Vénissieux air accident of 22 August 1938

On 22 August 1938 two Amiot 143 bombers of the 35ème Escadre d'observation collided directly above Vénissieux during a night exercise, killing all six crew members.

The accident

At 21:00 on Monday 22 August 1938 the Amiot 143 bombers of the 35ème Escadre d'observation, stationed at air base 105 Lyon-Bron, were conducting a series of exercises involving alternating night takeoffs and landings on the airport's runways. This exercise was being followed by many people, who watched the movements of the aircraft, which were fitted with regulation fixed green and red position lights. The takeoffs and landings followed one another without problems until the lights of two aircraft were noticed entering a high-speed collision course. At 22:05 the two aircraft collided in flight directly above the present-day car park of the Parilly racecourse, on the boundaries of the communes of Bron-Saint-Priest-Vénissieux.

Amiot 143 n.120, ripped open by the collision, lost the rear part of the fuselage with the tail unit, which fell onto the edge of the roof of a house in rue des Sports in Saint-Priest that was home to six children, while the fuselage fell two hundred metres further on and caught fire. The point of impact of the aircraft's fall was about fifty metres from the high-voltage electrical transformer station of the Société de Transport d'Electricité des Alpes (STEDA) at Vénissieux-Parilly, at the start of avenue Pierre Mendès France, on the Parc de Parilly side.

The bomber's crew consisted of Lieutenant Pierre Brunet, aircraft commander, 29, a native of Ainay-le-Château in the Allier, with 600 flight hours, Second Lieutenant Louis Blugeon, pilot, 38, from Mohon in the Ardennes, married and father of two children, with 250 flight hours, of which 184 at night, and Sergeant Sabot, gunner, 22, with 248 flight hours.

Amiot 143 n.51 caught fire in flight, losing an engine on the other side of avenue Pierre Mendès France, before crashing to the ground two hundred metres further on, on the left side of rue du Dauphiné in Saint-Priest. Only the tail unit and the rudder escaped the flames, which destroyed the aircraft.

The aircraft's crew was made up as follows: Second Lieutenant Pierre Delaye, aircraft commander, 25, a native of Lyon, with 900 flight hours, Warrant Officer Gaston Capdeville, pilot-instructor, 31, a native of Paris, with 1852 flight hours, and Sergeant André Dorè, pilot, 23, from Nancy in Meurthe-et-Moselle, with 686 flight hours.

Fire-service vehicles and rescue equipment, as well as the ambulances of the Bron air base, were immediately sent to the scene of the tragedy. Two large fires guided the rescue teams, who were joined by the Lyon firefighters. None of the airmen survived.

The bodies of the six servicemen were taken to the mortuary of the "Desgenettes" military hospital in Lyon. A religious service was held in the Primatial Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist and Saint Stephen in Lyon on Thursday 25 August, followed by a military ceremony in the cathedral square in the presence of the civil and military authorities.