5 Airline Crashes Resulting from Tomfoolery

Aviation is an industry that thrives on precision, discipline, and adherence to strict protocols. However, there have been tragic instances where gross misconduct, recklessness, and outright tomfoolery by those in the cockpit have led to catastrophic outcomes. These rare but devastating events highlight the critical importance of professionalism in the skies and how a moment of folly can result in irreversible tragedy. This article digs into some of the most notorious airline crashes where irresponsible behavior played a pivotal role, shedding light on the dire consequences of such actions.

Aeroflot Flight 593

On March 23, 1994, Aeroflot Flight 593, operated by Russian Airlines, was en route from Moscow to Hong Kong with 63 passengers and 12 crew members on board. The flight was piloted by Captain Andrey Viktorovich Danilov and co-pilot Igor Vasilyevich Piskaryov. Due to the long-haul nature of the journey, they were joined by a relief pilot, Captain Yaroslav Vladimirovich Kudrinsky, who had brought his two children, 15-year-old Eldar and 12-year-old Yana, on their first international trip.

Shortly after midnight, with Captain Danilov resting in his cabin, relief Captain Kudrinsky invited his two children to the cockpit for a brief tour. He proudly showed them the various computerized displays and explained the unique features of the aircraft. Then, turning to his 12-year-old daughter, he asked if she would like to sit in the captain’s seat.

Although bringing guests into the cockpit of a passenger plane during flight is against regulations, airliners have occasionally flouted this rule, allowing small children to have a glimpse of the flight deck. While such actions don't typically pose significant safety risks, letting someone sit in the captain’s seat is an entirely different matter.

A breakdown of the events in the cockpit, as illustrated by Matthew Tesch for Macarthur Job’s “Air Disaster: Volume 3.”

At her father’s invitation, Yana climbed into the captain’s seat and took hold of the control stick. Kudrinsky then adjusted the autopilot heading, causing the plane to bank left. As the control column moved in Yana’s hands, it gave her the impression that she was actually steering the plane. After a few minutes, Yana vacated the seat for her older brother Eldar. Again, Kudrinsky played with the plane’s heading knob to give the impression that Eldar was flying the plane, before correcting the heading and putting the plane back on the intended course. Eldar, however, didn’t let go off the controls and continued applying force until the flight computer responded by switching the plane's ailerons to manual control. A silent indicator light came on to alert the pilots that the autopilot was no longer steering the plane. The pilots, who were accustomed to Soviet-designed planes that had audible warning signals, apparently failed to notice the indicator light.

The plane began to slowly bank to the right. Without the autopilot to correct the deviation, the bank angle increased gradually until it was way past the allowed 30 degrees, the normal in-flight maximum. Ironically, it was Eldar who first identified that the plane was banking. Unaware that the horizontal channel of the autopilot was turned off, the pilots debated what had caused the plane to bank until the bank angle went past 45 degrees. With the wings unable to maintain lift at such a high bank angle, the plane began to descend. The autopilot, still controlling the vertical axis, attempted to compensate by pitching the nose up and increasing engine thrust.

With Eldar still gripping the control stick, co-pilot Piskaryov tried desperately to regain control of the aircraft. However, his efforts were hampered both by the extreme bank angle and Eldar’s unintentional resistance. As the plane reached an almost 90-degree bank, it began to spiral uncontrollably. The aircraft’s automated systems responded by lowering the nose, causing the plane to enter a nosedive in an attempt to recover from the stall.

Recovering a plane from such a precarious situation requires the combined effort of both pilots. But as the plane fell, G-forces increased tremendously pinning Eldar to the seat and making him unable to get up and out of the way. Only Piskaryov was at the controls with Kudrinsky barking orders from behind the seat.

For a brief moment, the plane began to level out, allowing Eldar to get out of the captain’s seat, but in the process he accidentally stepped on the right rudder pedal, sending the plane yawing sharply to the right. In the chaos and desperate to regain control, Piskaryov inadvertently initiated a steep climb, which led to another critical loss of airspeed. The plane stalled once more and entered into a deadly spin. The pilots fought valiantly to regain control, but the situation had already spiraled beyond recovery. The aircraft plummeted from the sky, ultimately crashing into the side of a snow-covered mountain and killing all 75 people on board.

Aeroflot Flight 593 Crash Animation with cockpit voice recording.

There is no doubt that Kudrinsky's reckless decision to allow his children to manipulate the aircraft's control column initiated the sequence of events that led to the loss of control and the eventual crash. In its investigation, the Interstate Aviation Committee (MAK) strongly criticized Kudrinsky, stating that his choice to let Eldar handle the controls "demonstrated an utterly careless and irresponsible disregard for flight safety, a consequence of poor discipline and a blatant ignorance of the rules contained in [the civil aviation regulations]."

The tragedy was compounded by the fact that, according to the investigation, the disaster might have been averted if the pilots had simply released the control column after the aircraft's initial spin. Aerodynamic principles would likely have allowed the plane to naturally level itself out, potentially preventing the catastrophic crash.

The headstone of Yana Kudrinskaya and Eldar Kudrinsky at Mitinskoe Cemetery, Moscow. Photo credit: Findagrave

Aeroflot Flight 6502

Eight years before the infamous Flight 593 crash that damaged Aeroflot's reputation, the Soviet airline experienced another crash due to unprofessional pilot conduct. This incident took place on October 20, 1986, involving a Tupolev Tu-134A en route from Yekaterinburg to Grozny, with a scheduled stop at Kurumoch Airport in Samara.

As the aircraft approached Kurumoch Airport, Captain Alexander Kliuyev made a wager with First Officer Gennady Zhirnov that he could land the plane solely using instruments. To enforce the challenge, they agreed to cover the cockpit windows, blocking any view of the ground.

Without any visual reference outside the cockpit and disregarding instructions from air traffic controllers to perform a Non-directional beacon (NDB) approach, Captain Kliuyev persisted with his attempt to land the plane using only instruments. As the aircraft descended to just 200 feet above the ground, audible warnings alerted Kliuyev to the dangerously low altitude, but he obstinately ignored repeated instructions from the traffic controller to abort the landing.

Due to a critical misjudgment of both speed and altitude, the plane struck the runway with tremendous force, causing it to flip over before erupting into flames. Despite the severity of the crash, 24 of the 94 occupants on board miraculously survived, including Captain Kliuyev. He was initially sentenced to 15 years in prison, though his sentence was later reduced to six years. Co-pilot Zhirnov, who survived the initial crash, succumbed to cardiac arrest while en route to the hospital.

The wreckage of Aeroflot flight 6502. Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons

United Airlines Flight 2885

On January 11, 1983, United Airlines Flight 2885 was scheduled to fly cargo overnight from Cleveland, Ohio, to Los Angeles, California, with a planned stopover in Detroit, Michigan. On the flight deck that night were three flight crew members—Captain William Todd (aged 55), First Officer James Day (51), and Flight Engineer Robert Lee (50).

The aircraft began its takeoff roll at 02:51. Shortly after takeoff, witnesses on the ground described that the nose of the aircraft pitched up to an unusually high position and it climbed to about 1,000 feet. The airplane then rolled to the right reaching an almost 90-degree bank, before plunging back to the ground and exploding on impact. All three crew members were killed.

The DC-8-54AF of United Airlines Flight 2885 involved in the crash. Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons

During investigation, recording of an absurd conversation emerged from the Cockpit Voice Recorder. As the plane was being loaded at Detroit, the captain asked the first officer if he would consider switching seats with the flight engineer to allow him to perform the take-off. Both the first officer and the flight engineer agreed to the ridiculous proposition. Later interviews with other crew members of United Airlines who had flown with United 2885’s crew revealed that Captain Todd, while a skillful pilot, often allowed second officers to fly the plane. They also revealed that seat swapping was fairly common on cargo flights, although they occurred less frequently because second officers on United Airlines no longer received pilot training.

Flight Engineer Robert Lee had limited pilot training himself. He had attempted to undergo training on a DC-8 in 1979 but his training was terminated two months later because the instructors found his abilities less than adequate. The flight engineer resumed his first officer training a few months later, this time for the Boeing 737. While he was described by the instructor as a “very hard worker”, he did not make progress in his training. After several failed en-route and proficiency checks, the flight engineer decided not to try anymore and remain a flight engineer for the rest of his career.

That night, First Officer James Day had forgotten to reset the trim setting which had been set on high during the previous flight. It was reported that James Day was not a consistent pilot and often performed pre-flight checks out of order which made him prone to errors. He was frequently observed not to reset the trim after landing. When the plane took off, the inexperienced flight engineer failed to correct the attitude in time, leading to engine surges, aircraft banking and eventually an upset and an unrecoverable stall. It is not known why the captain did not manage to correct the situation and whether the crash would have been averted if the first officer was on his seat. Crash investigation concluded that the captain's decision to allow the flight engineer to perform the takeoff was a contributing factor in the accident.

Pinnacle Airlines Flight 3701

On October 14, 2004, Captain Jesse Rhodes (31) and First Officer Peter Cesarz (23), flying for Pinnacle Airlines, decided to have some fun. They were operating a 50-seat Bombardier CRJ-200 on a repositioning flight from Little Rock, Arkansas, to Minneapolis, Minnesota, with no passengers on board—just the two of them. The purpose of the flight was to relocate the empty aircraft to Minneapolis for a scheduled flight the following morning.

Captain Rhodes, an experienced pilot with a strong familiarity with the CRJ-200, had logged 973 hours on the aircraft. Most of his flights were conducted at altitudes of 33,000 feet or lower, but Rhodes knew that the CRJ-200 was certified to reach a maximum altitude of 41,000 feet, the aircraft’s published service ceiling. With no passengers on board and minimal perceived risk, Rhodes decided to push the boundaries of the aircraft's performance. The pilots requested and received permission from air traffic controllers to climb to 41,000 feet.

They yanked back the control column and rapidly rose to 37,000 feet, after which the crew set the autopilot to climb at 500 feet per minute—more than twice the fastest recommended rate—to the airplane's maximum altitude of 41,000 feet. The aggressive climb rate caused the plane to lose forward speed as the autopilot angled the nose of the aircraft up. By the time the aircraft reached 41,000 ft. and leveled off, it was flying at only 150 knots, barely above the stall speed.

The low airspeed activated the plane’s antistall device that attempted to nose-down the aircraft in an effort to increase speed and prevent stall. But the pilots repeatedly overrode the automatic nose-down in an attempt to stay at 41,000 feet. After four overrides, both engines, deprived of oxygen in the thin atmosphere, flamed out.

With no engine thrust, the airplane began to fall while the pilots desperately tried to restart the engines. One method they tried, called the windmill restart, requires taking the plane on a sharp dive in an attempt to force air into the engine housing, spinning the rotors and creating enough compression for ignition. The procedure requires at least 300 knots of airspeed. But at 20,000 feet and only 236 knots, the crew decided to abort and instead to try a second option—drop to 13,000 feet and attempt to relight the engines using the plane's auxiliary power unit (APU), which generates pneumatic pressure to spin the engine's core. The crew tried repeatedly to restart the engines using APU, but the engines wouldn’t budge.

Finally, they decided to attempt an emergency landing at Jefferson City airport. But with the plane losing altitude fast, they fell short 2 and 1/2 miles shy of the runway. On impact, the plane split apart, flipped over and caught fire. Both pilots died. Miraculously, no one on the ground was injured.

The wreckage of Pinnacle Airlines Flight 3701. Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons

Investigation of the crash revealed that the crew had pushed the airplane’s performance envelop, subjecting the engines to tremendous stress. The flight data recorder showed that the right engine had reached 2,200 degree Fahrenheit—almost 600 degrees above redline. When investigators pulled apart the right engine, they found that the ends of the high-pressure turbine blades had liquefied and re-solidified on the low-pressure blades behind them.

After this accident, Pinnacle set the service ceiling for all CRJ-200 flights to 37,000 feet. They also added detailed climb profiles to the pilots' quick reference guides and changed its training program to include simulator training in high-altitude operations.

LAC Colombia Flight 028

Perhaps the dumbest of all airline mishaps was the crash of LAC Colombia Flight 028 on February 4, 1996. The cargo flight took off from Silvio Pettirossi International Airport in Luque, Paraguay destined for Campinas in Brazil. Shortly after takeoff, the captain gave control of the plane to his co-pilot, a novice, and to tease him shut off one of the left engines of the four-engine Douglas DC-8, causing the aircraft to bank. At 500 feet, he turned off another engine. The co-pilot was heard asking the crew to stop joking as he struggled to take control of the plane. The co-pilot put the airplane on a climb, with two engines still shutoff.

Details of what happened next is scarce, but apparently the two running engines flamed out. Witnesses on the ground reported hearing two explosions while the airplane was in the air. The plane fell to the ground, crashing into a playing field around 2 kilometers from the end of the runway. The four Colombian crew members died instantly along with 18 other people who were playing soccer in the field. The crash severely damaged the airline's reputation and finances, leading to the airline ending operations later that year.