Berlin Tegel Airport - Accidents and Incidents

Accidents and Incidents

There are no recorded, fatal accidents involving commercial airline operations at Berlin Tegel itself. However, two commercial flights, one of which was due to arrive at Tegel Airport and the other which had departed the airport, were involved in fatal accidents. These accidents are listed below:

• On 15 November 1966, Clipper München, a Pan Am Boeing 727–21 (registration N317PA) operating the return leg of the airline's daily cargo flight from Berlin to Frankfurt Rhein-Main Airport (flight number PA 708) was due to land that night at Tegel Airport, rather than Tempelhof, due to runway resurfacing work taking place at that time at the latter. Berlin Control had cleared flight 708 for an Instrument Landing System (ILS) approach to Tegel Airport's runway 08, soon after the crew had begun its descent from Flight Level (FL) 090 to FL 030 before entering the southwest air corridor over East Germany on the last stretch of its journey to Berlin. The aircraft impacted the ground near Dallgow, East Germany, almost immediately after the crew had acknowledged further instructions received from Berlin Control, just 10 mi (16 km) from Tegel Airport. All three crew members lost their lives in this accident. Visibility was poor, and it was snowing at the time of the accident. Following the accident, the Soviet military authorities in East Germany returned only half of the aircraft's wreckage to their US counterparts in West Berlin. This excluded vital parts, such as the flight data recorder (FDR), the cockpit voice recorder (CVR) as well as the plane's flight control systems, its navigation and communication equipment. The subsequent National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigation report concluded that the aircraft's descent below its altitude clearance limit was the accident's probable cause. However, the NTSB was unable to establish the factors that had caused the crew to descend below its cleared minimum altitude.

• On 24 November 2001, a Crossair Avro RJ100 (registration: HB-IXM) operating flight LX 3597 from Berlin Tegel to Zürich on behalf of Swiss International Air Lines crashed during a night time approach to Zürich's Kloten Airport, killing 24 of the aircraft's 33 occupants (three out of five crew members and 21 out of 28 passengers).

The following notable, non-fatal incidents involving airline operations occurred at Tegel. These include commercial flights that were about to depart or had actually departed/arrived as well as unscheduled stopovers:

• Between 1969 and 1982, Berlin Tegel was the destination of several aircraft hijackings involving LOT Polish Airlines domestic flights within Poland. The hijackings were a means of forcing the authorities in communist Poland to let the hijackers emigrate from the Eastern Bloc. Once the aircraft had landed at Tegel, the French military authorities in charge of the airport during the Cold War era let the hijackers and anyone else who did not wish to return to Poland disembark and claim political asylum in West Berlin. The aircraft, its crew and those passengers who did not want to disembark were subsequently returned to Poland.

• Upon completing the repair and run-up of the faulty engine that had caused a rejected takeoff due to an engine oil warning at Berlin Tegel during the late 1980s, a Dan-Air Boeing 727–200 Adv collided with a jetway at the airport's terminal building while maintenance engineers taxied the aircraft back to its stand. This badly injured the ground crew member manning the jetway and ruptured the fully refuelled aircraft's centre wing tank at the left wing root. As a result, a large quantity of jet fuel spilled onto the tarmac. The maintenance engineers' failure to pressurise the aircraft's hydraulics had resulted in a complete loss of hydraulic pressure just before reaching the stand, making it impossible to steer the aircraft and rendering the brakes ineffective.

• On 7 January 1997, Austrian Airlines flight 104, a McDonnell Douglas MD-87 en route to Vienna International Airport, was hijacked shortly after takeoff from Tegel Airport by a Bosnian male carrying a knife (which was small enough to be allowed on board under then valid safety regulations). The pilots were forced to return to Berlin, where the perpetrator was overpowered by German police forces.

• On 6 November 1997, an Air France Boeing 737–500 skidded off the runway while landing at Berlin Tegel due to a suspected brake defect. There were no injuries.

There were also two Cold war era incidents relating to an American and a British airliner that had departed Tegel on international non-scheduled passenger services. Both of these occurred in Bulgarian airspace. The former was a charter flight carrying German holidaymakers to the Bulgarian Black Sea coast, the latter a migrant charter en route to Turkey:

• On 28 May 1971, a Modern Air CV-990A with 45 passengers on board en route from Berlin Tegel to Bulgaria was unexpectedly denied permission to enter Bulgarian airspace, as a result of a new policy adopted by that country's then communist government to deny any aircraft whose flight had originated or was going to terminate at a West Berlin airport the right to take off and land at any of its airports. This resulted in the aircraft having to turn back to Berlin, where it landed safely at the city's Tegel Airport.

• The same year, a Dan-Air Comet carrying Turkish migrant workers from Berlin Tegel to Istanbul was "escorted" by Bulgarian fighter planes into Sofia. The crew flying the aircraft was attempting to take the shortest route to Istanbul when leaving Yugoslav airspace by entering Bulgarian airspace, instead of taking the longer route through Greek airspace. They were not aware of the then communist government of Bulgaria's decision not to let any aircraft enter its airspace whose flight had originated or was going to terminate at a West Berlin airport, without stopping en route at another airport outside West Berlin. The aircraft landed safely at Sofia. It was released along with its crew and passengers when the flight's commander paid with the company's credit card the fine the Bulgarian authorities had imposed for violating their country's airspace.

In addition to these Cold War incidents involving commercial passenger flights that had originated at Berlin Tegel, there was another serious incident on a Tegel-bound non-scheduled passenger flight. This incident, which occurred during the same period over West Germany, involved a British holiday jet carrying German tourists from Austria to West Berlin:

• On 17 August 1969, a Laker Airways BAC One-Eleven 320L (registration: G-AVBX) operating a charter flight from Klagenfurt to Berlin Tegel under contract to West Berlin package holiday company Flug-Union Berlin made an emergency landing at Hanover Airport. The aircraft was 30 miles (48 km) from Hanover, when an electrical fire started in an aerial tuning unit in the forward cabin area behind the flightdeck. This filled the cabin with fumes and reduced visibility on the flightdeck to 18 inches (46 cm). Forward vision was nil. Using the emergency oxygen system, the captain began his emergency descent from FL 250 under radar guidance from Hanover air traffic control (ATC), while the co-pilot depressurised the aircraft and attempted to open a side window to clear the smoke. The cabin crew were deprived of both their public address system and intercom with the flightdeck during the descent. Due to lack of time before landing, emergency procedures were abandoned. Following the successful emergency landing, the aircraft came to a rapid halt clear of the runway. By the time the last of the 89 occupants (five crew and 84 passengers) had evacuated the aircraft, the fire had burned through the pressure hull and was being fed by oxygen. There were no injuries. The fire was extinguished on the ground. Following the incident, the aircraft manufacturer issued several service bulletins (SBs) listing action to be taken as mandated by the UK's Airworthiness Requirements Board (ARB). These SBs were circulated to all One-Eleven operators. The ARB also issued a more general warning to all One-Eleven operators regarding the need to ensure that oxygen leaks do not create fire hazards, and that oxygen lines are routed away from potential fire sources. As a result of this incident, the ARB also began to pay close attention to the fire resistance of aircraft fittings and furnishings due to their potential to form major hazards in oxygen-fed inflight fires. The flightdeck crew subsequently received the Queen's Commendation for Valuable Service in the Air, while the cabin crew were commended for their action during the emergency. The citation for the Queen's Award stated that "the crew displayed a high standard of airmanship in circumstances which could have had very serious consequences".