1985 Colombian Air Force Douglas DC-6 accident
Douglas DC-6B · The 1985 Colombian Air Force Douglas DC-6 accident occurred on 24 July 1985
From Alfredo Vásquez Cobo International Airport (LET) to El Dorado International Airport (BOG)
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
- 80 · 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
- Military
Douglas DC-6B
- Aircraft type
- Douglas DC-6
- 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
- FAC-902
- Operator
- Colombian Air Force
- Onboard fatalities
- 80
- Route
- From Alfredo Vásquez Cobo International Airport (LET)To El Dorado International Airport (BOG)
Cause areas
- Aircraft › Aircraft power plant
- Not determined › Not determined
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 1985 Colombian Air Force Douglas DC-6 accident occurred on 24 July 1985. On that day, a Douglas DC-6B of the Colombian Air Force crashed while carrying fare-paying passengers on a domestic scheduled flight from Leticia to Bogotá, thereby replacing an Avianca aircraft that had remained on the ground due to a pilots' strike. All 80 people on board were killed in the accident.
Accident sequence
Due to a pilots' strike at Avianca, SAM Colombia and Helicol, civil air traffic in Colombia was paralysed. The Colombian Air Force thereupon deployed transport aircraft on domestic flights to ensure commercial passenger air service. The DC-6 took off from Leticia Airport at 16:47. Shortly afterwards it flew through a rainstorm, when the captain suddenly, about 15 minutes after takeoff, detected a fire on engine No. 3 (right inboard) and declared an emergency. On the way back to Leticia Airport the fire spread to the wing. The aircraft then went out of control and crashed into the jungle, killing all 80 occupants.
Investigation and cause
Cause
The cause of the failure and fire of engine No. 3 could not be determined.
Some passengers who had previously flown on the aircraft reported that it had been in poor condition. A passenger who had disembarked in Apiay reported that the DC-6's engine had sounded like the engine of a semi-trailer truck, and that the engine had been smoking and leaking oil. The aircraft was said to have been repaired in Apiay and the pilots were said to have been advised not to take off.
Translated into English with AI assistance from the German Wikipedia article “Flugunfall einer Douglas DC-6 der kolumbianischen Luftwaffe 1985” (revision 253555571, 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 einer Douglas DC-6 der kolumbianischen Luftwaffe 1985
- Translation
- Into English with AI assistance; names of linked operators and aircraft types from Wikidata. It may contain errors.
- Revision
- 253555571 · 2025-02-22 · retrieved 2026-09-19
- Wikidata
- Q123053481
- 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 einer Douglas DC-6 der kolumbianischen Luftwaffe 1985" (page 12785917, revision 253555571), 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
- operator named as an armed force or military unit in the infobox
- 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.