Tu-22M3 crash in Olenegorsk
Russian Aerospace Forces Tupolev Tu-22M · Poor weather conditions, crew errors
From an unrecorded airport to Olenya
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
- 3 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- Unknown
- Occupants
- Unknown
- Survivors
- Unknown
- 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
- 1
- 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
Tupolev Tu-22M
- Aircraft type
- Tupolev TU-22
- 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
- № "35 кpacный"
- Operator
- Russian Aerospace Forces
- Onboard fatalities
- 3
- Route
- From not recordedTo Olenya
Approximate · Estimated position: Olenya airbase, the airport the Wikipedia article names as the site. Where on or near it is not known.
From the Wikipedia article
The Tu-22M3 crash in Olenegorsk was an aviation disaster involving a Tu-22M3 military aircraft that occurred on 22 January 2019 at Olenya air base.
Chronology of events
On 22 January 2019 at 13:40 Moscow time, during the approach to land at its home airfield Olenya on a heading of 185 degrees in bad weather (heavy snow), Tu-22M3 aircraft RF-94159 of the 40th Composite Aviation Regiment of the Long-Range Aviation of the Russian Aerospace Forces, which had a mock-up of a Kh-22 missile on board, crashed.
During the pre-landing descent the aircraft entered a dense snow squall, and the aircraft commander allowed a touchdown with increased g-load in the area of the runway threshold. After the hard contact (impact) of the main landing gear struts with the runway, the nose of the aircraft dropped sharply and the crew cabin practically separated from the fuselage, while the fuselage continued moving upward. When the nose of the aircraft touched the runway, the first explosion occurred at the point of the break (which completely separated the 2 parts of the aircraft), after which there was another explosion in the area of the nose landing gear strut. The crew did not carry out the flight director's commands to eject from the aircraft. Then the crew cabin overturned, fell to the ground and caught fire. The fuselage flipped over in the air and crashed onto the runway, where it continued moving and subsequently burned out. Together with the fuselage, the crew cabin came to a stop at the junction of the 2nd taxiway and the runway in an inverted position, approximately 500 metres from the runway threshold. Because of spilled kerosene and a shortage of airfield equipment, the fire at the airfield was extinguished after 1.5 hours.
Aftermath of the air crash
Of the 4 crew members on board, 3 people were killed: Aleksei Guryev (died at the Olenegorsk Central City Hospital), Konstantin Mazunin (killed on the spot), Viktor Greif (died at the air base medical unit).
Only one person survived — Maksim Anatolyevich Rylkov (who suffered multiple fractures, including of the ribs, and injuries to internal organs).
Investigation and cause
Investigation
According to preliminary data, the causes of the crash were:
An error in piloting technique.
Lack of preparedness for flying in these weather conditions.
Violation by the command of the requirements for flight control.
An error in the work of the landing radar group (GRP).
Unsatisfactory aviation technical support (ATO) of flights.
Translated into English with AI assistance from the Russian Wikipedia article “Авиакатастрофа Ту-22М3 в Оленегорске” (revision 155061673, 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
Russian Wikipedia article: Авиакатастрофа Ту-22М3 в Оленегорске
- Translation
- Into English with AI assistance; names of linked operators and aircraft types from Wikidata. It may contain errors.
- Revision
- 155061673 · 2026-09-14 · retrieved 2026-09-19
- Wikidata
- Q113411867
- 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
- ru Wikipedia article "Авиакатастрофа Ту-22М3 в Оленегорске" (page 9437913, revision 155061673), 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 coordinates)
- 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 infobox: summary
Source notes (1)
- Wikipedia · Facts from the Russian Wikipedia article's infobox, translated into English with AI assistance, not checked against an investigation report. Independent review pending.