1957 Aviaco accident on Majorca
de Havilland DH-114 Heron 2D · Controlled flight into terrain after navigation error
From Josep Tarradellas Barcelona-El Prat Airport (BCN) to Son Bonet Airfield (LESB)
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
- 4 · 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
de Havilland DH-114 Heron 2D
- Aircraft type
- de Havilland DH-114
- 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
- EC-ANZ
- Operator
- Aviaco
- Onboard fatalities
- 4
- Route
- From Josep Tarradellas Barcelona-El Prat Airport (BCN)To Son Bonet Airfield (LESB)
Cause areas
- Personnel issues › Task performance
From the investigation findings the Wikipedia article reports, sorted into the NTSB's cause areas with AI assistance.
Not plotted · Not plotted: the Wikipedia article gives no coordinates, and its site names no town or airport that matches exactly.
From the Wikipedia article
The 1957 Aviaco accident on Mallorca occurred on 15 November 1957, when a de Havilland DH-114 Heron 2D of Aviaco, during a domestic scheduled flight from Barcelona-El Prat Airport to Aeródromo de Son Bonet, was flown into a 400-metre-high mountain in the Serra de Tramuntana on approach to the destination airport. All four occupants of the aircraft were killed in the incident, which was caused by navigation errors.
Accident sequence
The aircraft took off from Barcelona at 19:19. At 20:02 the crew reported to the area control centre in Palma de Mallorca that they were passing over the MJ beacon at flight level 60. The area control centre then issued clearance to conduct an approach using the radio compass. At 20:08 local time the aircraft struck a mountain in the Serra de Tramuntana 14.5 kilometres west-northwest of the destination airport and was completely destroyed. The two pilots and the two passengers were killed.
Investigation and cause
Cause
The exact cause of the accident could never be determined. It was established that the pilots had flown a heading of 295° instead of 195°. Accordingly, there had been a course deviation of 100°. It could be ruled out that the aircraft had been blown so significantly off course by the wind, which was blowing at a speed of 14 knots. Rather, it was assumed that the prevailing difficult weather conditions and turbulence, which had been reported by another aircraft, had confused the captain, who had only limited experience on the aircraft type flown, causing him to make a navigation error.
Translated into English with AI assistance from the German Wikipedia article “Flugunfall der Aviaco auf Mallorca 1957” (revision 269744078, retrieved 2026-09-19) by its authors, under CC BY-SA 4.0. Extracted as plain text: references, tables, images and some sections are left out; the translation may contain errors, and long articles were cut to their first 700 words. Read the article
Sources
German Wikipedia article: Flugunfall der Aviaco auf Mallorca 1957
- Translation
- Into English with AI assistance; names of linked operators and aircraft types from Wikidata. It may contain errors.
- Revision
- 269744078 · 2026-08-17 · retrieved 2026-09-19
- Wikidata
- Q106695298
- 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
- de Wikipedia article "Flugunfall der Aviaco auf Mallorca 1957" (page 11741778, revision 269744078), translated into English with AI assistance
- Date
- Wikipedia infobox: date
- Place and country
- Wikipedia infobox: site
- Map position
- none
- Aircraft, operator and route
- Wikipedia infobox: aircraft type, registration, operator, origin and destination; route airports from the linked airport articles' Wikidata codes (OurAirports)
- Operation
- "scheduled flight" in the article's opening paragraph
- Fatalities
- Wikipedia infobox: aircraft fatalities
- Ground fatalities
- not stated in the Wikipedia infobox
- Summary
- Wikipedia article lead
Source notes (1)
- Wikipedia · Facts from the German Wikipedia article's infobox, translated into English with AI assistance, not checked against an investigation report. Independent review pending.