Air Rhodesia Flight 827

Air Rhodesia Flight 827

An Air Rhodesia Vickers Viscount, similar to the aircraft involved in the incident
Shootdown summary
Date	12 February 1979
Summary	Civilian airliner shoot-down during wartime
Site	Vuti African Purchase Area 16°25′S 29°26′E / 16.417°S 29.433°E / -16.417; 29.433Coordinates: 16°25′S 29°26′E / 16.417°S 29.433°E / -16.417; 29.433
Passengers	55
Crew	4
Fatalities	59 (all)
Survivors	0
Aircraft type	Vickers Viscount
Operator	Air Rhodesia
Registration	VP-YND
Flight origin	Salisbury
Last stopover	Kariba
Destination	Salisbury

Air Rhodesia Flight 827, the Umniati, was a scheduled flight between Kariba and Salisbury that was shot down on 12 February 1979 by Zimbabwe People's Revolutionary Army (ZIPRA) guerrillas using a Strela 2 missile soon after take-off. The circumstances were very similar to that of Air Rhodesia Flight 825 five months earlier. To date, it remains the deadliest aviation incident in Zimbabwe.

The flight's departure from Kariba had been delayed, so it had not climbed over the lake to get above the ceiling of shoulder-launched anti-aircraft missiles before heading for Salisbury. The aircraft was damaged by a Strela 2 missile and came down in rough terrain in the Vuti African Purchase Area east of Lake Kariba. None of the 59 passengers or crew survived.

Following the second incident, Air Rhodesia added shrouding to the exhaust pipes of their Viscount aircraft to reduce their infrared signature, and painted the aircraft with a low-radiation paint.

On 25 February 1979, the Rhodesian Air Force, with covert assistance from the South African Air Force, launched a retaliatory bombing raid against a ZIPRA camp in Angola.