1961 Holtaheia Vickers Viking crash
Eagle Airways Vickers 610 Viking 3B · Controlled flight into terrain
From London Heathrow Airport (LHR) to Stavanger Airport, Sola (SVG)
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
- 39 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- Unknown
- Occupants
- Unknown
- 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
Vickers 610 Viking 3B
- Aircraft type
- Vickers 610
- 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
- G-AHPM
- Operator
- Eagle Airways
- Onboard fatalities
- 39
- Route
- From London Heathrow Airport (LHR)To Stavanger Airport, Sola (SVG)
Cause areas
- Personnel issues › Task performance
- Not determined › Not determined
From the investigation findings the Wikipedia article reports, sorted into the NTSB's cause areas with AI assistance.
Approximate · Coordinates from the Wikipedia article; not checked against an investigation report.
From the Wikipedia article
The 1961 Holtaheia Vickers Viking crash (Holtaheia-ulykken) was a controlled flight into terrain incident on 9 August 1961 at Holta in Strand Municipality, Norway. The Eagle Airways (later, British Eagle) Vickers 610 Viking 3B Lord Rodney was en route from London Heathrow to Stavanger Airport, Sola on an AIR Tours charter flight taking a school group for a camping holiday. The aircraft was making an instrument landing when it crashed 54 km north east of Stavanger. All 39 people on board died.
Crash
The Viking left London Heathrow at 13:29 on what was an estimated two and a half-hour charter flight. Between 16:24 and 16:30 it crashed 18 nmi north-east of the airport on to Holtaheia, a steep mountainside at an elevation of 1600 ft. The crash site was 30 ft below the summit.
The aircraft was destroyed and an intense fuel and oil fire followed the impact. The search for the aircraft included an RAF Shackleton and Royal Norwegian Navy ships investigating the fjords in the area. The wreckage was found fifteen hours after the crash by a Royal Norwegian Air Force helicopter, 15 mi east from the ILS track.
Investigation and cause
Investigation
The report into the crash put the cause down to "a deviation from the prescribed flight path for reasons unknown".
Text from the Wikipedia article “1961 Holtaheia Vickers Viking crash” (revision 1346111189, 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: 1961 Holtaheia Vickers Viking crash
- Revision
- 1346111189 · 2026-03-30 · retrieved 2026-09-18
- Wikidata
- Q5884634
- 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 "1961 Holtaheia Vickers Viking crash" (page 32897290, revision 1346111189)
- 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
- operator named as an airline 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.