Ramstein airshow disaster

Ramstein air show disaster

The memorial set up to commemorate the victims
Collision summary
Date	August 28, 1988 (1988-08-28)
Summary	Mid-air collision
Site	Ramstein Air Base Rhineland-Palatinate West Germany 49°26′18″N 007°36′13″E / 49.43833°N 7.60361°E / 49.43833; 7.60361Coordinates: 49°26′18″N 007°36′13″E / 49.43833°N 7.60361°E / 49.43833; 7.60361
Total fatalities	70 (including 67 on the ground)
Total injuries (non-fatal)	Approximately 1,000, 346 serious (ground)
First aircraft
Type	Aermacchi MB-339PAN
Name	Callsign "Pony 10"
Operator	Frecce Tricolori Aeronautica Militare
Crew	Lt. Col. Ivo Nutarelli (killed)
Second aircraft
Type	Aermacchi MB-339PAN
Name	Callsign "Pony 1"
Operator	Frecce Tricolori Aeronautica Militare
Crew	Lt. Col. Mario Naldini (killed)
Third aircraft
Type	Aermacchi MB-339PAN
Name	Callsign "Pony 2"
Operator	Frecce Tricolori Aeronautica Militare
Crew	Capt. Giorgio Alessio (killed)

The Ramstein air show disaster occurred on Sunday, 28 August 1988 during the Flugtag '88 airshow at the US Ramstein Air Base near the city of Kaiserslautern, West Germany.

Aircraft of the Italian Air Force display team collided during their display, crashing to the ground in front of a crowd of about 300,000 people. There were 70 fatalities (67 spectators and 3 pilots); 346 spectators sustained serious injuries in the resulting explosion and fire, and hundreds more had minor injuries. At the time it was the deadliest air show accident (until overtaken in 2002 by the Sknyliv air show disaster).

Ten Aermacchi MB-339 PAN jets from the Italian Air Force display team, Frecce Tricolori, were performing their "pierced heart" (Italian: Cardioide, German: Durchstoßenes Herz) formation. In this formation, two groups of aircraft create a heart shape in front of the audience along the runway. In the completion of the lower tip of the heart, the two groups pass each other parallel to the runway. The heart is then pierced, in the direction of the audience, by a lone aircraft.

The mid-air collision took place as the two heart-forming groups passed each other and the heart-piercing aircraft hit them. The piercing aircraft crashed onto the runway and consequently both the fuselage and resulting fireball of aviation fuel tumbled into the spectator area, hitting the crowd and coming to rest against a refrigerated trailer being used to dispense ice cream to the various vendor booths in the area.

At the same time, one of the damaged aircraft from the heart-forming group crashed into the emergency medical evacuation UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter, injuring the helicopter's pilot, Captain Kim Strader. He died weeks later, on Saturday, 17 September 1988, at Brooke Army Medical Center in Texas from burns he suffered in the accident.