1948 Gatow air disaster

The 1948 Gatow air disaster was a mid-air collision in the airspace above Berlin, Germany, that occurred on 5 April, sparking an international incident. A British European Airways (BEA) Vickers VC.1B Viking airliner crashed near RAF Gatow air base, after being struck by a Soviet Air Force Yakovlev Yak-3 fighter aircraft. All ten passengers and four crew on board the Viking were killed, as was the Soviet pilot. The disaster resulted in a diplomatic standoff between the United Kingdom and United States on one hand, and the Soviet Union on the other, and intensified distrust leading up to the Berlin Blockade in the early years of the Cold War.

Flight details

The aircraft involved in the incident was a Vickers 610 Viking 1B with the registration G-AIVP; and had first flown in 1947. The BEA flight had a four-member crew, all of whom were former members of the Royal Air Force. There were ten passengers on board, most of whom were British.

Crash

In the days preceding the incident, Soviet military aircraft had been buzzing American and British passenger aircraft while they passed through the western zones of the city. The Viking was on a scheduled commercial flight from London via Hamburg to RAF Gatow in the British Sector of Berlin. At approximately 2:30pm while the Viking was in the airport's safety area levelling off to land, a Soviet Yak-3 approached from behind. Eyewitnesses testified that as the Viking made a left-hand turn prior to its approach to land, the fighter dived beneath it, climbed sharply, and clipped the port wing of the airliner with its starboard wing. The impact ripped off both colliding wings and the Viking crashed inside the Soviet Sector, at Hahneberg (Berlin-Staaken), Staaken, just outside the British Sector (about 2.5 miles northwest of Gatow), and exploded. The Yak-3 crashed near a farmhouse on Heerstrasse just inside the British sector. All the occupants of both aircraft died on impact.

It was also testified that the Yak pilot was doing aerobatics prior to the accident; the Soviet Air Force had not informed Royal Air Force air traffic controllers at Gatow of its presence. They claimed that the fighter was coming in to land at Dallgow, a nearby Soviet airbase (although examination of the wreckage showed that the undercarriage was still locked up, so this was unlikely).

Allied investigators later concluded that the "collision was caused by the action of the Yak fighter, which was in disregard of the accepted rules of flying and, in particular, of the quadripartite flying rules to which Soviet authorities were parties."