Kam Air Flight 904
Kam Air on behalf of Phoenix Aviation Boeing 737-242 · Controlled flight into terrain for undetermined reasons
From Herat - Khwaja Abdullah Ansari International Airport (HEA) to Kabul International Airport (KBL)
Event
- NTSB case
- DCA05RA033
- Event typeAccident: someone killed or seriously injured, or the aircraft substantially damaged (NTSB definition). Incident: an occurrence that affected or could have affected safety, short of that. Glossary
- Accident
- InvestigationHow far the investigation had got when the record was published: preliminary, ongoing, final or completed. Unknown where the source does not say. Glossary
- Unknown · led by another country; figures from NTSB notifications
- Event fatalities
- 105 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 0
- Occupants
- 105
- Survivors
- 0
- InjuriesFatal: death within 30 days. Serious: over 48 hours in hospital within a week, most broken bones, severe bleeding, nerve or organ damage, or serious burns. Minor: anything less. Glossary
- 0 serious · 0 minor (NTSB)
- OperationWhat kind of flying it was, grouped by the rules it flew under: airline (US Part 121), air taxi and commuter (Part 135), general aviation (Part 91 and similar), military or government. Glossary
- Airline
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Not recorded
Boeing 737-242
- Flight
- RQ904
- Aircraft type
- Boeing 737
- Category
- Airplane · from aircraft type
- RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
- EX-037
- Onboard fatalities
- 105
- Route
- From Herat - Khwaja Abdullah Ansari International Airport (HEA)To Kabul International Airport (KBL)
- Aircraft age
- Not recorded
- Flight rulesThe regulations the flight operated under: in the US, Part 91 (general aviation), Part 121 (airlines), Part 135 (air taxi and commuter) and others; for flights abroad, the NTSB's coarser commercial or non-commercial code. Glossary
- Non-U.S., Commercial
- Phase of flightThe stage of the flight when things started to go wrong: standing, taxi, takeoff, initial climb, en route, maneuvering, approach or landing. Glossary
- Not recorded
- Defining eventThe single coded event the NTSB judges best describes what happened (records from 2008 on). Older records name the first occurrence in the sequence instead. Glossary
- Not recorded
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Not recorded
Cause areas
No findings designated as a cause are recorded in the NTSB data yet.
Approximate · Coordinates from the Wikipedia article; not checked against an investigation report.
From the Wikipedia article
Kam Air Flight 904 was a scheduled passenger domestic flight from Herat Airport in Herat to Kabul International Airport in Afghanistan's capital Kabul. On 3 February 2005, the aircraft crashed in mountainous terrain, killing all 97 passengers and 8 crew on board.
The incident took place shortly after 4:00 p.m. local time (UTC+4:30) when the Kam Air Boeing 737-200 operated by Phoenix Aviation went missing on approach to Kabul. The area was experiencing a heavy snowstorm at the time. The wreckage was found 4 days later and all occupants were confirmed dead.
The crash is the deadliest air disaster in the history of Afghanistan.
Accident
The aircraft lost communication during the worst winter snowstorm for 5 years. The cause of the loss of communication and the subsequent crash is unknown. Taliban leader Mullah Dadullah stated that his guerrilla fighters had not shot down the plane and expressed sadness at the crash. Air traffic control for the Kabul area was provided by the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF).
At the time of the accident, there was no established intra-governmental agency plan in Afghanistan to deal with a major aircraft crash. Initially, it was proposed that the Ministry of Transportation be responsible for not only the investigation but also human remains identification and recovery and wreckage recovery. When the logic of this concept fell apart because of the small size of the MOT and its almost total lack of resources, these duties were divided among the Ministry of Defense and Ministry of Health (human remains), the Ministry of the Interior (wreckage recovery), and the MOT (the actual accident investigation).
Text from the Wikipedia article “Kam Air Flight 904” (revision 1374330124, retrieved 2026-09-18) by its authors, under CC BY-SA 4.0. Extracted as plain text: references, tables, images and some sections are left out. Read the article
Sources
Wikipedia article: Kam Air Flight 904
- Article
- Kam Air Flight 904
- Revision
- 1374330124 · 2026-09-11 · retrieved 2026-09-18
- Wikidata
- Q2208597
- Licence
- Text CC BY-SA 4.0, by the article's authors; Wikidata CC0; town positions GeoNames (CC BY 4.0)
NTSB record DCA05RA033
- Event ID
- 20050207X00143
- Case number
- DCA05RA033
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Where each value comes from
- Record
- Wikipedia article "Kam Air Flight 904" (page 1470629, revision 1374330124); merged with NTSB case DCA05RA033 (events / aircraft)
- Date
- Wikipedia infobox: date
- Place and country
- Wikipedia infobox: site; country from Wikidata (P17)
- Map position
- Wikipedia: Wikipedia article coordinates
- Aircraft, operator and route
- Wikipedia infobox: aircraft type, registration, operator, origin and destination; route airports from the linked airport articles' Wikidata codes (OurAirports); gaps and aircraft details from NTSB record DCA05RA033
- Operation
- airline flight number in the infobox
- Fatalities
- Reviewed (2026-09-19): Afghanistan Ministry of Transport final investigation report (EX-037), hosted by ASN, https://asn.flightsafety.org/reports/2005/20050203_B732_EX-037.pdf
- Ground fatalities
- Reviewed (2026-09-19): Afghanistan Ministry of Transport final investigation report (EX-037), hosted by ASN, https://asn.flightsafety.org/reports/2005/20050203_B732_EX-037.pdf
- Summary
- Wikipedia infobox: summary
Source notes (3)
- One occurrence in two sources, merged: the Wikipedia article "Kam Air Flight 904" and NTSB case DCA05RA033, matched by the same aircraft registration and date. For this event outside the United States Wikipedia's values are used where the two differ; each value names its source.
- Death toll settled: the NTSB record (DCA05RA033) gives 104 and the Wikipedia article 105; Afghanistan Ministry of Transport final investigation report (EX-037), hosted by ASN gives 105. Final report: 105 on board (8 crew + 97 passengers), all fatally injured. NTSB's 104 matches early press counts of 96 passengers. One Afghan soldier killed by a mine during the search is not counted as an accident fatality.
- No bulk values were replaced by the NTSB case API.