It’s perhaps one of the most terrifying Cockpit
Voice Recordings to ever be released. The final moments on the flight deck of Pulkovo Airlines
Flight 612 were revealed with the public showing a flight crew battling to save their plane from
an incredibly dangerous aerodynamic stall often referred to as a Tailspin. The Russian airliner
had flown into precarious weather conditions, the crew seemingly tried to avoid such weather
somehow found themselves in this dangerous scenario. We should take a closer look at this
accident and what lead to a loss of control on this plane which ultimately killed so many people.
-intro- During the summer months, the Russian City of
Anapa located on the Black Sea becomes a popular tourist destination, mainly for other Russians
flocking to the region from other parts of Russia. Temperatures soar to above 30 degrees
rivaling Mediterranean destinations. Anapa’s Airport was just one of many domestic
destinations served by Pulkovo Airlines based out of Saint Petersburg. The accident flight of
discussion today occurred on August 22nd, 2006. Pulkovo Aviation Enterprise or just Pulkovo
for short, operated a mix of modern and older Russian planes. Among these was the Tupolev 154,
a plane we have already discussed on the channel but to recap. The Aircraft was one of the most
popular passenger planes to ever be developed in the Soviet Union. The three-engine design is
very reminiscent of the Boeing 727. It’s a single isle narrow body passenger plane that was very
abundant in the Soviet Union and thus continued to fly for many carriers in Russia and former
Warsaw Pact countries following the cold war. During this time in the 2000s, the Tupolev 154
was still very common in this part of the world. On that August Day in 2006, this particular plane
was making a simple trip between Saint Petersburg and Anapa. The first leg of the trip into Anapa
went as planned and the return trip back north was scheduled in the afternoon. At just after
3pm, flight 612 left Anapa for the return trip. The flight plan would take the Tupolev plane
over Eastern Ukraine. Weather in this region, in hindsight was objectively appaling.
On the flight deck was a crew of five. In the left seat was 49-year-old Captain Ivan Korogodin.
He had acquired over 12,000 flight hours with nearly 6000 in the Tupolev 154. His First Officer
that day was 59-year-old Vladimir Onishchenko, also a highly experience pilot with just
under 12,000 total flight hours logged, over 2000 in this plane. He was not in the
right-hand seat, instead this was occupied by a Pilot Under Training, 23-year-old Andrei
Khodnevich. Being just 23, he was still very early in his flying career with just 189 total hours
logged, just 88 of which were on the Tupolev. Also on board was a Flight Engineer, 51-year-old
Viktor Makarov, another member of crew with substantial experience on this plane and
the Navigator, 36-year-old Igor Levchenko, again someone who had accumulated
several thousands of hours on this plane. As the city of Anapa was a tourist
destination for many Russians, most on board were families returning home. At
least 45 of the 160 passengers were children. For the first half hour of the flight, the
plane climbed to its cruising altitude of 10,700 meters, around 35,100 feet. The
pilots of flight 612, did have the necessary information about weather forecasted indicating
possible thunderstorms along their flight path, Air Traffic Control however did not notify them
of the hazards in flight. Once observing the large storm cells ahead of them, the captain
suggested deviating around the storms. Not an uncommon practice as pilots often do wish
to avoid stormy weather for obvious reasons. Flight 612 deviated some twenty
kilometers away from their flight plan. Afterward the captain then suggested a climb
to fly over the storm. What the flight crew did not know was that this storm actually towered
much higher than usual. Records indicate that the storm had a ceiling that extended up to around
49,000 feet. Much higher than any commercial plane (aside Concorde) could fly. The pilots not knowing
this key piece of information initiate a climb. What you are about to here is the cockpit voice
recording from inside the flight deck in the flight’s final minutes. Though we’ll interject
at key moments, the recording largely speaks for itself and in its final seconds can be very
unsettling to viewers watching. I have attempted a restoration of the low-quality recording
and attached subtitles for your convenience. -cvr- The captain initializes a climb to a higher
altitude, though Pilot Under Training Andrei Khodnevich was in control in the right-hand seat.
In this case they sought to climb to an altitude of 39,000 feet or Flight Level 390. Just to note
here that as later stated by other crew members, altitudes on this flight were
officially measured in meters. However the use of Flight Levels here suggests
that they were jumping between feet and meters. Flight 612 had entered an area of severe
turbulence and the captain would soon notice hail as they approached the thunderstorm.
The comments from the pilots would suggest that it may have been unbearable and likely
a highly uneasy experience for the passengers who statistically were not frequent flyers.
Though turbulence in the past has been a cause of air accidents in this case, though it was
present it was merely an environmental factor which pushed the captain to ascertain a
higher fly level in the hope of avoiding it. The comments and language from the captain to
his work colleagues is also highly questionable. -cvr- Here, the stall warning can be heard. The pilot
flying had been flying in a manual setting with Altitude increasing at a high rate. The Tupolev
154 did not have an advanced autopilot that could climb or descend on its own, this needed to be
done manually as the plane only had the ability to hold altitude. In the efforts to climb higher
the plane’s angle of attack had increased to a critical angle. Sources indicate that the plane
had a nose up attitude of 46 degrees which is far higher than a passenger plane should normally
position themselves at. What would happen in the next moments is that the plane’s overall speed
would drop significantly to or near to zero. This would instigate a critical aerodynamic Deep Stall.
-cvr- The captain suggesting to
not descend or lower the nose goes against the very nature of pilot
instincts when it comes to a stall. Stall recovery can usually be defined as a nose
down attitude with maximum power. Kinetic energy generated by an aircraft in a stall recovery
maneuver can allow a pilot to pull the plane out of the intentional dive. Captain Korogodin
called for maximum engine power but not a descent, contradicting his first officer who immediately
suggested a descent. The captain would soon concede but not before the plane would enter a
deep stall that would transition into a tailspin. A tailspin, also known as a flat spin or
simply spin for short, can be highly dangerous and difficult to impossible to recover
from. Pulkovo Flight 612 begins to drop. -cvr- The stall warning was still ringing
throughout. The pilots had likely begun to realize how dire their situation
was as Mayday and SOS calls go out. Their plane was out of control, with no forward
speed to pull themselves out of the fall. For passengers in the cabin, this would not have
been a comfortable final moments of their lives as those looking out of the windows would
have seen cloud followed by the ground coming up towards them, coupled with the sensations that
come from being in a plane that is simply falling. The final moments on the flight deck were recorded
here and I will let this play out. The atmosphere quickly turns to a state of pure panic from
the moment the ground emerged from the clouds. The recording is extremely unsettling, if you
wish to skip, please use the timestamp provided. -cvr-
Pulkovo Flight 612 crashed in Eastern Ukraine, 28 miles Northwest
of Donetsk. The crash was captured on cellphone video. The footage of which is available
right here on YouTube. There were no survivors from the disaster, killing 170 people.
The cause of the crash according to the investigation was broadly put down to pilot error.
However the more nuanced conclusion would be the critical angle of attack which resulted in an
unrecoverable deep stall transitioning into a tailspin. This was in part due to pilot
error but also contributing was the pilot training and flight manuals not having detailed
explanations of how to appropriately execute a climb at high altitude in this particular plane.
The lack of simulator training was also cited. The crash of flight 612 also seemed to resemble
another plane crash which occurred the previous year in 2005. A McDonnell Douglas MD80 operating
for West Caribbean Airlines also entered a deep stall which resulted in a deadly crash
which killed 160 people. Perhaps we’ll look at this incident one day in its own video.
The Tupolev 154 continued to be a poplar plane for a few more years before its gradual retirement
from passenger service in the 2010s. As for the airline, Pulkovo, that carrier was owned by the
Russian government and was soon rebranded as Rossiya later that year following the incident.
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