1973 Paris Air Show Tu-144 crash - GIF

[Altair]

1973 Paris Air Show Tu-144 crash. Fourteen people were killed and 60 were injured.




Previously:

Sknyliv air show disaster - GIF
Airshow head-on collision - GIF
MiGs collision at airshow - GIF and video
Airshow taxiway accident - photo
Airplane vs. helicopter collision - video

[Hoosiersmoker]

Pretty impressive take-off! Not so much on the landing though...

[meyer77]

Was the cause ever determined?

[Moldyjim]

Was the cause ever determined?

I read it was foreign object damage (FOD) to a tire.

If I remember right on takeoff they picked up something off the tarmac.
When it blew the tire it punctured a fuel cell and caused the crash.
Continental airlines was at fault according to Google.

I did see one do a couple of flybys back in the early eighties at an airshow.

Pretty impressive, but still not as impressive as the SR71. That plane did a whole program and static display.

[meyer77]

I don't know if you have read, watched, or heard Brian Shul talk about his time as a SR-71 pilot. His one book "Sled Driver" is great.
Search you tube and several videos will come up. One funny story about several pilots asking the LA tower for a speed check a Cessna was at 90 knots, a Beech Craft(?) was at 240, and an f16 was at 640 or 690. When Brian's navigator called in, the tower came back with we have you at 1996 knots, to which he replied "We are showing closer to 2,000

[Floradawg]

You are describing the crash of the Concorde SST. This was the USSR Supersonic passenger plane. I think they only built a couple and if I remember correctly, it didn't go into regular service. They just wanted to be first. They also just wanted to be first with a space shuttle. It never went into service either but it did fly once without anyone on board before NASA's did. This crash had to be a huge embarrassment to them. I'm sure some heads rolled. I think they tried to blame the crash on another plane that was in their way causing the TU-144 to make a maneuver that caused it to break apart. There was no nearby plane however. It was just them trying to cover up what was probably a faulty design of the structure.

[schuylergrace]

From what I've read over the years, the short reason for the crash was that the pilots broke the plane. There are two main stories, though. In one the pilots were trying to avoid another aircraft and overstressed theirs in the evasive maneuver. In the other, the pilots were showing off and overstressed the airframe. Either way, the plane broke up, spraying fuel everywhere and landing on a bunch of homes. No one on the aircraft survived (a crew of maybe eight), and I think there were around 60-70 people killed, total.

[Saltfever]

edit . . . They also just wanted to be first with a space shuttle. It never went into service either but it did fly once without anyone on board before NASA's did. . . . . .

The Buran's first and only flight was 1988. Many years after the 1st shuttle flight. I remember playing back the Buran's landing. Single-stepping each frame as the wheels hit to see its attitude. The puff of smoke from each tire occurred in the same frame at exactly the same time. I have never seen a more perfect landing.

[Floradawg]

I sit corrected. (I'm sitting) Thank you for enlightening me. All these years I thought theirs flew first. No biggie. A lot of what I still think is probably incorrect also.