flight to be ushered into the Chief pilots office to meet some men from the Accident Investigation Board (AAIB). I was given a very thorough grilling by these guys as they insisted that I had had engine trouble all the way back from Palma. They did not say what they were looking for, and I assumed that they were getting at me for not writing up the distributor wash that we did in Palma?? In the end I got pissed and said "if you tell me what you are looking for I may be able to help, until then", etc. They changed their tone and told me that they had put the Stockport accident down to contaminated fuel. I had then emptied the same fuel truck that the Argonaut had used, so I must have had fuel contamination!! They were deadly serious!!

My replies had destroyed their theory and they had to go back, and start all over. In the end they found that the fuel and crossfeed levers were not all the way in the correct positions, and the fuel had been flowing from the fullest tanks to empty tanks, and not all going to the engines. A factor was the stretch for the F/O to operate the levers, and they never carried a proper Flight Engineer on the Argonaut. Any self respecting Flight Engineer on any of the big Douglas machines knew how to do this as you could balance the fuel quickly after a refueler had screwed up, or you had miscalculated??

Speedbird 48.

Actually the bulk of the IT accidents seem to have been caused by navigation CFIT at secondary destination airports rather than airframe-related issues (Stockport being an exception). What would they have given for GPS ? There were a number of other accidents to turbine aircraft on IT flights at the time - Dan-Air Comet at Barcelona, Britannia at Ljubljana etc.

The quick move to jets in the late 1960s was brought about by several coincidental factors.

1. The arrival of the BAC One-Eleven 500 which was well suited to such operations. The 737 came along at the same time which was chosen initially by Britannia as their first jet.

2. BOAC and BEA selling off their Comet fleets for operators like Dan-Air and Airtours.

3. Tour operators forming closer financial links with airlines leading to much longer term contracts, something you can take to the bank to borrow the millions to buy jets. This also led to a concentration on UK airlines rather than destination-based ones, who were even more likely to have old equipment.

4. The bankruptcy of British Eagle in late 1968 removed a large fleet of prop Britannias from the market.

At Derby Aviation ( forunner of BMA) we also lost a Dak into a mountain at Perp. in the 60's

Aircraft had Decca but I think it lost the chain. Also we did not use ink in th chart plotters

air ferry DC-4 accident
 

hi speedbird48,
I am finding this all so interesting. I will be in france on the western side of the pyrenees in april/may so will ring the mairie in Py and find out where the memorial site is. I know it exists as this friend knew people who had seen it many years ago but they have since passed on. As i told Anthony - I think i need to go there myself (for some reason!)
cheers
robb

If its of interest the Derby Aviation DC-3 crashed on 7 October 1961, with the loss of all 34 on board, also on Mt Canigou!

http://www.crash-aerien.com/www/data...he.php?id=3539

Maybe I'll see you there then Robb

Regards

Anthony

WHBM -

My post was really referring to sentiment, rather than factual analysis. It was the press that found the 'link' between these two incidents to have been the elderly airframes involved. Whilst I agree that the other factors you mention were instrumental in the change to jet fleets, I still feel that weekend in June 1967 changed the way the public felt about 'old' piston-engined aircraft.

You also mention that British Eagle's demise removed a number of Britannias from the market. On the contrary, those aircraft were bought by the likes of Monarch, Lloyd International and Donaldson who continued to fly them on IT charters, although not for many years.

a very intreresting post

i just finished the book about the history of air ferry and the author mentions that there were a series of accidents into that region around perpignan over those 10 years claiming over 600 lives...
the book is a good read

Re the Derby Aviation Crash
 

HI

I have been told (by the daughter of one of the victims of the Derby Aviation crash) that a possible cause for the crash was magnetic interference caused by unique geological conditions in the area. This may conflict with the findings of the inquiry but provides an interesting theory. Perhaps the two incidents could be connected?

webs1275
 

I doubt it's anything magnetic, more likely "just" the terrain. Before moving down here (I live not far North of Andorra) I imagined the Pyrennees were little more than a bit of a ridge but on arriving here for the first time I was seriously impressed by the terrain. The highest, Aneto is over 3400 metres and the whole ridge has some significant peaks such as the aforementioned Canigou. The range often spawns some ferocious thunderstorms, with all the associated hazards ( turbulence, icing) , and even in clear weather there can be some pretty significant Clear AIr Turbulence.

Air Ferry
 

I recall Air Ferry's DC-4 G-ASOG crashing on approach to Frankfurt in January 1967 with the loss of the crew. It may have been a freight flight. I used to pass the crash site just north of the then main road from the city to the airport. Black days indeed for operators of pistons.
Hope you find the memorial.

brgds
atb

atb1943

there's quite a bit about G-ASOG on a thread a couple of years ago here where I too was trying to find out about a (very loose) acquaintance.

Disregard the thread title - I thougth at first it was a Vanguard or Viscount - but AH&N did an epic job in no time flat!

Piston transports needed a fair bit more 'management' then their jet counterparts, especially fuel systems.
The DC-6B for example had either eight or ten fuel tanks, requiring dedicated attentiopn by the Flight Engineer for optimal operation.
This, together with shifting blowers, modulating oil shutters and cowl flaps (not to mention the ignition analyzer) kept him fairly busy.

In the end, this one Douglas piston transport was certainly the most reliable, and had the lowest operating cost of any.
The DC-4 wasn't bad, either, although just a tad underpowered.
DC-7?
OK, except for the engines, which seemingly had a mind of their own...failing PRT's with uncommon regularity.

1649 Constellation?
Very complicated, but a good performer...typical Lockheed.

crash site found!!
 

hi speedbird.
i was contacted a couple of months ago by another person from england whose parents were killed in the june 3 air ferry crash on mt canigou. since my husband and i were in france we contacted the village of Py and we managed to put this lady in touch with a retired english teacher living in the village. she also met a local who was there the day of the crash and remembers it well! She was then taken to the actual site where a small piece of the engine still remains. she placed some flowers there. She is the only relative of any victims who has visited the village that they can remember and they are keen to set up some sort of memorial.
so thanks for your help and also for the pprune site!!
robb arrieula

I was in the area of Mt Canigou last August and wondered exactly where the crash site was. The accident has strong resonances for me, not because of any personal involvement but because, at about the time the aircraft crashed, I was at Manchester Airport watching the Argonaut that crashed the next day at Stockport being loaded for its outward journey.

Next morning I woke to news of the crash in France not realising I was about to escape being involved in the Stockport crash by a matter of less than five minutes.

I ran a hiking club and that Sunday we had booked a coach to take a group of us from Stockport to Edale. We picked up at various locations, the final pick up being at Hopes Carr where the last of our party, joining from Bredbury, were dropped off by the father of one of the girls. We then set off again, turned left at Hillgate and then joined the A6. Approaching Stepping Hill Hospital we were surprised to see no less than six ambulances, sirens blaring, rushing towards Stockport. We thought nothing of it until we reached Edale and someone with a transistor radio heard the news on the Light Programme.

The exact location of the crash was unknown to us until we tried to leave the girls for the father to pick up.

Hopes Carr was full of literally hundreds of spectators, at least two ice cream vans and a hot dog vendor, not to mention TV crews and the press - by this time it was around 19.30 hrs.

When we found out the time of the crash, linked it to the ambulances we had seen and the time we were at Hopes Carr, we worked out that our coach had stopped no more than 12 feet from where the tail of the Argonaut landed and we had departed about three minutes before the crash.

The press made much of the precision of the Captain in putting the aircraft down "on the only patch of greenery in a built up area", totally overlooking the fact that Hopes Carr is a very small ravine, only about as long as the Argonaut, and that the aircraft had just flown over the copious greenery of Vernon Park and the fields below the park.

Unlike in France, there is a memorial at Hopes Carr which goes in someway to make up for the ghoulishness of the local populace who remained in their hundreds until late in the evening.

The two crashes happened a month before my 20th birthday and though I had witnessed the Viscount (G-ALWE) disappear from view followed by a column of smoke at Manchester in 1957 and have unfortunately seen a few accidents since, those two events, with very similar aircraft so close together in time, prompted my interest in airliners to to widen to include a detailed interest in air safety and flight deck procedures - what is now called crew resource management - long before NASA became interested and invented the term.

philbky - I have only known one person who saw Viscount WE crash in '57 - he was returning from primary school for lunch and saw the whole thing.

Where did you see it from?

I cycled from home (sale then) to Stockport next day to see the Argonout. My dad was involved in the insurance assessment of the TV aerial company the aeroplane came down on, so I got to go on site later that week. I was amazed how old-fashioned were the now-exposed cockpit controls even for 1967 - looked like a WW2 aeroplane.

I think your friend would have been returning to school from lunch as the crash was at 13.46.

I was at St Winifred's Primary School, Didsbury Rd, Stockport which is at the top of the escarpment to the north of the Mersey valley with a view across the Cheshire plain.

We were kicking a ball about when the Viscount flew down the approach. A few of us were interested in aircraft and invested 2/6d in J W R Taylor's ABC Civil Aircraft Markings every year. Movements at Manchester were comparatively sparse in 1957 so we stopped and looked.

As the Viscount flew past, we were whistled into line to go down a path to a football field at a lower level for the afternoon games session.

From our vantage point, aircraft disappeared from view at a point which I was later to learn was overhead Heald Green railway station.

As we started down the path to the field the aircraft disappeared. Seconds later a large column of smoke appeared close to the point we had last seen the aircraft. As nine and ten year olds we were curious about the smoke but did not link it to the aircraft until we were told, on the return to the classroom, that the aircraft had crashed.

Had the wind/atmospheric conditions been right we would have heard the impact as, in the right conditions, it was possible to hear aircraft engines at take off and full power whilst on the ground and, some years later the sound of Vanguards taxying was plainly audible.

Air Ferry DC-4 crash 3 June 1967
 

I seem to remember that the faulty heater in this aircraft was a Janitrol. At that time I was a 1-11 line captain with BUA. The captain of the DC-4 had been a F/O with us but was offered a command elsewhere and so left. I had known him earlier in Silver City and Britavia and, knowing him to be very competant, was surprised that this tragic accident should have occurred to his aircraft until learning that he and his co-pilot had suffered from CO poisoning.

Silver City...Britavia
 

Hallo Skybird,

Magic words those! Blackbushe was my local airport, as kids we were taken up there on our trikes from where we lived in Fleet by our granddad, who had a horse in a field just below Cats Farm Hill. We were always wandering around your aircraft, and those of Eagle too, and I distinctly recall the feeling of walking up a studded floorway to the nose of what turned out to be their Halifax.

Along the side of the Silver City hangar and out-buildings there used to be several foreign aircraft parked, but I can only recall one bearing the name 'Zambesi', later to be identified as a Catalina. You wouldn't happen to have any photos of the general area would you...?

Somewhat later, I took some very unidentifiable photos myself in your hangar with a simple box camera, but all you can recognize is the glazing of a Bell 47!

During the Farnborough show of 1957 I happened to be there when the Seahawk crashed quite close to your out-buildings, and was the first one to reach the pilot, who had come down with I believe a broken ankle. A very good friend took the quite famous photo of its plunge to earth with about a yard to go, and I am to be seen about to take off over the A30 in its direction. Had the Seahawk not corkscrewed in its dive, it would have come down on us at the terminal building. We were watching it come at us, fascinated and rooted to the spot...

Some years later, as a clerk at FUDC I'd have dealings with the father of a schoolchum, Les Painter was his name, and he used to be a general factotum at Eagles as far as I recall. Son's name was Doug.

A friendly police motorcycle patrolman used to call in for a coffee and we got to know him quite well. In fact he arranged for us (spotters) to get a flight in Eagle's Viking G-AMGG.

Some ten years later I'd be working on their Britannias at Heathrow...

Happy days!

brgds
atb

G-ASOG
 

Teeteringhead

I have just read and re-read your previous posts, for which many thanks!

brgds
atb

Let's not forget two other terrible CFIT accidents involving turboprops belonging to British IT charter airlines in the 1960's and early 1970's: British Eagle Britannia G-AOVO near Innsbruck in winter 1963/64; and the Invicta Vanguard G-AXOP near Basel in April 1973. CFIT accidents were all too prevalent in those days, and certainly not restricted to piston-engined aircraft.

The Invicta accident was especially notorious, and apparently involved a significant amount of spatial disorientation on the part of the crew, while attempting an NDB approach to minimums in a snowstorm. This accident was especially tragic as the aircraft was chartered on behalf of a group of country ladies from Somerset for a day visit to Basel, most of whom had never flown before.

Mt. Canigou
 

I am hoping to receive a reply from this mail.

One of the crew members on board was Captain Isaacs - did you know him?

Many regards,

Mt. Canigou
 

Dear Sir,

I am looking for old Air Ferry colleagues of Captain Edward Isaacs, who died at Mt. Canigou 1967.

I am hoping to hear from you.

catalina
 

Dear abt1943--somewhat off topic but Catalina was VP-KKJ.....early 50s?

Robmack,

Thank you very much - that is definitely the one.. Looking at the photo in Airliners.net was very evocative.

Somehow though I don't think she was called Zambesi, more like Kilimanjaro, which my grey cells had somehow switched over the years.

Anyway, much appreciate your help, and have a happy new year.

cheers
Alan

hi there,

i posted earlier here last year and this is a very interesting post.
i remember at 10 years old the 2 crashes on the same weekend involving IT charters, air ferry and BMA at stockport.
i am in perpignan soon and hope to try to visit the crash site,
subject to the weather etc (late sept)

the nearest village is py and i understand from others here that its possible to get up there...
any contacts or help would be appreciated.
regards.