Cathay Pacific Flight 033
Convair 880 · Runway overrun
From Kai Tak Airport to Dum Dum Airport (now Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport), Calcutta (now Kolkata)
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
- 1 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- Unknown
- Occupants
- Unknown
- Survivors
- 126
- 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
- 28
- 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
Convair 880
- Aircraft type
- Convair 880
- 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
- VR-HFX
- Operator
- Cathay Pacific
- Onboard fatalities
- 1
- Route
- From Kai Tak AirportTo Dum Dum Airport (now Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport), Calcutta (now Kolkata)
Cause areas
- Aircraft › Aircraft systems
- Personnel issues › Task performance
- Environmental issues › Conditions/weather/phenomena
From the investigation findings the Wikipedia article reports, sorted into the NTSB's cause areas with AI assistance.
Approximate · Estimated position: Kai Tak Airport, the airport the Wikipedia article names as the site. Where on or near it is not known.
From the Wikipedia article
Cathay Pacific Flight 033 was a flight from Hong Kong to Saigon, Bangkok, and Calcutta. On 5 November 1967, the Convair 880M (VR-HFX) overran the runway on takeoff from Hong Kong International Airport (a.k.a. Kai Tak Airport) following a loss of control after the right nosewheel blew, killing 1 of 127 on board.
Accident
The flight started its takeoff roll on runway 13 at 02:34 AM local time. At a speed of just under 120 knots, the crew felt a vibration that progressively got stronger as the plane continued gaining speed. The vibrations eventually became so severe that the crew decided to abort the takeoff. The brakes, spoilers and thrust reversers were applied. However, the plane started to veer to the right, away from the centerline of the runway. The crew applied left rudder to try to counteract the motion to the right which failed. The crew then applied differential braking as an alternative method, fully releasing the brakes on the right hand side (which were applied during the initial deceleration sequence after touchdown) and applied maximum left braking in addition to full left rudder. This only had a slight effect on the right-hand yaw of the aircraft but was not enough to fully bring the plane back to the runway. The aircraft exited the runway, sliding across the grass strip adjacent to it, still yawing to the right. It then crossed a seawall at a heading of 47 degrees from the centerline of the runway in a left "crab" configuration. The plane then left the seawall, rotating 180 degrees and coming to a stop near Kowloon Bay, facing the seawall. All 4 engines separated from the aircraft on impact with the rest of the plane severely damaged. Some pieces of the aircraft sunk into the mud of Kowloon Bay. One passenger onboard was killed with the remaining passengers and crew suffering only minor injuries.
The aircraft went past the seawall, and fell into the Hong Kong Harbour. The aircraft broke into two. Helicopters; Man Shun, a ferry; along with some tugboats and launches, went to rescue passengers. Howell assisted passengers in leaving the crashed aircraft. Some passengers put on life jackets.
Its crash site was very close to that of Thai Airways International Flight 601.
Investigation and cause
Investigation
Cathay Pacific's internal report stated that the main reason why the accident occurred was the failure of a tyre. It did not assign blame to the flight crew.
The final accident report by the colonial Hong Kong government also did not assign blame to the flight crew.
The Hong Kong final accident report and Cathay Pacific's internal report both stated that the actions of the cabin crew helped ameliorate problems by managing passenger behaviour.
The final report issued by the CAD concluded that the cause of the crash was a loss of directional control resulting from separation of the tyre tread on the main landing gear and the inability for the crew to stop the aircraft within the adequate runway available due to the use of differential braking which affected the stopping capability of the aircraft as well as the tailwind present on takeoff.
As a result of the accident, the CAD also issued several recommendations:
The temperature of the aircraft's wheels should be checked after every flight to detect any possible malfunction of the braking system
Any personal belongings, such as passenger's luggage, should not obstruct or impede the evacuation route or process
Stricter loading procedures for ground staff which include checking and recording the total weight of the aircraft to prevent incorrect inputs and as a result, V1 speeds
Text from the Wikipedia article “Cathay Pacific Flight 033” (revision 1374575155, 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: Cathay Pacific Flight 033
- Article
- Cathay Pacific Flight 033
- Revision
- 1374575155 · 2026-09-12 · retrieved 2026-09-18
- Wikidata
- Q10926933
- 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 "Cathay Pacific Flight 033" (page 84188126, revision 1374575155)
- Date
- Wikipedia infobox: date
- Place and country
- Wikipedia infobox: site
- Map position
- airport the Wikipedia infobox site links (Wikidata 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
- flight number in the article title
- 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.