Aircraft down in residential area of Karachi?
 

There are reports circulating at the moment of a large aircraft (possibly russian) that's come down in a residential area of Karachi, Pakistan

More information getting through now

A Russian Cargo Airplane on way to Sudan (Khartoum) crashed 5 minutes after take off from Karachi Airport, Pakistan. It has crashed into a Naval Colony (Malir Cantt Ext) destroying 8 houses. Reporting 4 on board.

Edit: Other reports suggesting that there may have been 8 crew on board, and that witnesses claim to have seen the right engine on fire prior to the crash. Obviously it's much too early to have hard facts

sky news saying it was 2 minutes into flight, russian, and al queda possibly involved!..

There is a live stream from the crash site showing large fires Live Streaming Dunya News TV , Dunya TV Pakistan

more detail
 

Sunway Airlines IL-76

YouTube - Russion Cargo Plane iL-76 Crash in karachi sunday 28 November 2010

BBC says its mechanical failure so we might as well close this thread. Lord knows why we waste so much money on professional accident investigation when conclusions can be reached in such a straightforward manner.

Ref post#3 al queda ? ?

Regretably I think " Russian Cargo Aircraft" is probably enough of an explanation if we look at historical precedent, no need to involve Osama B.L. methinks.

Really ? Lets look at 2010 fatal accidents by manufacturer and country of origin and see what they have to say about your comment.


Airbus 2
Antonov 6
ATR 2
Beechcraft 2
Boeing 5
Convair 1
DeHaviland 1
CASA 1
Cessna 4
Dornier 1
Embraer 3
Fairchild 1
GAF 1
Learjet 1
LET 2
Lockheed 1
PZL 2
Rockwell 1
Tupolev 1


Australia 1
Brazil 3
Canada 1
Czech Rep 2
France 4
Poland 5
Germany 1
Russia 5
Spain 1
USA 16

If this crash was indeed an IL-76, it would be the first fatal Ilyushin crash of 2010.

PS All An-2 were built in Poland after around 1961 and are counted as Polish. I counted Airbus and ATR as "French" although its more complicated.

another video clip...
 

The BBC actually says:

Video
 

Amateur video showing the last few seconds of flight.
YouTube - Amateur Video Clip of Ilyushin Il-76 hitting ground in Karachi
Shown by a Pakistani TV channel.

there are reports of the crew declaring mayday and requesting emergency landing. the airplane caught fire just after take off, and for a change we have video to confirm it. it went down into some houses being constructed for naval officers in Pakistan Naval Station Karsaz.

as far as i can figure the crash site is pretty much in line with 25L an slightly left of 25R at about 2NM from the end of 25L.

Montrealguy

How many 76's are there airworthy these days?

Its the number of accidents per fleet size that really matters.
Boeing come out 2nd 5, but there are thousands of those flying all over the world!

Oh, and welcome to prune....:ok:

In the video the aircraft is still on fire when it hit the ground. Seems to me it was too much time for just an engine fire. :uhoh:

The short inflight portion of that last video showed a pretty big fire going. Seems likely that more than just an engine was burning. Perhaps another uncontained engine failure?

Thanks for the welcome.

Actually there are several hundred IL-76 still flying these days, but there are only 130 civilian IL-76s flying legally, ie with a real and a valid Certificate of Airworthiness. These are all listed here on the Ilyushin website:

Airworthy Ilyushins

The very reason Ilyushin listed those CIVILIAN aircraft that were flying legally, is because many of those that were involved in crashes these past years, crashed, not because they were Ilyushins, but because they had been flown without conforming to the maintenance and inspection programs of the manufacturer, leading to comments like were made by you on this Forum.

You will notice that 4L-GNI, the Georgian Registered IL-76 involved in last night's crash, is not on the list of the IL-76 with a real Certificate of Airworthiness. Not a coincidence.

Ilyushin encourages visitors to this page to also visit the website of Saturn, the engine manufacturer' Website, to discover if the engines that are hung on an individual aircraft are legal.

The Indian Air Force has 26 IL-76-based aircraft and has been operating them since 1985 with zero losses. Not a coincidence either.

There are reports that after 2007 this airframe was only allowed to fly if a service life extension programme was completed.

Montrealguy,

I think what you, and others, have posted justifies , rather than invalidates , my comment.

I didn't claim that the aircraft, if operated/maintained in accordance with its original design brief by a technically competent crew/legally operating company/correctly functioning airworthiness authority, couldn't be safe. But, even without getting involved in African ops, that is not how the majority of these aircraft/companies are conducting their business, so my comment , in the very general sense, stands, and is I believe an accurate reflection of all Soviet cargo aircraft worldwide this last decade or more. Read flight international's annual accident reviews and see how many Soviet cargo aircraft come to grief each and every year.
Final Q, you can get in the back of one of these mothers, or get the train and take a few days longer, what you gonna choose ? me, I'll let the train take the strain thanks.
Look at some of the related videos appearing on youtube, like the curvature of the earth aided take-off. :eek: These aircraft ,through no fault of their own, are being operated by individuals/companies/regimes that don't have the first idea, and even less concern for, anything relating remotely to flight safety. Sad but, evinced by the number of smouldering wrecks each year, all too true.