An-12 crash at Negombo

The An-12 crash at Negombo was an aviation disaster that occurred on Friday, 24 March 2000. An An-12BK military transport aircraft of the airline "Antei" was operating cargo flight SCB 702 (for the airline Sky Cabs) on the Bangkok–Colombo route, but while approaching to land at Colombo airport in difficult weather conditions it made two unsuccessful approaches, and during the third approach it crashed onto Negombo (a suburb of Colombo) due to sudden fuel exhaustion and engine failure. The crash killed 9 people — 6 of the 8 people on board the aircraft (7 crew members and 1 passenger) and 3 people on the ground.

Chronology of events

On 24 March 2000, An-12BK RA-11302 operated flight SCB 701 — at 01:10 (SLST, corresponding to UTC+6:00) it departed Colombo (Sri Lanka) and at 08:20 (UTC+7:00) landed in Bangkok (Thailand); the flight was normal and uneventful. The aircraft was then to operate the return flight SCB 702 — from Bangkok to Colombo. Flight 702's stopover in Bangkok lasted 4 hours 20 minutes. The aircraft's fuel tanks contained 8300 kilograms of fuel, but later it was refuelled with another 6681 kilograms of aviation fuel, and in total 14,981 kilograms of Jet A-1 aviation fuel turned out to have been put into its fuel tanks. Also boarding the aircraft was 1 passenger accompanying the cargo — 51-year-old Elpage Sebastian Jayasiri Gunasekera (Elpage Sebastian Jayasiri Gunasekera), an employee of the airline Sky Cabs.

Before departure the pilots of Flight 702 received a weather report according to which the weather along the entire route was favourable. Ibrahim Nasir Airport in Malé (Maldives) was chosen as the alternate airport. The estimated flight time was 5 hours 20 minutes, and the estimated time of arrival in Colombo was 16:30 (UTC+5:30). At 12:40 (UTC+7:00) flight SCB 702 departed Bangkok; on board were 7 crew members, 1 accompanying passenger and 13,428 kilograms of cargo (clothing). The aircraft's total take-off weight was 62,804 kilograms, which was 1804 kilograms more than the maximum take-off weight (61,000 kilograms) specified in the An-12 flight manual; when choosing between loading the aircraft with cargo and fuelling it, preference was given to the cargo. The weather on 24 March at Bandaranaike Airport was as follows — at 13:10 the main thunderstorm front began to spread actively over land and by 15:10 had spread over the entire eastern sector of the airport.

At 16:16 the crew of Flight 702 contacted Colombo ATC, where they received the latest weather report for Bandaranaike Airport. At 16:40 the controller passed the pilots a storm warning valid until 20:15 (it spoke of thunderstorms) and instructed them to switch to the approach controller — 34-year-old Sanjaya Chandimal Disapathige (Sanjaya Chandimal Disapathige). By 17:00 the entire Bandaranaike Airport (except the western and north-western sectors) was covered by the thunderstorm, and visibility had dropped to 1000 metres, but at 17:50 it improved to 2000 metres. From 17:00 to 18:00 there was severe thunderstorm activity and a downpour at Bandaranaike Airport, which lasted a little over 1 hour. The wind at times reached a maximum speed of 37 km/h.

The approach controller asked the pilots of Flight 702 for their distance and gave clearance to descend and approach runway No. 04; there were some difficulties in the communications between the crew and the approach controller because the pilots did not know English very well. Two attempts to land using the instrument landing system on runway No. 04 were unsuccessful because of the downpour and pilot fatigue. The crew began a third approach, this time on the reciprocal course and onto runway No. 22, but while performing this turn (and while proceeding to the point of the fourth turn) the aircraft suddenly ran out of fuel and all 4 engines stopped, their propellers began to feather, and after that the aircraft went into a controlled glide. At 18:04, while descending, flight SCB 702 began to clip the tops of coconut palms, and first the left wing was torn off (on impact it broke into several pieces even before hitting the ground), then the right wing was torn off (it remained intact after separating from the fuselage), then all 4 engines were torn off (having separated from the wings, they fell in four different places), and then the nose section with the cockpit. After that the remaining part of the fuselage, with the tail section still attached, crashed onto houses in Negombo (a suburb of Colombo) 2.2 kilometres north-northwest of Bandaranaike Airport.

From the impact with the coconut palms and the ground the aircraft was completely destroyed. Two localised fires broke out at the crash site — the first in a wing fuel tank and the second in the auxiliary power unit (APU), but they were not severe and went out by themselves. On board flight SCB 702, 6 people were killed — 5 crew members (the navigator, flight engineer, radio operator, loadmaster and maintenance engineer) and the passenger accompanying the cargo; …