1976 Zagreb mid-air collision
Encyclopedia
Vrbovec
Vrbovec is city in Zagreb county, Croatia, lying to the northeast of the capital Zagreb.-Geography:The town of Vrbovec lies to the north-east of Zagreb, either along the highway A4 , and then B28 expressway Vrbovec is city in Zagreb county, Croatia, lying to the northeast of the capital...
, Yugoslavia
Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was the Yugoslav state that existed from the abolition of the Yugoslav monarchy until it was dissolved in 1992 amid the Yugoslav Wars. It was a socialist state and a federation made up of six socialist republics: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia,...
when British Airways
British Airways
British Airways is the flag carrier airline of the United Kingdom, based in Waterside, near its main hub at London Heathrow Airport. British Airways is the largest airline in the UK based on fleet size, international flights and international destinations...
Flight 476, a Hawker Siddeley Trident 3B
Hawker Siddeley Trident
The Hawker Siddeley HS 121 Trident was a British short/medium-range three-engined jet airliner designed by de Havilland and built by Hawker Siddeley in the 1960s and 1970s...
en route from London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
Heathrow Airport
London Heathrow Airport
London Heathrow Airport or Heathrow , in the London Borough of Hillingdon, is the busiest airport in the United Kingdom and the third busiest airport in the world in terms of total passenger traffic, handling more international passengers than any other airport around the globe...
to Yeşilköy International Airport
Atatürk International Airport
Atatürk International Airport is the major international airport in Istanbul, Turkey. Opened in 1924 and located in Yeşilköy, on the European side of the city, it is west of the city centre. In 1980, the airport was renamed to Atatürk International Airport in honor of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the...
, Istanbul
Istanbul
Istanbul , historically known as Byzantium and Constantinople , is the largest city of Turkey. Istanbul metropolitan province had 13.26 million people living in it as of December, 2010, which is 18% of Turkey's population and the 3rd largest metropolitan area in Europe after London and...
, collided in mid-air
Mid-air collision
A mid-air collision is an aviation accident in which two or more aircraft come into contact during flight. Owing to the relatively high velocities involved and any subsequent impact on the ground or sea, very severe damage or the total destruction of at least one of the aircraft involved usually...
with Inex-Adria Aviopromet Flight 550, a Douglas DC-9 en route from Split
Split (city)
Split is a Mediterranean city on the eastern shores of the Adriatic Sea, centered around the ancient Roman Palace of the Emperor Diocletian and its wide port bay. With a population of 178,192 citizens, and a metropolitan area numbering up to 467,899, Split is by far the largest Dalmatian city and...
Kaštela/Resnik Airport
Split Airport
Split Kaštela/Resnik Airport is the airport serving Split and Kaštela in Split-Dalmatia County, Croatia. It is close to the town of Trogir....
, Yugoslavia, to Cologne Bonn Airport
Cologne Bonn Airport
Cologne/Bonn Airport is an international airport located in the district of Porz in the city of Cologne, Germany, and is surrounded by the Wahner Heide nature reserve. The airport is centrally located in the Cologne/Bonn Region southeast of Cologne city centre and northeast of Bonn...
, West Germany
West Germany
West Germany is the common English, but not official, name for the Federal Republic of Germany or FRG in the period between its creation in May 1949 to German reunification on 3 October 1990....
, at 11:15am local time (10:15 UTC).
All 176 people aboard both flights were killed, making it, at the time, the world's deadliest mid-air collision; it had a death toll higher than that of All Nippon Airways Flight 58
All Nippon Airways Flight 58
All Nippon Airways Flight 58 was a Boeing 727-281 airliner, JA8329, that collided with a Japan Air Self-Defense Force F-86F fighter jet, 92-7932, while en route from Chitose Airport in Sapporo to Tokyo International Airport in Tokyo on 30 July 1971 at 2:04 local time. All 162 of those on board...
. It was, and remains, the only fatal accident to befall an aircraft operated by British Airways (not counting BA's ancestors), as well as the deadliest aviation accident in Croatia
Croatia
Croatia , officially the Republic of Croatia , is a unitary democratic parliamentary republic in Europe at the crossroads of the Mitteleuropa, the Balkans, and the Mediterranean. Its capital and largest city is Zagreb. The country is divided into 20 counties and the city of Zagreb. Croatia covers ...
.
Flights
British Airways Flight 476 departed Heathrow at 08:32 UTC as flight BEA476 with 54 passengers on board and a crew of 9. At the controls of the Trident 3B was an experienced captain Dennis Tann (born 1932), who by the time of the accident had accumulated 10,781 flying hours. He was assisted by first officer Brian Helm and acting first officer Martin Flint.Inex-Adria Flight 550 departed Split, Yugoslavia at 09:48 UTC bound for Cologne, West Germany as flight JP550. It carried 108 passengers, mostly German holiday-makers returning home at the end of a holiday on the Dalmatian coast, and a crew of 5. At the controls sat captain Jože Krumpak (born 1925), an experienced pilot with 10,157 flying hours, and first officer Dušan Ivanuš. Inex-Adria was a charter airline based in Slovenia
Socialist Republic of Slovenia
The Socialist Republic of Slovenia was a socialist state that was a constituent country of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia from 1943 until 1990...
, the northern-most of the constituent republics making up the federation of Yugoslavia
Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was the Yugoslav state that existed from the abolition of the Yugoslav monarchy until it was dissolved in 1992 amid the Yugoslav Wars. It was a socialist state and a federation made up of six socialist republics: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia,...
.
Both flights proceeded uneventfully until they reached the Zagreb VOR
VHF omnidirectional range
VOR, short for VHF omnidirectional radio range, is a type of radio navigation system for aircraft. A VOR ground station broadcasts a VHF radio composite signal including the station's identifier, voice , and navigation signal. The identifier is typically a two- or three-letter string in Morse code...
.
Air traffic control
In the mid-1970s, the Zagreb air traffic controlAir traffic control
Air traffic control is a service provided by ground-based controllers who direct aircraft on the ground and in the air. The primary purpose of ATC systems worldwide is to separate aircraft to prevent collisions, to organize and expedite the flow of traffic, and to provide information and other...
region was one of the busiest in Europe despite being seriously undermanned and poorly equipped. The Zagreb VOR was a reporting point for a number of congested airways between northern Europe and southeastern Europe, the Middle East, and beyond. The airspace
Airspace
Airspace means the portion of the atmosphere controlled by a country above its territory, including its territorial waters or, more generally, any specific three-dimensional portion of the atmosphere....
was divided into three sectors by altitude: the lower sector below 25,000 feet, the middle sector from 25,000 to 31,000 feet, and the upper sector above 31,000 feet.
At the time of the accident, staff on duty at the Zagreb Area Control Center
Area Control Center
In air traffic control, an Area Control Center , also known as a Center, is a facility responsible for controlling instrument flight rules aircraft en route in a particular volume of airspace at high altitudes between airport approaches and departures...
included:
- Julio Dajčić, chief of shift
- Gradimir Tasić, upper sector controller
- Nenad Tepeš, upper sector controller
- Mladen Hochberger, upper sector controller
- Bojan Erjavec, middle sector controller
- Gradimir Pelin, middle sector controller
Accident
On entering Yugoslav airspace from Austria, flight 476 established radio contact with the Zagreb ACC upper-sector controller Gradimir Tasić at 10:04:12 UTC, informing him that they were at flight levelFlight level
A Flight Level is a standard nominal altitude of an aircraft, in hundreds of feet. This altitude is calculated from the International standard pressure datum of 1013.25 hPa , the average sea-level pressure, and therefore is not necessarily the same as the aircraft's true altitude either...
330 and expected to reach the Zagreb VOR at 10:14. The controller responded by instructing them to select transponder code 2312, and to call again on reaching the VOR:
| 10:04:12 | BEA476 | Zagreb, Bealine 476, good morning. |
| Zagreb Upp | Bealine 476, good morning, go ahead. | |
| 10:04:19 | BEA476 | Er, 476, is Klagenfurt at 02, 330 and estimating Zagreb at One Four. |
| 10:04:27 | Zagreb Upp | Bealine 476, roger, call me passing Zagreb, flight level 330, Squawk Alpha 2312. |
| 10:04:40 | BEA476 | 2312 is coming. |
This was the last communication with the Trident aircraft before the accident.
At around the same time, JP550 contacted middle-sector controller Bojan Erjavec asking for a higher flight level; the aircraft was at flight level 260, or 26,000 feet. FL280 and FL310 were unavailable, so Erjavec informed JP550 of the situation and offered FL350, which the pilots accepted. To get clearance for a higher level, it was necessary to obtain the permission of the upper-sector controller. Erjavec waved his hand to get Tasić's attention, but Tasić (who was working the upper sector on his own, as Hochberger had gone to search for Tepeš) was far too busy to be interrupted. Pelin was then instructed to co-ordinate the climbout for the DC-9 with Tasić.
According to Pelin, he walked to the upper sector console holding JP550's flight progress strip
Flight progress strip
- General :A flight progress strip is a small strip of paper used to track a flight in air traffic control . While it has been supplemented by more technologically advanced methods of flight tracking since its introduction, it is still used in modern ATC as a quick way to annotate a flight, to...
. He asked Tasić if the DC-9 could climb to FL350. Tasić took the strip from Pelin and looked at it, then asked where the aircraft was at the moment. Pelin then pointed to a blip on the screen approaching Kostajnica
Kostajnica
Kostajnica can refer to:* Kostajnica, Bosnia and Herzegovina, a town on the right bank of river Una, in Bosnia* Hrvatska Kostajnica, a town on the left bank of river Una, in Croatia* Kostajnica , a village near Doboj, Bosnia and Herzegovina...
. Tasić's response was 'yes, it could climb'. Pelin then noticed an aircraft on the screen coming from the direction of Metlika
Metlika
Metlika is a town and municipality in the southeastern Slovenia. It lies on the left bank of the river Kolpa on the border with Croatia. The municipality is at the heart of the area of Bela Krajina, the southeastern part of the traditional region of Lower Carniola. It is now included in the...
and asked Tasić about it, who said 'wait until they cross'. Pelin referred to the middle-sector screen to make sure that he had identified the DC-9 positively on the upper-sector screen. He then returned to Tasić and they both watched the targets pass each other, at which point Tasić authorized JP550 to climb. Pelin then called out to Erjavec and said 'yes, climb it'. Upon Erjevec receiving the OK from Pelin, he instructed the DC-9 to climb to FL350. That was at 10:07:40.
At 10:12:03, JP550 called the Zagreb middle-sector controller to inform them that the aircraft was out of flight level 310. The last instructions given by Erjavec to JP550 were to call the upper-sector controller on 134.45 MHz and to stop squawking the assigned squawk code. By instructing JP550 to squawk Standby, Erjavec simply released a code allocated for the middle sector. The data tag for the DC-9 would now disappear from his screen and the aircraft would become merely a point among many others. If everything about this handover had been normal, the DC-9 would have been given a new code on initial contact with the upper sector controller and would have been positively identified on the upper sector screen with its flight number and altitude readout. But this had not been a normal handover because of the ill-handled coordination for the climb. Also, Tasić was busy with other traffic and JP550 did not immediately contact the upper-sector controller. This could have been because the frequency was busy, but the pilots might also have delayed the call for some unknown reason.
By the time JP550 contacted the upper-sector controller at 10:14:04 it had reached the Zagreb VOR and was already climbing through flight level 325. The controller immediately asked for confirmation of the aircraft's level:
| 10:14:04 | JP550 | Dobar dan ["Good day"] Zagreb, Adria 550. |
| 10:14:07 | Zagreb Upp | Adria 550, Zagreb, dobar dan, go ahead. |
| 10:14:10 | JP550 | 325 crossing Zagreb at One Four. |
| 10:14:14 | Zagreb Upp | What is your present level? |
| 10:14:17 | JP550 | 327. |
Realising the imminent danger of collision, Tasić instructed the JP550 to stop climbing. In doing so, he reverted to his native Serbo-Croatian
Serbo-Croatian
Serbo-Croatian or Serbo-Croat, less commonly Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian , is a South Slavic language with multiple standards and the primary language of Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Montenegro...
language, contrary to the regulations. Unfortunately, this meant that the British Airways plane, even if they overheard this conversation, would have very little chance of understanding their own imminent danger. The controller's last moment attempt to avert catastrophe turned what would have been a near miss into the collision he was trying to prevent. For, by the time JP550 had leveled off it was at flight level 330, exactly the same level as BE476:
| 10:14:22 | Zagreb Upp | ... e... zadržite se na toj visini i javite prolazak Zagreba ["uh... hold yourself at your height and report passing Zagreb"]. |
| 10:14:27 | JP550 | Kojoj visini? ["What height?"] |
| 10:14:29 | Zagreb Upp | Na kojoj ste sada u penjanju jer... e... imate avion pred vama na... 335 sa leva na desno. ["The height you are climbing through because... uh... you have an aircraft in front of you at... 335 from left to right."] |
| 10:14:38 | JP550 | OK, ostajemo točno 330. ["OK, we'll remain precisely at 330."] |
Half a minute later, Tasić called BEA476 and instructed it to report passing the next waypoint at Našice
Našice
Našice is a town in the Osijek-Baranja county of Croatia, population 7,894 , total municipality population 16,228 . It is located on the northern slopes of Krndija Mountain in eastern Slavonia, 51 km southwest of Osijek; elevation 157 m....
:
| 10:15:06 | Zagreb Upp | Bealine 476, Zagreb... report passing Nasice. |
| 10:15:12 | BE778 | Beatours 778, were you calling...? |
| 10:15:14 | Zagreb Upp | Negative. |
Tasić continued to call BE476 and JP550, ignoring calls from other aircraft, but to no avail:
| 10:15:50 | Zagreb Upp | Adria 550, Zagreb... |
| 10:16:00 | Zagreb Upp | Adria 550, Zagreb... |
| 10:16:14 | Zagreb Upp | Adria 550, Zagreb... |
| 10:16:32 | Zagreb Upp | Adria 550, Zagreb... |
| 10:16:42 | Zagreb Upp | Adria 550, Zagreb... |
| 10:16:50 | Zagreb Upp | Bealine 476, Zagreb... |
| 10:16:58 | Zagreb Upp | Bealine 476, Zagreb... |
A Lufthansa
Lufthansa
Deutsche Lufthansa AG is the flag carrier of Germany and the largest airline in Europe in terms of overall passengers carried. The name of the company is derived from Luft , and Hansa .The airline is the world's fourth-largest airline in terms of overall passengers carried, operating...
Boeing 737 travelling eastbound on UB5 at level 290 towards Zagreb, was positioned only 15 miles behind the Trident. The co-pilot saw the collision as a flash of lightning and afterwards, out of a ball of smoke, two aircraft falling towards the ground. The Boeing 737 commander, Captain Josef Kröse, reported the sighting to Erjavec, the middle-sector controller.
| 10:15:40 | Capt Kröse R/T | ....e Zagreb! It is possible we have a mid-air collision in sight. We have two aircraft going down, well, almost below our position now. |
This was spoken in such an agitated voice that Erjavec was unable to understand what was being said. (Later, on hearing the recording of this call, Captain Kröse had difficulty in understanding his own words). The Lufthansa captain had to repeat his message several times.
| 10:18:12 | Capt Kröse R/T | It is possible that the other aircraft ahead of us had a mid-air collision....er...just overhead Zagreb. We had two aircraft going down with a rapid rate of descent...and there was also smoke coming out. |
When the implications of what was being said dawned on Erjavec he glanced across to the upper-sector controller. At his station sat a stunned Tasić, white-faced with shock. Slowly he lifted the headset from his ears and placed it on the console in front of him.
The two aircraft had collided over the town of Vrbovec
Vrbovec
Vrbovec is city in Zagreb county, Croatia, lying to the northeast of the capital Zagreb.-Geography:The town of Vrbovec lies to the north-east of Zagreb, either along the highway A4 , and then B28 expressway Vrbovec is city in Zagreb county, Croatia, lying to the northeast of the capital...
. The last 5 meters of the DC-9's left wing sliced through the Trident's cockpit section and forward passenger compartment. The DC-9 went into an immediate nose dive; the Trident remained in flight for a short while before going down. All 63 people aboard flight 476 and 113 people aboard flight 550 were killed.
A police officer who was one of the first to arrive at the scene reported that a baby on the ground was "still giving feeble signs of life near the [British] plane, but even if the ambulances had arrived before me, it would have been too late to save it."
Trial
By noon that day, all controllers were in custody for interrogation. Later, all were released except Tasić, who remained in custody until the trial.The trial opened on 11 April 1977 in Zagreb District Court. All the controllers were indicted under the Penal Code of Yugoslavia, Articles 271-72 as "persons who by endangering railway, sea or air traffic, threaten the lives of men or property".
Tasić was the only one to be found guilty; he was sentenced to seven years' imprisonment. After a petition by air traffic controllers, it was determined that Tasić had been used as a scapegoat
Scapegoat
Scapegoating is the practice of singling out any party for unmerited negative treatment or blame. Scapegoating may be conducted by individuals against individuals , individuals against groups , groups against individuals , and groups against groups Scapegoating is the practice of singling out any...
, and he was released on 29 November 1978. He had served nearly two years and three months in prison.