Congo crash

[nippysweetie]

Reports that a cargo plane has gone down in a residential area of Kinshasa, Congo

[suncomesout]

According to German news, the Antonov 26 crashed on a marcet place near Kinshasa. Number of victims remains unclear.

SCO

[nippysweetie]

Antonov 26 crashed in a market in Kingasani area. No details of injuries at present, airport officials still trying to get details

[nippysweetie]

First eyewitness account suggests the aircraft came down on houses near Ndili international airport. There is also confusion over whether there were pax on flight

[nippysweetie]

Airport officials say 17 people on board when the Antonov crashed this morning.
Airport spokesman named as Jean-Claude Bakongo said a major explosion followed the crash in the Kingasani neighbourhood.

NS

[SQUAWKIDENT]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/7027789.stm

[suncomesout]

First picture...

http://www.itar-tass.com/eng/level2....ewsID=11933853

Many victims on the ground are feared. plane operated by "Africa-1", Russian crew...

SCO

[Speedbreak]

(Small, but..) Apparently, the plane did not crash in the famaous Massina Market, wich is at that time really crowded!

Speedbreak

[AlphaWhiskyRomeo]

That looks like an AN-26 tail to me.

[mr Q]

MORE

(Corrects spelling of airport to Ndjili from Ndili)
By Joe Bavier

KINSHASA (Reuters) - A Russian-made cargo plane with 17 people on board crashed and exploded on Thursday in a crowded neighborhood of Democratic Republic of Congo's capital Kinshasa, airport officials and witnesses said.

A United Nations spokesman said there were "many dead."

The Antonov aircraft belonging to Congolese airline Africa 1 came down on several shacks in the Kingasani neighborhood near Ndjili international airport, the sources said.

"There were 17 people on board," said airport protocol official Jean-Claude Bakongo, who said a major explosion followed the crash.

"I saw it fall in the Kingasani neighborhood."

Another airport security official who went to the crash site told Reuters that fire fighters were struggling to reach the wreckage in the shanty town.

"There are at least four houses burning, the airplane is burning ... There's a lot of smoke and flames, everybody in the houses must be dead," he said.

"People say the plane was overloaded."

Air travel is notoriously dangerous in Congo. Ageing planes suffer from a lack of maintenance and spare parts but they are often the only way to transport people and goods across the vast African country slowly recovering from a 1998-2003 civil war.

[Foxyflyer]

Russian down in DRC

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/rtrs/200710...648bc60_8.html

Reports all on board dead and almost certain further casualties on the ground.
Very sad.

[samosa]

once again........

one A/C down in DRC........ again!?

Use to fly in the region....... as many others......if we have to blame someone is not the company but the Congoleese CAA which is corrupted until the end of their nail....and they do not perform checks! They are doing sometimes checks and you have to pay a lot of $$$$$. ........ sry they just want $$$$

Congoleese CAA must do their job!!!! they are a banch of asles, mainly seated iat N'dolo , answering to their multiple cellulars and contemplating their last german (new) car

I do hope, with this (unfortuate) accident that they will wake up!!!

Sorry guys to be furious and sad!

I'ts again a sad day for DRC

Samosa

PS English ids not mymother tongue

[nano404]

25 dead. Witness said that it had the "tires in the air" so I imagine that it's upside down.

[AlphaWhiskyRomeo]

Not commenting at all on the payload and balance of the crashed aircraft, but if an AN-26 is fully loaded and loses an engine shortly after t/o (which apparently might have happened in Kinchasa), can it still be expected to circle and land safely? Or was this not intended in the initial design of the aircraft?

[el #]

An-24: 21,000 Kg MToW. 2 x 2,100 Kw engines, or 5 Kw/Kg.
ATR-42: 18,600 kg MToW, 2 x 1,790kW engines, or 5.2 Kw/Kg.

I think both types can climb (slowly) on one one engine at MToW,

[express315]

I flew AN-26 for 10 years and three years of it was in Africa.
AN-26 MTOW is 24000 kg. For actual conditions in Africa the performance
limiting weight goes down to around 22000 kg most of the time.
The reality was that we had to fly as heavy as 27000-29000 kg.
I survived, some others not...

[PAXboy]

In Africa, 'weight already loaded' and 'there is still space in there for another crate' are not mutually exclusive.

The flight crew may not have known what was on board.

[poorwanderingwun]

The realities of operating these (ex USSR) a:c in certain parts of Africa have little to do with published performance figures.. basically they're good workhorses when maintained to the basic standards but in the hands of impoverished companies who see them as a disposable asset good for making a few bucks they can be lethal... gross overloading is commonplace and one russian pilot (Ukrain to be precice) I talked to at Mbandaka was quite open about how they sold space (no seats on cargo a:c) to locals after the freight was loaded.. as it was well overweight before the pax climbed aboard the mind boggles at the performance expected once 10 to 20 people found seating space...a bit like the merchant marine in its early days... all of us familiar with flying in places such as DRC have become accustomed to old Russian stock taking to the air and relying on the curvature of the earth to gain altitude;; often stil at 2 to 3 hundred feet when disappearing over the rooftops 5 miles away... they don't need to lose an engine... any engine producing less than 100% is likely to result in a disaster..

[madherb]

I've had the dubious pleasure of having flown in Africa (not the DRC) in an AN-24 - the APU, located in the nacelle, with exhaust supplying some thrust, was only shut down at top of climb. SOP?

The load manifest indicated 50kg below MAUW. However, the freight was 'estimated' at 750kg, and every pax seat was full. The take-off was interesting.

The FE gleefully informed me that 'last flight we had full pax and 2000kg of freight'.........

CRM appeared to be non-existent, with the Captain flying, navigating, and doing the radio work. I did wonder what would happen in the cockpit if something went pear-shaped at a critical moment.

Fortunately for those dependent on my physical presence to harvest an income (read ex) nothing went awry.

With this kind of operation very much the norm, and oversight from many African CAAs confined to money-collecting and issuing of bits of meaningless paper, we shall no doubt continue to read of, and experience the loss of innocent lives. Viva Africa viva! Viva corruption! Viva greed!

[brain fade]

Call me a spotter, but that don't look like an AN-26 to me. More like a CASA 212 or an AN-12.

Could be the way it's lying tho.