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Royal Brunei Airlines Flight 839

6 Sept 1997 · Lambir Hills National Park near Miri Airport, Miri, Malaysia

Merpati Intan on behalf of Royal Brunei Airlines Dornier 228-212 · Controlled flight into terrain due to pilot error

From Labuan Airport (LBU) to Miri Airport (MYY)

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Event

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
Event fatalities
10 · all aircraft and ground
Ground fatalities
Unknown
Occupants
10
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
Unknown
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

Dornier 228-212

Flight
BI839
Aircraft type
Dornier 228
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
9M-MIA
Onboard fatalities
10
Route
From Labuan Airport (LBU)To Miri Airport (MYY)

Approximate · Coordinates from the Wikipedia article; not checked against an investigation report.

From the Wikipedia article

Royal Brunei Airlines Flight 839 was a charter flight from Labuan to Bandar Seri Begawan and Miri, operated by Merpati Intan on behalf of Royal Brunei Airlines. On 6 September 1997, a Dornier 228, registered as 9M-MIA, conducting the flight crashed on approach to Miri, killing both crew members and all eight passengers on board.

Accident

Flight 839, a Dornier 228, departed from Brunei International Airport at 19:13 local time with eight passengers and two pilots on board for a short-haul flight to Miri Airport. The crew of Flight 839 requested clearance to land at the airport. Air traffic control cleared the flight for the final approach to Runway 2 at Miri Airport in Sarawak, Malaysia, but the flight crew did not radio back the control. At 19:42 whilst on approach to the runway, Flight 839 crashed into a slope at 500 m in Lambir Hills National Park. The wreckage of the Dornier 228 was found at 07:10 the following morning. According to Bernama, the crash was the second to occur in Miri, following an aviation accident on 3 September 1991 which killed 14 people, and was the sixth to occur in Malaysia in 1997.

Text from the Wikipedia article “Royal Brunei Airlines Flight 839” (revision 1360870418, 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: Royal Brunei Airlines Flight 839
Article
Royal Brunei Airlines Flight 839
Revision
1360870418 · 2026-06-24 · retrieved 2026-09-18
Wikidata
Q7373856
Licence
Text CC BY-SA 4.0, by the article's authors; Wikidata CC0; town positions GeoNames (CC BY 4.0)
Where each value comes from
Record
Wikipedia article "Royal Brunei Airlines Flight 839" (page 27553419, revision 1360870418)
Date
Wikipedia infobox: date
Place and country
Wikipedia infobox: site
Map position
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)
Operation
airline flight number in the infobox
Fatalities
Wikipedia infobox: aircraft fatalities
Ground fatalities
not stated in the Wikipedia infobox
Summary
Wikipedia infobox: summary
Source notes (1)
  • Wikipedia · Facts from the Wikipedia article's infobox and coordinates, not checked against an investigation report. Independent review pending.