Caspian Airlines Flight 7908
Tu-154 Caspian Airlines (EP-CPG) involved in the incident
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| Accident summary | |
|---|---|
| Date | 15 July 2009 |
| Summary | Mechanical failure due to bird strike |
| Site | near Qazvin, Iran 36°8′33″N 49°59′38″E / 36.14250°N 49.99389°ECoordinates: 36°8′33″N 49°59′38″E / 36.14250°N 49.99389°E |
| Passengers | 153 |
| Crew | 15 |
| Fatalities | 168 (all) |
| Survivors | 0 |
| Aircraft type | Tupolev Tu-154 |
| Operator | Caspian Airlines |
| Registration | EP-CPG |
| Flight origin | Tehran Imam Khomeini International Airport, Tehran, Iran |
| Destination | Zvartnots International Airport, Yerevan, Armenia |
Caspian Airlines Flight 7908 was a scheduled commercial flight from Tehran, Iran, to Yerevan, Armenia, that crashed near the village of Jannatabad, outside the city of Qazvin in north-western Iran, on 15 July 2009. All 153 passengers and 15 crew on board died.
The crash was the deadliest aviation accident in Iran since the 2003 crash of a military-operated Ilyushin Il-76, in which 275 people were killed (though some sources list the fatality count at 302). It was the second-deadliest aviation incident in 2009 behind Air France Flight 447.
The aircraft was a Tupolev Tu-154M built in 1987 and operated by Iran's Caspian Airlines, according to a spokesman for Iran's aviation agency.
The crashed aircraft was registration EP-CPG, an aircraft which entered service on 20 April 1987 as YA-TAR for Bakhtar Afghan Airlines and was sold to Ariana Afghan Airlines in 1988. YA-TAR served with Ariana Afghan until sold to Caspian Airlines on 15 March 1998, 11 years after it was built. It was re-registered as EP-CPG in 1999.
The aircraft was checked for safety in June 2009 and was given flight licence until 2010. This was also stated by an Armenian aviation official, saying that the plane had gone through technical control in Mineralnye Vody Airport in southern Russia in June.
The aircraft crashed at 11:33 Iran Daylight Time (07:03 UTC), 16 minutes after take-off from Tehran Imam Khomeini International Airport. According to authorities, the aircraft's tail suddenly caught on fire. The pilot circled, trying to find a safe spot to land, but without success. The aircraft was destroyed after it crashed into an agricultural field, carving a crater up to 10 metres (33 ft) deep. An eye witness who claims to have been within 300 metres (330 yd) of the crash-site described the event as if "the plane just fell out of the sky". Three hours after the crash, fires over a 200 square metres (2,200 sq ft) area still remained. A witness told Fars News Agency:
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Wikipedia