Disappearance of DC-3 ECT-025
Kurfiss Aviation Douglas DC-3 · Unknown
From Cuatro Vientos Airport, Madrid, Spain to Perpignan Airport, Perpignan, France (Stopover), Frankfurt Airport, Frankfurt, West Germany
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
- Unknown
- 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
- General aviation
Douglas DC-3
- Aircraft type
- Douglas DC-3
- 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
- ECT-025
- Operator
- Kurfiss Aviation
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Cuatro Vientos Airport, Madrid, SpainTo Perpignan Airport, Perpignan, France (Stopover), Frankfurt Airport, Frankfurt, West Germany
Cause areas
- 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 disappearance of Kurfiss Aviation DC-3 ECT-025 refers to a private civil flight that went missing in Spanish airspace, operated by a Douglas DC-3 (C-47A-35-DK) aircraft with registration ECT-025, belonging to the German company Kurfiss Aviation. The aircraft carried a crew of two, the pilot, Harold William Whitaker, a retired American serviceman, and the co-pilot Lawrence Jerôme Eckmann, a lieutenant colonel of the United States Air Force.
Investigation and cause
Investigation
From the moment its disappearance was confirmed, a search and rescue operation was launched and carried out, involving an Aviocar of the Spanish Air Force Rescue Service and a helicopter of the 803 Squadron, which combed the Catalan coast between Barcelona and the Spanish-French border, although both the location of the aircraft's wreckage and the causes of the accident remain unknown.
The Spanish organisation Civil Aviation Accident and Incident Investigation Commission (CIAIAC), the official national body responsible for investigating aviation accidents occurring within Spanish territory, concluded that it was possible that the aircraft had fallen into the Mediterranean Sea, its wreckage sinking.
Translated into English with AI assistance from the Spanish Wikipedia article “Desaparición del DC-3 ECT-025” (revision 159889621, 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
Spanish Wikipedia article: Desaparición del DC-3 ECT-025
- Translation
- Into English with AI assistance; names of linked operators and aircraft types from Wikidata. It may contain errors.
- Revision
- 159889621 · 2024-05-03 · retrieved 2026-09-19
- Wikidata
- Q16556261
- 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
- es Wikipedia article "Desaparición del DC-3 ECT-025" (page 6244536, revision 159889621), translated into English with AI assistance
- Date
- Wikipedia infobox: date
- Place and country
- Wikipedia infobox: site; country from Wikidata (P17)
- 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
- Reviewed correction (2026-09-26): The flight is described as a private civil flight by a company's DC-3: general aviation. The article: "refers to a private civil flight that went missing in Spanish airspace"
- Fatalities
- not stated in the Wikipedia infobox
- Ground fatalities
- not stated in the Wikipedia infobox
- Summary
- Wikipedia infobox: summary
Source notes (1)
- Wikipedia · Facts from the Spanish Wikipedia article's infobox, translated into English with AI assistance, not checked against an investigation report. Independent review pending.