1988 Sofia air accident
Hemus Air Yakovlev Yak-40 · Pilot error
From Vraždebna Airport, Sofia, Bulgaria to Varna Airport (VAR)
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
- 29 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- Unknown
- Occupants
- Unknown
- Survivors
- 8
- 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
- 8
- 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
Yakovlev Yak-40
- Aircraft type
- Yakovlev YAK-40
- 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
- LZ-DOK
- Operator
- Hemus Air
- Onboard fatalities
- 29
- Route
- From Vraždebna Airport, Sofia, BulgariaTo Varna Airport (VAR)
Approximate · Estimated position: Sofia Airport, the airport the Wikipedia article names as the site. Where on or near it is not known.
From the Wikipedia article
The 1988 Sofia air accident occurred on 2 August 1988, when the takeoff of a Hemus Air Yakovlev Yak-40 aircraft from Sofia's Vraždebna Airport failed and the aircraft plunged into a gorge. On board were 33 passengers and four crew members. Of them, 29 were killed in the accident and eight survived.
At the time of the accident, air traffic at Vraždebna Airport had been halted because a Bulgarian Air Force Tu-154 carrying the Bulgarian leader Todor Zhivkov was preparing to depart. That flight's departure was, however, delayed, whereupon the air traffic controller gave the Hemus Air flight to Varna clearance to depart, urging the crew to hurry. In the rush to depart, the crew forgot to set the horizontal stabilizer trim. It remained in the fully down position, when for takeoff it should have been set 2.5–3.5 degrees upwards. Thus the aircraft did not get airborne at all, but after the end of the runway continued along the ground, plunged into the gorge of the Iskăr river and caught fire.
Translated into English with AI assistance from the Finnish Wikipedia article “Sofian lento-onnettomuus 1988” (revision 23186200, 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
Finnish Wikipedia article: Sofian lento-onnettomuus 1988
- Translation
- Into English with AI assistance; names of linked operators and aircraft types from Wikidata. It may contain errors.
- Revision
- 23186200 · 2025-04-21 · retrieved 2026-09-19
- Wikidata
- Q42434799
- 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
- fi Wikipedia article "Sofian lento-onnettomuus 1988" (page 1414859, revision 23186200), translated into English with AI assistance
- Date
- Wikipedia infobox: date
- Place and country
- Wikipedia infobox: site
- Map position
- airport the Wikipedia infobox site links (Wikidata code, OurAirports)
- 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 is an airline according to Wikidata
- Fatalities
- Wikipedia infobox: aircraft fatalities
- Ground fatalities
- not stated in the Wikipedia infobox
- Summary
- Wikipedia article lead
Source notes (1)
- Wikipedia · Facts from the Finnish Wikipedia article's infobox, translated into English with AI assistance, not checked against an investigation report. Independent review pending.