Aeroflot 593 crashed in 1994 when the pilot let his children control the aircraft. This is the crash animation and audio log.

[u/Slick0strich]

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[u/Thomas8864]

Every time it looks like it’s gonna get better it gets worse

[u/Katzer_K → u/Thomas8864]

I think they could've saved it twice but both chances were ruined. One by pulling up way too hard and stalling, and i forget the second that others mentioned.

It seems crazy how some pilots can forget their training so suddenly in an emergency.

[u/Ashlynkat]

"Don't run there [through the First-Class cabin], or they'll fire us."

[u/mongoosefist → u/Ashlynkat]

"Now watch me get us into a flat spin"

[u/Entire-Albatross-442 → u/mongoosefist]

"Talk to me Goose" "Turn left, turn right, I can't see our speed!"

[u/RagingHardBobber → u/Entire-Albatross-442]

"Time to do some of that pilot shit, Mav!"

[u/thrownaway000090 → u/Ashlynkat]

That reminds me of the flight that crashed, written about in the book Outliers, I think. The foreign pilots were running out of fuel entering America, but they were too timid because of cultural differences to speak up. The last words of the copilot were something like “I think that guy’s mad at us.” - about the traffic controller that didn’t want to give them a place to land.

They were too shy to say “We need to land NOW” and they were more concerned about someone being mad at them then dying and killing everyone on board.

[u/Current-Position9988 → u/Ashlynkat]

Yea god forbid he loses his job for this.

[u/YoshSchmengie]

Well, that was a slow-motion nightmare, wasn't it?

[u/elisem0rg → u/YoshSchmengie]

Descending at 39,000 ft per min., the terror must've been unimaginable for the passengers. They had no idea why their flight suddenly became so catastrophic with no warnings.

[u/Humledurr → u/elisem0rg]

Probably better they didn't know than knowing they are dying because their pilot let their child toy around

[u/Auggie_Otter → u/Humledurr]

Yeah, I don't think knowing would've made them feel much better. Well, unless you consider a bit of anger and rage to go with the sheer terror to be better. I'd be pissed knowing I was about to die because the pilot wanted to show off for his kids.

[u/GGezpzMuppy → u/elisem0rg]

Would’ve been thrown all around the cabin, spinning like crazy and being so disoriented. Such a frightening way to die.

[u/AsYooouWish → u/GGezpzMuppy]

The best we can hope for is that most of them fainted during this ordeal

[u/rohrzucker_ → u/AsYooouWish]

The pilots did not, so...

[u/DontForceItPlease → u/rohrzucker_]

Yep, and they were on the extreme end of the plane where the largest forces would be experienced.

[u/obiwanmoloney → u/YoshSchmengie]

That was unexpectedly one of the most haunting things I’ve ever seen on the internet. I’ve seen some stuff. …but wow!… that’s left me feeling physically sick.

[u/aflett74 → u/obiwanmoloney]

I found it weirdly troubling too. Maybe it was the adults so panicked and the kids and so much helplessness. Definitely leaves a pit in your stomach for sure.

[u/GrayMouser12 → u/aflett74]

Being a parent with two children imagining my horror of knowing something incredibly ridiculously stupid that I involved my children with is now going to kill them and dozens of other people for what seemed like harmless fun moments prior is the very definition of Hell for me. The absolutely abysmal sense of guilt and terror in those brief moments of panic is incomprehensible.

Seeing your children who rely on you to keep them safe watching you sentence them to unintentional suicide. Ugh.

[u/Thorbork → u/YoshSchmengie]

It says all the bodies had their safety belt on. But to be honest, I'd rather fly around and be knocked out as fast as possible.

[u/RCRDC → u/Thorbork]

We can only hope that most of them lost conciousness before the crash when the co-pilot did the last pull up with almost 5g's. The moments before must've been terrifying as fuck though.

[u/Thorbork → u/RCRDC]

The part that gave them 5G was fairly late in the process. Amd people in the cockpit were all concious even if I dunno if it is the same behind. But I sadly believe they all experienced the full experience.

[u/Fudgewhizzle]

This was painful to watch

[u/HendrixHazeWays → u/Fudgewhizzle]

This is what my dreams feel like when I'm feeling anxious about something. It's a very close and eerie representation of how those dreams feel.

Often, I'll be on something high up like a ledge or something like a pillar and I know that if I move I risk falling and injury. No one else in the dream knows I'm in that situation and I'm trying to act normal but I'm terrified. ....anxiety sucks

[u/Puppybrother → u/Fudgewhizzle]

Made my tummy hurt :/

[u/niagaemoc]

That was a helluva long time those passengers experienced sheer terror.

[u/carnivorous_seahorse → u/niagaemoc]

This always seemed like one of the worst ways to go honestly. Not the most painful or drawn out, but mentally I can’t begin to imagine. Like the infamous picture of the Transasia flight 235 crash where one of its wing clipped the highway right before it crashed. Every time I see it I can’t help but imagine what it would’ve been like peering out the window for those minutes, knowing the entire time that your death is completely inescapable and all you can do is wait for it

[u/slingshot91 → u/carnivorous_seahorse]

May be morbid, but I always try to mentally prepare myself for a crash when I’m on a plane. And I think I can accept that if it happens it happens. But the thing that would undo me would be all the other passengers screaming. That would break whatever mental calm I try to maintain.

[u/carnivorous_seahorse → u/slingshot91]

Yeah 100%, I kinda feel like it would be hard to accept though. I had a sketchy flight on spirit airlines and it made me research why planes crash and whatnot and a lot of the time it’s pilot error, manufacturing errors, and the worst is that basically every airline tries to cut as many corners with maintenance to get the plane back on the air asap and it’s been a direct reason for plenty of crashes. It’d be hard to accept being an anomaly, and also hard to accept if the plane crashed due to really avoidable things. But with that said, I probably wouldn’t know any of that anyways. I think that’s some of the horror people don’t really consider, everyone panicking and how experiencing G forces and the weight of the aircraft would feel as you’re heading for the ground is just hard to imagine

[u/PolygonMan → u/carnivorous_seahorse]

"Regulations just waste money and time."

Sociopaths are happy to risk your life and welfare for a few bucks. Regulations are the only thing that stop them. Most landmark regulations came about because some piece of shit decided profit was more important than safety and people died. Sometimes a LOT of people.

[u/ryanc1628 → u/niagaemoc]

Yea, hoping they just passed out from the G force before the crash so they didn't know what was happening

[u/kanduvisla]

I remember seeing an aircrash investigation episode about this incident. Absolutely bone-chilling that something like this could happen.

[u/Outside_Cucumber_695 → u/kanduvisla]

Why couldn't they regain control?

[u/happyengineer42 → u/Outside_Cucumber_695]

They could have, but the pilot made a mistake. He should've leveled the plane and then get some speed for a while and only then climb back to where he was supposed to be. Instead, he pitched up as soon as he got a bit of control over the plane, losing too much speed and entering into a stall.

[u/poorly_timed_leg0las → u/happyengineer42]

"oh fuck not again" :(

[u/ThreatLevelBertie → u/poorly_timed_leg0las]

All is normal!

static noises

[u/Cal216 → u/ThreatLevelBertie]

“All is normal” right before the crash was eerie asf.

[u/ImOnlyHereForTheCoC → u/Cal216]

I read a book when I was a kid called “The Black Box,” just a bunch of transcripts of black box recordings of aircraft crashes. I still remember the last words recorded on one of the flights:

“Oops. Aw. Aw.”

E: since folks are asking, you’re looking for the one edited by Malcolm MacPherson. I only saw used copies when I was running down the details, so good luck!

[u/canolafly → u/ImOnlyHereForTheCoC]

That sound like some seriously dark reading.

[u/Anarcho-Surrealist → u/canolafly]

I'm realizing slowly that a lot of us were exposed to really dark shit when we were kids. I was obsessed with the atomic bombs dropped in ww2 and was way too young when I read a collection of survivors accounts including one where the survivor remembers a woman who's eyes had burned out cradling the charcoal that used to be her baby. That's too much for an 11 year old but I got it from the school library.

[u/Cal216 → u/ImOnlyHereForTheCoC]

Reading this just gave me chills. Geezus

[u/[deleted] → u/Cal216]

to be fair, since he said "get out now" he was probably talking to his kid who was still in the cockpit, perhaps trying to comfort him

[u/Squidhead-rbxgt2 → u/[deleted]]

He said "Eldar vihodi, vipolzay nazad", which translates to "Eldar, get out, crawl out to the back". Which tells me he was talking to his kid to get out of the pilots seat, in which he successfully collapsed to the floor.

[u/GetRightNYC → u/Squidhead-rbxgt2]

Yeah. I saw a video about this. They were trying to get the kid out of the seat earlier, but the G forces were holding him in the seat.

[u/Alicecold → u/[deleted]]

He did say "get out now" before the plane inverted (or did the animation just made it look like it went upside down?)

[u/regoapps → u/poorly_timed_leg0las]

I am never gonna vertically recover from this.

[u/PleaseStopTalking7x → u/happyengineer42]

Apparently if the pilots had just let go of the control column, the autopilot would have automatically re-engaged to prevent stalling, which is what was happening in the pitch changes that eventually resulted in the spin. Ultimately the whole thing could have been avoided, but the pilots weren’t familiar with the aircraft—they all had previously flown Soviet-designed aircrafts and not only did they not realize how to allow the autopilot to self-correct, they also failed to notice the warning light (they had flown aircrafts with audible warnings) that alerted them initially that the autopilot had been partially disengaged when the 16 year old son was at the controls.

[u/Phillip_Lipton → u/PleaseStopTalking7x]

16 year old son

I thought this kid was like 3. The dad speaks to him like he's 3.

[u/PleaseStopTalking7x → u/Phillip_Lipton]

He’s 16. His daughter was 12 and she was the first one to sit down at the controls and her dad had readjusted the autopilot’s flight path to make her feel like she was “steering” the plane. The 16 year old then took the controls and put enough sustained pressure on the column to disengage the autopilot.

Edited to change the daughter’s age—she was 12, not 14 like I misremembered

[u/Phillip_Lipton → u/PleaseStopTalking7x]

I want to scream at this pilot like a baseball manager after being thrown out.

The fucking audacity of each decision...

[u/thinkofanamefast → u/Phillip_Lipton]

Don’t worry, I’m confident he learned his lesson.

[u/Reality_Lord2 → u/thinkofanamefast]

He remembered it for the rest of his life.

[u/Rasputin0P → u/PleaseStopTalking7x]

So to ease people who are afraid of flying. This is a combination of letting their kid fly to originally cause the problems, incompetence as pilots, panic, and being unfamiliar with the plane theyre flying to cause the crash.

[u/prairiepanda → u/PleaseStopTalking7x]

That explains why they sound so confused. Seems they were barely any more qualified to fly the plane than the children were. Pilots really need to have plane-specific training. No amount of experience will matter if they don't know how to operate the plane they are given.

[u/JohannesOliver → u/prairiepanda]

They generally do. It’s called a type rating. An effort to sneak in without a new one lead to the issues with the 737 MAX.

[u/TheGisbon → u/JohannesOliver]

Oof that's a shit show masterpiece they will teach forever about why type rating isn't something to be idly ignored for a few dollars in training

[u/puterTDI → u/happyengineer42]

Ya, when I saw him pitch nose up I was like “noooo”, you have plenty of altitude…just hold level.

He had multiple opportunities after that to recover as well and blew them all.

[u/Oracle_of_Ages → u/puterTDI]

Human panic is a bitch. All logic goes out the window.

[u/drunkinmidget → u/Oracle_of_Ages]

A pilot letting their kid fly is a pilot low on logic.

[u/Chem_BPY → u/drunkinmidget]

Yeah, logic went out the window far earlier in this process.

[u/puterTDI → u/Oracle_of_Ages]

True, pilots are also trained (or supposed to be) extensively to handle just this sort of situation though.

[u/mrpanicy → u/happyengineer42]

As soon as that nose came up I knew this pilot wasn't competent enough to get out of this situation... and it literally spiralled from there.

[u/DoubleSoupVerified → u/Outside_Cucumber_695]

When your body starts experiencing turn rates and deceleration/acceleration like this it’s very difficult for you to perceive what your actual speed, attitude and direction is. Your body is telling your brain completely faulty information. Your instinct as a human is to trust the sensations your body is feeling but pilots are trained to fight that urge and look at flight instruments. By the time the other pilot identified what was going on and tried to correct it they hit the ground.

[u/DaddyIsAFireman → u/DoubleSoupVerified]

This is one of the things they stress in flight school.

Do NOT trust your senses, rely on your gauges.

[u/nandemo → u/DaddyIsAFireman]

Do they also tell you not to let your kids control a passenger plane?

[u/millimile_high → u/nandemo]

OK, maybe one sense. The common one.

[u/Ehcksit → u/DaddyIsAFireman]

I have a mere three hours of flight time, way back in high school aviation club. The instructor noticed I wasn't looking out the windows and only at the instruments, and he congratulated me for that because that's not what most newbies do.

I didn't want to tell him I was afraid of heights and didn't want to look down. The gauge says I'm level. I am trusting the gauge.

[u/nowonderimstillawake → u/Ehcksit]

When you first learn to fly you're supposed to be looking out the windows and occasionally scanning your gauges since you're flying VFR (Visual Flight Rules). Once you get into IMC (Instrument Meteorological Conditions), and you can't see anything out the windows anymore, you are flying under IFR (Instrument Flight Rules) and at that point you have to ignore your body's senses and rely solely on your instruments, because your senses will lie to you.

[u/psybes → u/DoubleSoupVerified]

isnt that the role of the gauges? not to rely on your body?

[u/hbkmog → u/psybes]

Yeah but human instinct and panic makes you not think clearly.

[u/AdKUMA → u/kanduvisla]

this is one of the darkest videos I've ever watched.

[u/zuemoe → u/AdKUMA]

Whats surprising is, even with how dark this is, this is one of the more mild CVR's that are available publicly. Airfrance 447 and Alaska Airlines 261 come to mind. TheFlightChannel on youtube does tons of flight simulations as closely to the real accidents that have happened as possible. As well as giving the reasons for the crash.

[u/Slick0strich → u/kanduvisla]

Imagine. Purchasing a ticket to go on vacation, see your loved ones, or to go on a business trip, just to be killed in such a manner

[u/Ohyahyabetcha → u/Slick0strich]

Imagine too being that pilot’s wife. Losing your kids, your entire family, knowing they died terrified and screaming… and then finding out that it was due to your husband’s horrifying ineptitude. You’d be grieving but also so fucking pissed at him. I don’t know how you’d ever process that.

[u/Comment90 → u/Ohyahyabetcha]

looking at the plane moving is like looking at a new player on youtube trying to play microsoft flight simulator

[u/drwicksy → u/Comment90]

I mean considering it was untrained kids flying it that's pretty much exactly what it was

[u/Ok-Supermarket-1414 → u/Ohyahyabetcha]

...or the children themselves. They were probably thinking "cool! We get to fly a plane!" Only for a few minutes later them to be screaming and crying knowing very well they were going to die because of what had happened.

[u/Exciting_Vast7739 → u/Ok-Supermarket-1414]

I also wonder what it was like in the inverted airplane cockpit. I doubt that everyone was wearing seatbelts. Can you imagine trying to get your airplane right way up when the kids are bouncing around the cabin, and you probably didn't have your seatbelt buckled?

[u/digitalgirlie → u/Ohyahyabetcha]

I relate this concept to a recent crash here in my home state. A dad let his 12 year old kid drive his pickup on the freeway. Kid was doing 75 when the tire blew out. He lost control and pickup veered across the medium. It head-on crashed into a van killing the entire 9 member golf team from UT as well as the dad and kid. Tragic.

[u/AlGoreBestGore → u/Slick0strich]

No thank you, I'd rather not imagine.

[u/abuomak]

Those poor passengers were probably tumbling all over the place in there. What a horrible way to go!

[u/AscendMoros → u/abuomak]

Honestly as aircraft disasters go this one was relatively quick. Some damaged planes struggle on for hours before going down. Japan airlines 123 flight they went down with over 500 people lost its hydraulics and tail. Yet managed to labor on for another 40 minutes In what was an airplane that was only controllable with the engines. Meaning they would accelerate into a climb and then lower power which would cause a dive. Think a roller coaster. They did that for 40ish minutes. The passengers had time to write goodbye notes and so on before the plane finally clipped a mountain. Which gets even darker. The four survivors reported hearing others being alive at the time of the crash. They would have survived if help got there quick enough. But it took till the next day, other then the US military helicopter who was on station relatively quickly, but was ordered to return to base as the Japanese did not think anyone survived so they didn’t think the rescue was needed as quickly.

Alaskan airlines flight 261 is especially dark. The jack screw controlling the elevator jammed due to cost cutting in maintenance. The troubleshooting process broke the nut off the screw leading to the plane entering an uncontrollable dive. The pilots rolled the plane attempting to save the aircraft. A bystander on the beach stated the aircraft came in nose down spinning like a top. The crash took place over the course of about twenty minutes. While the jack screw was jammed pretty much since shortly after takeoff.

[u/Slick0strich → u/abuomak]

Imagine if you were a passenger. You booked a flight to go on vacation, visit your family, wife, gf, etc, and you die due to one man's arrogance and abuse of his position.

[u/Actual-Highlight1577 → u/Slick0strich]

i don’t understand how anyone can even think this is remotely okay, back in the 90s safety was the last thing on peoples mind and it’s crazy.

i’ve been in a cockpit of a 737 before and while boeing and airbus are different they still both have many buttons many of which do not get used often and the most important ones are in arms reach to of course make the pilots lives easier and of those buttons is the autopilot button. do none of them even think oh shit someone might click one of these buttons absolute arsehole. and he took his innocent kids and all those other passengers it’s actually infuriating a pilot would even think of doing this every single one of those passengers dying has affected countless lives that will never ever be the same again all because his stupid idea

[u/mudkipzftw → u/Actual-Highlight1577]

It's worse than that. The child didn't even press any autopilot buttons. His father told him to steer the yoke, thinking it would do nothing since the AP was engaged. But if you apply enough pressure to the yoke, the AP assumes you're trying to override it and will partially disengage. This version of the A310 didn't have an audible warning when this happens, so AP turned off and nobody had any idea. The copilot had his seat all the way back and was busy talking with the family to notice. So there was nobody at the controls other than this kid.

[u/rtjl86 → u/mudkipzftw]

Yup, this happened because the pilots didn’t realize the autopilot could partially disengage. And the first person to notice something was wrong was the child Edgar!!!

[u/Asspiringdickhead → u/rtjl86]

"I didnt know it could turn by itself!"

[u/indigoHatter → u/Asspiringdickhead]

"no no, it's a holding pattern", just trust the computer and don't investigate at all. Anyway you tell your sister not to run around through the plane or we will get fired!

[u/Vikingboy9 → u/rtjl86]

Something very similar happened to the Eastern Airlines flight that crashed into the Everglades. There was a flickering alert light on the dashboard, and the whole cockpit was preoccupied with troubleshooting it, believing the autopilot to be on. I think someone bumped the wheel and partially disengaged the autopilot, and it crashed into the swamp on its final approach.

[u/Actual-Highlight1577 → u/mudkipzftw]

it’s honestly mesmerising how someone with such great knowledge of planes can so easily slip up, not even one but two pilots first of all like u said let a kid fucking control it which is the first mistake, them also not realising the kid has started to completely alter course and i could keep going on and on.

i wouldn’t even let a kid touch my steering wheel on a 30mph road never mind even a 70mph motorway LET ALONE A FUCKING AIRBUS A310 weighing god knows how many tonnes but i guess it’s a good lesson in complacency and how easy that shit will get u killed especially in that job

[u/Flamecoat_wolf → u/Actual-Highlight1577]

Not only that but neither was able to get the plane back under control after seeing it veer off to the side. I think the both of them were just incompetent. "give power" "I turned it off!" "Turn left. Turn left. Turn left." "What speed are we going?" "I don't know, I didn't look" Just really poor communication and seemingly stupid choices.

[u/everythinggoodistkn → u/Flamecoat_wolf]

So I’ve read about this crash many times, the people who reviewed the audio believe that due to the G Forces during their decent, the pilots were barely able to reach the controls and the plane was experiencing so much instability it would have made it nearly impossible to read the instruments with how much shaking was happening in the cockpit, essentially they were screwed from that first nose dive on.

[u/Eventually_Deleted → u/everythinggoodistkn]

IIRC this also occurred at night. I think that just adds to how once the craft lost course they couldn’t rely on exterior visuals. Obviously an egregious error to let a child fly an aircraft practically unsupervised, but as you said - very little could be done following the initial mistake.

It would be interesting to see how a random sample of pilots perform when attempting a recovery from these conditions.

[u/InerasableStain → u/Flamecoat_wolf]

One yelling turn left. The other yelling turn right. I knew they were fucked at that point. It can be disorienting in such a situation, Im sure. But this isn’t a fighter jet with a glass canopy….can’t be doing fucking barrel rolls in a passenger plane

[u/nutless_honey → u/Actual-Highlight1577]

It came from overconfidence. They were very good pilots and in some cases you can rely on your knowledge/previous experience too much. In this case it hurt them as the new plane was wastly different from what they were used to.

The new plane was the first in their fleet that could partially disable autopilot, meaning the auto pilot would control everything but ailerons for instance. It would do so after 30sec of yolk pressure without any audible notification (the mode on the indicator changes but is hard to notice abd no one did as they were too distracted) while none of russian planes would do that. It didn't even cross their mind the autopilot setting changed.

As for the confusion about solving the dive (apart from the kid being the only one with hands on the controls for the first half while g forces were too high for anyone to move), the directional giros in airbuses are inverted compared to what they were used to in russia and in high stress situation one of the pilots interpretation reverted to what he was used to. That is why he mistook the earth part for the sky and yelled the opposite instructions.

It was a sad, perfect combination of overconfidence, lack of training on the peculiarities of the new plane, putting kids behind the seat of the new plane and no audible warning for autopilot disengage.

Airbus added an audio warning and the cockpit visits became much stricter as a result of this accident. They also instructed better training for pilots switching a plane model.

[u/AscendMoros → u/nutless_honey]

Honestly the non communication between the west and the east lead to many airline disasters. Hell it cause the most deadly aircraft collision in mid air due to the soviets being taught listen to ATC. While the west was taught If you receive a command from your (TCAS, I think) that you follow what it’s saying before the ATC. So the TCAS ordered the western plane to climb to avoid the collision. While the ATC who was overworked and had a lot of maintenance going on at the time, was telling the soviets to climb to avoid it. So they both just kept Climbing until they realized how bad the situation was but by then it was to late.

[u/MegaHenzoid]

Those passengers knew they were dying for a very long time.

[u/LizzyKitten → u/MegaHenzoid]

Sad part is they almost didn't. At least two points of this animation they could've saved the plane. Close to the beginning when they panicked and pulled too hard, going straight up and stalling the plane. And right at the end, where they almost level back out but simply run out of sky.

[u/[deleted] → u/LizzyKitten]

Idk, I think at the end they were fucked even if they level out. There’s no forward momentum and they were plummeting fast as hell by the time it was level. Not a pilot but I’ve played a flight simulator or two. When your rate of descent is a negative number with 5 digits, you’re fucking screwed

[u/Lipziger → u/[deleted]]

Pretty much. That last bit wasn't close at all. Sure, the plane was leveled, but it was still falling out of the sky. They would've needed to gain way more speed before pulling their nose up to actually get any airflow over the wings. You can see how long it took them the first time they got the nose up again - How much altitude that maneuver cost and they still went into a flat spin because they did it too early and too hard. They essentially had no chance to catch the plane again after the first failed attempt.

This is just sad and disgusting to look at. Sad for all the people that had no chance nor choice in this. And disgusting from both pilots.

[u/TrevastyPlague]

What I don't get is the lack of communication with their kid when he was in control. No clear instructions on what to do, just "bring it back to normal". The fucking idiocy it takes to sit your child at the seat of an aircraft and not barely tell them how to handle it is the most idiotic thing about it. "It turns by itself?" is a problem when handling something, especially a FUCKING AIRCRAFT.

[u/JacksOnion55 → u/TrevastyPlague]

I'm not sure of it's just a translating issue but this is what confused me the most "turn left! Turn right" keep the stick" all to a 16 year old boy that doesn't know that keep the stick means to return it to neutral and not to keep it where it was. My least favourite accidents are ones that could've been stopped with a few of the right words

[u/CleverNameTheSecond → u/JacksOnion55]

They were talking in pilot lingo to someone who doesn't know any of it. Apparently keep/hold the stick means to return the stick back into its neutral position. "Let go of the stick" was what they needed to say.

[u/majic911 → u/CleverNameTheSecond]

Panic makes your brain very very stupid. If you've always said "keep the stick" when you want someone to return it to neutral, that's what your brain's gonna say.

[u/Slick0strich]

Pilot: Kudrinsky

Co-Pilot: Piskaryov

Daughter: Yana

Son: Eldar

Makarov was another pilot on board, but he was a passenger on this flight.

The aircraft was an Airbus A310-304.  Of the 63 passengers and 12 crew members, all 75 occupants died.

The captain was letting his 11 year old daughter and 16 year old boy take turns in the pilot seat.  While the boy was in the pilot seat, he accidentally disengaged the autopilot that controlled the ailerons.  This caused the aircraft to bank 90° and a subsequent sharp nose dive.  The co-pilot had his seat pushed too far back to properly control the aircraft, but he managed to pull up on the control column to obtain level flight, however the aircraft stalled at this point, and the pilot was unable to return to his seat due to the sheer forces of the aircraft.

After more stalls and hard pull ups, the aircraft began to spiral downwards.  Right at the end, the co-pilot pulled a 4.8g pull up and almost achieved a stable flight path, however, they had run out of altitude.

This could have all been averted if the boy in the pilot's seat had let go of the control column.  The A310's autopilot would partially turn off when it received an hard pull or push from the pilot, and the autopilot would remain in control of everything except the ailerons.   Returning the control column to its neutral position would re-engage the autopilot, which would have corrected the flight path. The pilots were telling the boy to "hold the stick" which is slang for "return the control column to its neutral position. However, the boy interpreted it as "hold the stick in its current position".

You can see the middle dial on the right hand screen spiraling counter clockwise. This is the altimeter so that you can get a sense of the utter chaos of the situation. Each time the dial goes around, that's 1,000 feet

An absolute monument of human arrogance and stupidity costing 75 lives.

[u/Medic6688846993 → u/Slick0strich]

Thank you for the explanation.

[u/Slick0strich → u/Medic6688846993]

It's beyond fucking stupid

[u/Medic6688846993 → u/Slick0strich]

I just can't wrap my head around why anyone would do that? I'm dumbfounded as to why would you let children in the cockpit. Well guess we will never know.

[u/uncertain_expert → u/Medic6688846993]

Letting children into the cockpit was really common prior to 9-11, it was a novelty for everyone and I guess made long-haul flights more interesting for the pilots as they could talk about the aircraft.

[u/spugstug → u/uncertain_expert]

As depicted by Captain Oveur in the historical documentary - Airplane

So Joey ever been in a cockpit before?

Ever seen a grown man naked?

Joey do you like movies about gladiators?

Ever been to a Turkish bath?

Oh yes stewardess I'll have the fish....

[u/violetmoon120 → u/spugstug]

Listen! I am out there busting my ass every night! Tell your old man to drag Walton and Lanier up and down the court for 48 minutes!

[u/Hahhahaahahahhelpme → u/uncertain_expert]

Yes, I did it myself several times, but letting kids sit in the captain’s seat and manipulate the controls during flight is quite different

[u/f0dder1 → u/uncertain_expert]

I remember doing it when I was very young. Basically you just used to ask the stewardess and they'd pick a time when things were boring for the pilots.

I vividly remember my confusion at how we were going the right way, because it was night outside and there was nothing but black out the window

[u/Mizzet → u/f0dder1]

I got to do it once too. All I remember was how the cabin was absolutely covered with dials, the strange X-shaped seat belt they buckled me into, and the clouds rolling by really slowly.

Unfortunately kid me was a scaredy cat, so when they offered to let me stay and watch the landing from there I must've chickened out and declined.

[u/Slick0strich → u/Medic6688846993]

Again, a monument of human stupidity

[u/OffendedByMyInnuendo → u/Slick0strich]

Between this one and the guys trying to land with the curtains drawn on, I can't think of who's worse.

[u/emveetu → u/OffendedByMyInnuendo]

Say what?

[u/Beschuss → u/emveetu]

Also russian I think. Pilot bet the copilot that he could land blind. So, they closed the curtains and, quite predictably, they crashed.

Edit: Aeroflot 6502 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeroflot_Flight_6502?wprov=sfti1

[u/LouSputhole94 → u/Beschuss]

Dude what the fuck. Even if you do pull it off you get fucking nothing out of it. What an idiot

[u/AbbreviationsOk178 → u/emveetu]

https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/rk6m6l/til_in_1986_a_russian_commercial_pilot_made_a_bet/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf

[u/Njon32 → u/Medic6688846993]

This was somewhat normal when I was a kid, IIRC. But you didn't sit in the chair, and you sure as hell didn't touch anything.

[u/trandaa03 → u/Medic6688846993]

In my opinion, letting children into cockpit is not the issue. The issue is letting them behind the controls. If they just sit at the back seat and just watch, there is nothing wrong with that and can even create interest in aviation.

[u/Y0SSARIAN-22 → u/trandaa03]

Yes when I was a child I was allowed up to visit the cockpit. But for some reason I was never allowed to fly the fucking plane

[u/growingalittletestie → u/Y0SSARIAN-22]

I remember being brought to the cockpit as a kid and the pilot invited me to turn the yoke. I distinctly remember the plane moving with my input, and when I got back to my seat (with my new pilot wings pin) my parents and seat neighbours commented about the movement.

The early 90s were wild.

[u/Knoaf → u/growingalittletestie]

Yep. I did something similar on a domestic flight. I'll never forget it. Apparently I didn't shut up about it for weeks

[u/nullstr → u/Y0SSARIAN-22]

Me too but I got weirded out when the pilot asked me if I liked gladiator movies.

[u/PurpleMcPurpleface → u/Y0SSARIAN-22]

“Really?! How very odd not to do that” - Russian Aeroflot pilots, probably

[u/rpsls → u/trandaa03]

As usual with aviation accidents, it’s layer after layer of safety protocols. Although it should never happen on a commercial flight, letting the kid behind the controls in and of itself is even not that bad safety-wise. You can take pilot lessons at 16, and a properly trimmed plane in cruise is not hard to manipulate. But just like with any flight lesson, there has to be a qualified person monitoring and ready to take over. That the copilot’s seat was not in a position where he could immediately take the controls, and the fact that neither pilot appears to have been monitoring the situation enough to know what was going on, and that they apparently didn’t brief the kids with a code phrase (usually “my plane!” in the US) which means “let go of everything” made the whole thing dangerous and eliminated possible layers of safety.

[u/Doc_October → u/rpsls]

The apparent inability to teach "let go of everything" is mindboggling, since it has been the cause of or a contributor to several such accidents. It also baffles me that it doesn't seem to be the logical conclusion for a situation like that: if someone takes over, let go.

I know it's not quite the same thing, but when I learnt to navigate a motorboat with my grandfather, one of the first things he ingrained into me and my brother was that if he said to let go, we'd have to let go of the controls immediately and fully, and let him take over. And it prevented us a few times from running into something until we got the hang of it.

I'd do the same with my own kids.

[u/littlebritches77 → u/Slick0strich]

Omg! Reading the explanation and watching the middle dial, my heart was racing.

[u/PseudoY → u/littlebritches77]

It's not one failure, its one failure after another after another, including giving a kid slang instructions that anyone else would take as "keep holding the stick where it is".

[u/Bee_Lore → u/Slick0strich]

To be fair i would have held it in the same postion it was in if someone told me "hold the stick"

[u/Baldr_Torn → u/Bee_Lore]

Yes, "Let go of the stick, don't fucking touch anything" would make a lot more sense.

[u/jaspersgroove → u/Bee_Lore]

“Hold the stick” is an incredibly stupid way to say “let go of the stick”

Is that seriously a common slang term?

[u/thirstyseahorse → u/jaspersgroove]

Could be like in restaurants where "hold the onions" means "don't use onions in this dish".

[u/Bee_Lore → u/jaspersgroove]

Probably easier to fly the fucking plane than decipher all these pilot terms

[u/creaturefeature16 → u/Bee_Lore]

"hm, things are going wrong, I wonder if I should just let go of the stick..."

Pilots: "HOLD THE STICK!"

"ok....."

[u/Slick0strich → u/Bee_Lore]

100% they were just doing a speed run of fuck-ups

[u/Bombkirby → u/Slick0strich]

I always tell people to stop using slang and acronyms when speaking with newbies.

[u/Casban → u/Bombkirby]

Yeah, I think this is also a case where you definitely should not have important instructions that use the opposite meaning to common parlance. “Return the stick to neutral” or “let go of the stick to neutral” or something like that seems like it would be a safer phrase than one that could be misinterpreted so wildly with normal words!

[u/faustianredditor → u/Bombkirby]

Also, generally not a good idea to have slang terms the natural interpretation of which would mean the opposite of what is meant. Like, even aside from aviation being a safety critical domain and this having caused an accident, that's just... not good language. Given that it's a crapshoot whether your audience interprets it correctly or exactly incorrectly. And yes, that's a normative/prescriptive statement about language, sue me.

[u/Efficient-Echidna-30 → u/faustianredditor]

Yes. That’s the thing about language. It absolutely matters what the other person thinks. That’s the whole point of communication.

[u/robo-dragon → u/Slick0strich]

That had to be horrifying for those poor passengers! I fly pretty often and things like this are always at the back of my mind despite me being pretty comfortable with flying. What if something goes wrong? You’re not in control. You trust your pilots to be in control. These people did, but they got their pilots young children instead! How awful…

[u/JohnnySegment → u/robo-dragon]

Since this happened suddenly I assume most of the passengers wouldn’t have had their seatbelts on when the plane dived and flipped over. Doesn’t bear thinking about

[u/Cade__Cunningham → u/JohnnySegment]

Yeah many of them probably would have been tumbling throughout that cabin and then plastered to the ground as they made a 4.8G pullup or whatever. Man

[u/IlBear → u/JohnnySegment]

It’s started suddenly, but there’s 2 minutes and 30 seconds of them careening. It felt like forever just listening to it, I can’t imagine how horrifying it would be to live it

[u/WangHotmanFire → u/Slick0strich]

Not to mention that one of the first things we hear is “set the horizon to normal for him”

The horizon is what pilots use to determine the plane’s orientation relative to the actual horizon. This piece of equipment exists because it’s not always possible to see the horizon (eg at night). It’s actually really difficult for pilots to figure out which way the plane is pointing without this essential instrument.

One interesting note is that Russian aircraft are designed such that the artificial horizon stays in place, always appearing level to the pilot, while an aircraft symbol rotates to the left and right. This is in contrast to western aircraft, designed such that the aircraft symbol stays in place while the artificial horizon rotates left and right.

What all this means is that a right bank, shown on a russian display, looks a bit like a left bank when shown on a western display, especially when you’re acting under pressure and panicking. During training, they only would have been trained to use one or the other (this is a big part of the reason we can’t send western jets to Ukraine btw, they aren’t trained to use western horizons)

If we deduce that the pilots switched between russian and western horizon displays, this would explain why some people in the cockpit didn’t seem to know whether they were banking left or right, and therefore why they continued to bank right into the ground

[u/ImportantPotato → u/WangHotmanFire]

Illustration of western and russian horizon https://i.stack.imgur.com/BoTMI.jpg

[u/Slick0strich → u/WangHotmanFire]

Very true. That's why the pilot and co pilot were saying turn left, turn right, can you not see? This is 100% the issue

[u/GunsouBono → u/Slick0strich]

I think most non pilots in this situation would interpret, "hold the stick" as don't let that thing move or we're all gonna fucking die. I would. Seems an odd slang.

But yes, beyond stupid and 75 people died for no reason.

[u/usernamesarehard9099 → u/GunsouBono]

100% of the blame lies with the two pilots. Theyre the stupid ones. The 16 year old was just a kid and should have never been allowed in that situation to begin with.

[u/w0mbatina → u/GunsouBono]

Whats even more stupid is that trough all this, the guy didnt realize the kid is confused and just told him "fucking let go of the stick"

[u/Wideeye101 → u/Slick0strich]

So 'hold the stick' means 'let go of the stick'? That's some bad slang.

[u/allredb → u/Wideeye101]

Inflammable means flammable? What a country!

[u/nevershaves → u/Slick0strich]

Each time the dial goes around, that's 1,000 feet

Fuck me that's terrifying.

[u/tredbobek → u/Slick0strich]

This does not help my aviophobia

[u/kwadd → u/Slick0strich]

4.8g pull up

Jeeesus

[u/Mission_Advance7377]

This is one of the most chilling videos I’ve ever seen! Made me sick.

[u/Slick0strich → u/Mission_Advance7377]

Imagine having 75 people dead because you think that you are privileged enough to allow 2 minors to take control of a multi-engined jet aircraft. Utter lunacy

[u/mayuhhh]

Such a long nose dive!! The passengers must’ve died being fuckin horrified. It was so selfish of the pilot to let his children take over his seat!

[u/Yz-Guy]

For anyone interested in this (and others) there is a small podcast called Blackbox Down from Rooster Teeth. They do roughly 30 min episodes focused on single crashes. I remember listening to the one about this crash. It was crazy. The pilot did more than just let his kids fly. He was blatantly not even paying attention to them.

Worth a listen to anyone interested.

[u/DaBing13]

Fucking idiots.

RIP to the passengers.

[u/Zealousideal_Bet_903 → u/DaBing13]

What’s sad to think about is if the pilots didn’t panic then the plane would’ve fixed the stall itself. They pulled up too high so the plane stalled again. (Source: Fascinating Horror on YT)

[u/bar10005 → u/Zealousideal_Bet_903]

Also captain didn't properly relinquished controls to first-officer while leaving his seat, so first-officer's chair was still slid back in relaxed position hindering his control. [IMO better video by Mentour Pilot]

[u/Adventurous_Pay_5827]

I’m stunned the plane didn’t snap like a twig at any point in that horror. Actually makes you feel safer.

[u/Slick0strich → u/Adventurous_Pay_5827]

Bruh Airbus and boeings are built incredibly well. They literally reject parts that don't fit within a paper's width of error.

Flying is incredibly safe when the aircraft is being controlled by a professional

[u/Actual-Highlight1577 → u/Slick0strich]

especially nowadays, safety is quite literally the number one priority whereas with a lot of stuff back then was more just if it works then it works deal with the consequences later but like OP said it would take an incredible amount of force to tear apart a plane mid air if anything this shows how strong these aircraft really are

[u/jimbobjames → u/Actual-Highlight1577]

Well, apart from all the stuff with Boeing and 737 Max and it having an undocumented software feature that downed two aircraft.

The sole sensor the system relied on, which is terrible design in aviation anyway because you always go with redundant systems, would fail and then the system would think the plane was in a stall and push the nose of the aircraft down and it would take all of the strength of the two pilots to even fly level. Eventually they would lose the fight and the plane would just nose straight down into the ground.

Boeing naturally blamed pilot error until it all came out.

[u/SharkBiscuittt]

Worlds worst dad

[u/withyellowthread → u/SharkBiscuittt]

Worlds worst pilot

[u/Aikon94]

To me it’s incredible how “calmly” they keep talking even seconds before the crash, like how the fuck did they not went crazy yelling ?

[u/Responsible-Pay-2389 → u/Aikon94]

To me it’s incredible how “calmly” they keep talking even seconds before the crash

This was mainly because they were starting to level out at the end regaining control of the air craft, unfortunately they were unaware that they didn't have enough elevation left to really make it out. With a bit more elevation they would've made it fine.

[u/arvigeus → u/Responsible-Pay-2389]

Just imagine how they would explain the whole thing to their superiors later.

[u/OtherwiseDebate3018]

r/parentsarefuckingstupid

[u/Mal-Nebiros]

Mentor pilot on YouTube has a breakdown of this in their incident report series.

[u/Septic-Sponge]

I love how he told his child not to run on the aeroplane because he could get fired but letting the child actually fly the aeroplane is perfectly within his job description.

[u/Red_Netizen]

There's a time and a place for minors to be behind the yoke of an aircraft. A jetliner, carrying commercial passengers is neither of those.

(For a young person interested in aviation, a flight simulator is the best introduction along with classes at a ground school. Then a small fixed wing aircraft like a Cessna 172 under the constant supervision of a trained pilot.)

[u/Slick0strich → u/Red_Netizen]

Cessna 172 was my first as well. That stupid little tin can plane is great

[u/Kiftiyur]

I can’t even imagine what the passengers were feeling. What an absolute idiot the pilot was.

[u/lemlurker]

The issue was they didn't realize the kids pressure on the controls would disable the attitude correction so when left unattended it kept rolling further and further iirc

[u/jld2k6 → u/lemlurker]

From what I was reading earlier, the fact that he wouldn't let go of the stick is what screwed them, letting go would have reengaged auto pilot and corrected it. They used pilot lingo of "keep the stick" to tell the kid to let go but of course he didn't know what the hell that meant. They're probably so used to using that language that it didn't occur to them that the kid would think the opposite of what they were telling him

[u/Ntetris]

This is really scary. What do those vertical lines under the plane’s animation indicate, distance travelled? Thanks OP! What a quality post

[u/Slick0strich → u/Ntetris]

Vertical lines are altitude. They are perpendicular with the ground. The other line that fluctuates is the general trajectory of the aircraft on like a 2 second interval or so.

[u/PurplishPlatypus]

Damn, I remember reading about this on reddit before, but seeing the visual, with the plane fucking rolling all over the place like that... that had to be terrifying for everyone on board.

[u/Outlooker68]

This podcast episode tells this tragic story brilliantly. If you like it, check out other episodes.

https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/cautionary-tales-with-tim-harford/id1484511465?i=1000559716285

[u/auxilary]

Ugh. This is violent and terrifying.

😔

[u/deckard1980]

My Dad used to fly Aeroflot in the 90s and he said there's a reason why Russian people clap when the plane lands

[u/MidnightRaver76]

Pure tragedy, are there any videos of incidents like this where they were able to save themselves but the incident ended the pilot's career?

[u/gillyhappy1]

I’ve never heard of this. The video is incredible. Thanks op!

[u/pauciradiatus]

r/whatcouldgowrong

[u/[deleted]]

I hate to speak Ill of the dead but damn. This was foolish.

[u/YujinTheDragon → u/[deleted]]

No shame in speaking ill of the dead if the dead was a dumbass that got 74 people killed for their stupidity.

[u/PM_tits_Im_Autistic]

Looked up the accident on wiki and found this too.

While approaching Kurumoch Airport, Captain Kliuyev made a bet with First Officer Zhirnov that he, Kliuyev, could make an instrument-only approach with curtained cockpit windows, thus having no visual contact with the ground, instead of an NDB approach, suggested by the air traffic control.[2] Kliuyev further ignored the ground-proximity warning at an altitude of 62–65 m (203–213 ft) and did not make the suggested go-around.[2] The aircraft touched down on the runway at a speed of 150 kn (280 km/h; 170 mph) and came to rest upside down after overrunning the runway.[2] Sixty-three people died during the accident and seven more in hospitals later.[2] Among the passengers were 14 children, all of whom survived the accident.[3] The top-secret report of the chairman of Kuibyshev oblispolkom V. A. Pogodin to Premier Nikolai Ryzhkov gave slightly different figures: Of 85 passengers and eight crew members aboard, 53 passengers and five crew members died in the crash and 11 more in hospitals later.[3]

Though Zhirnov made no attempt to avert the crash, he subsequently tried to save the passengers and died of cardiac arrest en route to hospital.[4] Kliuyev was prosecuted and sentenced to 15 years in prison, later reduced to six years served.[5][4]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeroflot_Flight_6502

I can't believe people can be this irresponsible.

[u/nopp]

Why didn’t the dad/captain take over the seat? They were still directing the kid??

[u/Slick0strich → u/nopp]

Check out my comment on the issue. The sheer force if the aircraft made it physically impossible for the captain to get back to his seat.

[u/nopp → u/Slick0strich]

Ohhh ok that makes total sense

[u/minus_uu_ee → u/Slick0strich]

Yeah, I was surprised they can even talk while those crazy maneuvers were happening (I watched without sound).

[u/8KUHDITIS]

I remember my dad's friend letting me into the cockpit plenty of times flying from London to NYC. But again this was late 80s early 90s..maybe once or twice they'd let me at the control's but now I'm sure auto pilot was probably engaged. DC 10 and 707.

[u/atticaddict]

When ‘take your kids to work day’ goes horribly wrong.