Llandow air disaster
Encyclopedia
The Llandow air disaster was an aircraft accident in Wales in 1950. At that time it was the world's worst air disaster with a total of 80 fatalities. The aircraft, an Avro Tudor V, had been privately hired to fly rugby union enthusiasts to and from an international game in Ireland; and the crash, which was caused by a stall, happened on the return flight.
Star Girl owned by Airflight Limited
and being operated under the "Fairflight" name, took off from Dublin Airport
in Ireland, on a private passenger flight to Llandow aerodrome
in South Wales
. The aircraft had 78 passengers and 5 crew on the manifest. The flight had been chartered privately for a trip to Belfast to watch the Welsh rugby union team
compete against the Irish in the Five Nations Championship at the Ravenhill Stadium
. The aircraft had been initially booked for 72 passengers, but the plane had been stripped to accommodate another six.
The weather conditions were clear, and on the outboard journey aboard the same craft no incidents were reported.
Eye-witnesses (including police constable John Davies) state that at 3:05 pm the Avro Tudor was approaching runway 28 of Llandow aerodrome at an abnormally low altitude with the undercarriage
down. The pilot attempted to correct the descent by increasing the power of the engines and brought the plane up. The aircraft rose steeply to 100 m (300 ft) attaining a nose-up attitude of 35 degrees to the vertical, and then the aircraft stalled
.
Star Girl plummeted towards the ground with the right wingtip hitting the ground first, followed in turn by the plane's nose and left wing, which separated from the fuselage
when it made contact. The plane turned clockwise and finally came to a rest near a field beside Park Farm close to the small hamlet
of Sigingstone
(or Sigginstone). There was no explosion on impact or ground fire.
Two passengers who were sitting in additional seats bolted in at the back of the tail section
walked away unaided, and a third man, who was in the bathroom and knocked unconscious at the time of the crash, survived but was in hospital for four months. Eight more survivors of the initial impact would die later in hospital of their injuries, bringing the final death toll to 80, 75 passengers and all five crew.
The 13 March 1950 edition of "The New York Times' reported thus:
"London, 12 March—Eighty men and women were killed in Wales today in an aeroplane crash, the worst disaster in the history of aviation. Three men survived. The death toll eclipsed the previous record for aeroplanes, set last 2 Nov., when a fighter plane rammed an airliner near the National Airport in Washington, causing the deaths of fifty-five persons. It also exceeded the toll of seventy-three dead in the loss of the United States Navy dirigible Akron off Barnegat, N. J., on 4 April 1933. The eighty persons lost in Wales went to their destruction in a type of aircraft—the British Avro Tudor—that had already caused fifty-four fatalities and had been banned from passenger service on Britain's publicly owned international airlines."
Akron
in 1933. On 20 December 1952, 86 lives were lost when a U.S. military Douglas C-124 Globemaster II went down near Moses Lake, Washington
. As far as civilian passenger craft deaths, the Avro disaster resulted in the highest loss of lives until 128 died in the 1956 Grand Canyon mid-air collision
. The Tudor's single plane death toll was the highest on record until 12 August 1958, when a KLM Super Constellation went down off Ireland
, claiming 99 lives.
the Ministry of Civil Aviation announced that the probable cause of the accident was the loading of the aircraft, which had moved the centre of gravity
considerably aft of where it should have been, thus reducing the effectiveness of the elevators
.
. Llanharan RFC
lost six members of their playing team. Both clubs remember the victims with symbolism on their club badges.
On 25 March in the final game of the 1950 Championship against France
at the Cardiff Arms Park
, the crowd stood in silence while five buglers sounded a Last Post
tribute to the memory of the supporters who had died in the plane crash.
Course of events
On 12 March 1950, an Avro 689 Tudor VAvro Tudor
Avro's Type 688 Tudor was a British piston-engined airliner based on their four-engine Lincoln bomber, itself a descendant of the famous Lancaster heavy bomber, and was Britain's first pressurised airliner...
Star Girl owned by Airflight Limited
Airflight
Airflight Limited was a British charter, and cargo airline from 1948 to 1950.- History :The airline was formed by former Air Vice-Marshall Don Bennett to operate in the Berlin Airlift operating two long-fuselage Avro Tudor aircraft. These were flown by Bennett and a single other pilot...
and being operated under the "Fairflight" name, took off from Dublin Airport
Dublin Airport
Dublin Airport, , is operated by the Dublin Airport Authority. Located in Collinstown, in the Fingal part of County Dublin, 18.4 million passengers passed through the airport in 2010, making it the busiest airport in the Republic of Ireland, followed by Cork and Shannon...
in Ireland, on a private passenger flight to Llandow aerodrome
RAF Llandow
RAF Llandow was a Royal Air Force airfield situated near the village of Llandow, Vale of Glamorgan, South Wales, 15 miles west of Cardiff. It opened in 1940 and closed in 1957....
in South Wales
South Wales
South Wales is an area of Wales bordered by England and the Bristol Channel to the east and south, and Mid Wales and West Wales to the north and west. The most densely populated region in the south-west of the United Kingdom, it is home to around 2.1 million people and includes the capital city of...
. The aircraft had 78 passengers and 5 crew on the manifest. The flight had been chartered privately for a trip to Belfast to watch the Welsh rugby union team
Wales national rugby union team
The Wales national rugby union team represent Wales in international rugby union tournaments. They compete annually in the Six Nations Championship with England, France, Ireland, Italy and Scotland. Wales have won the Six Nations and its predecessors 24 times outright, second only to England with...
compete against the Irish in the Five Nations Championship at the Ravenhill Stadium
Ravenhill Stadium
Ravenhill Stadium is located in Belfast, Northern Ireland. It is used by Ulster Rugby. It has a normal capacity of 12,300 and is owned by the Irish Rugby Football Union.-History:The grounds were opened in the 1923/24 season...
. The aircraft had been initially booked for 72 passengers, but the plane had been stripped to accommodate another six.
The weather conditions were clear, and on the outboard journey aboard the same craft no incidents were reported.
Eye-witnesses (including police constable John Davies) state that at 3:05 pm the Avro Tudor was approaching runway 28 of Llandow aerodrome at an abnormally low altitude with the undercarriage
Undercarriage
The undercarriage or landing gear in aviation, is the structure that supports an aircraft on the ground and allows it to taxi, takeoff and land...
down. The pilot attempted to correct the descent by increasing the power of the engines and brought the plane up. The aircraft rose steeply to 100 m (300 ft) attaining a nose-up attitude of 35 degrees to the vertical, and then the aircraft stalled
Stall (flight)
In fluid dynamics, a stall is a reduction in the lift coefficient generated by a foil as angle of attack increases. This occurs when the critical angle of attack of the foil is exceeded...
.
Star Girl plummeted towards the ground with the right wingtip hitting the ground first, followed in turn by the plane's nose and left wing, which separated from the fuselage
Fuselage
The fuselage is an aircraft's main body section that holds crew and passengers or cargo. In single-engine aircraft it will usually contain an engine, although in some amphibious aircraft the single engine is mounted on a pylon attached to the fuselage which in turn is used as a floating hull...
when it made contact. The plane turned clockwise and finally came to a rest near a field beside Park Farm close to the small hamlet
Hamlet (place)
A hamlet is usually a rural settlement which is too small to be considered a village, though sometimes the word is used for a different sort of community. Historically, when a hamlet became large enough to justify building a church, it was then classified as a village...
of Sigingstone
Sigingstone
Sigingstone is a small hamlet in the Vale of Glamorgan, Wales.It mainly consists of residential housing and two small working farms. There are two roads - one leading to the two nearby towns Llantwit Major and Cowbridge, and the other to Llanmihangel. It also has an 19th Century public house,...
(or Sigginstone). There was no explosion on impact or ground fire.
Two passengers who were sitting in additional seats bolted in at the back of the tail section
Empennage
The empennage , also known as the tail or tail assembly, of most aircraft gives stability to the aircraft, in a similar way to the feathers on an arrow...
walked away unaided, and a third man, who was in the bathroom and knocked unconscious at the time of the crash, survived but was in hospital for four months. Eight more survivors of the initial impact would die later in hospital of their injuries, bringing the final death toll to 80, 75 passengers and all five crew.
The 13 March 1950 edition of "The New York Times' reported thus:
"London, 12 March—Eighty men and women were killed in Wales today in an aeroplane crash, the worst disaster in the history of aviation. Three men survived. The death toll eclipsed the previous record for aeroplanes, set last 2 Nov., when a fighter plane rammed an airliner near the National Airport in Washington, causing the deaths of fifty-five persons. It also exceeded the toll of seventy-three dead in the loss of the United States Navy dirigible Akron off Barnegat, N. J., on 4 April 1933. The eighty persons lost in Wales went to their destruction in a type of aircraft—the British Avro Tudor—that had already caused fifty-four fatalities and had been banned from passenger service on Britain's publicly owned international airlines."
Fatalities
The death toll of 80 exceeded the previous aviation fatality total, which was the 73 lives lost on the U.S. Navy dirigibleAirship
An airship or dirigible is a type of aerostat or "lighter-than-air aircraft" that can be steered and propelled through the air using rudders and propellers or other thrust mechanisms...
Akron
USS Akron (ZRS-4)
USS Akron was a helium-filled rigid airship of the United States Navy that was lost in a weather-related accident off the New Jersey coast early on April 4, 1933, killing 73 of the 76 crew and passengers on board...
in 1933. On 20 December 1952, 86 lives were lost when a U.S. military Douglas C-124 Globemaster II went down near Moses Lake, Washington
Moses Lake, Washington
Moses Lake is a city in Grant County, Washington, United States. The population was 20,366 as of the 2010 census. Moses Lake is the largest city in Grant County.-Background:...
. As far as civilian passenger craft deaths, the Avro disaster resulted in the highest loss of lives until 128 died in the 1956 Grand Canyon mid-air collision
1956 Grand Canyon mid-air collision
The 1956 Grand Canyon mid-air collision occurred on Saturday, June 30, 1956 at 10:30 AM Pacific Standard Time when a United Airlines passenger airliner struck a Trans World Airlines airliner over the Grand Canyon in Arizona, resulting in the crash of both planes and 128 fatalities...
. The Tudor's single plane death toll was the highest on record until 12 August 1958, when a KLM Super Constellation went down off Ireland
KLM Flight 607-E
KLM Flight 607-E, also known as Hugo de Groot, registration PH-LKM, was a Lockheed Super Constellation which crashed 180 kilometres west of Shannon, Ireland on August 14, 1958. All 99 on board died in the accident, including six members of the Egyptian fencing team...
, claiming 99 lives.
Investigation
After a court of enquiry chaired by William McNair KCQueen's Counsel
Queen's Counsel , known as King's Counsel during the reign of a male sovereign, are lawyers appointed by letters patent to be one of Her [or His] Majesty's Counsel learned in the law...
the Ministry of Civil Aviation announced that the probable cause of the accident was the loading of the aircraft, which had moved the centre of gravity
Center of mass
In physics, the center of mass or barycenter of a system is the average location of all of its mass. In the case of a rigid body, the position of the center of mass is fixed in relation to the body...
considerably aft of where it should have been, thus reducing the effectiveness of the elevators
Elevator (aircraft)
Elevators are flight control surfaces, usually at the rear of an aircraft, which control the aircraft's orientation by changing the pitch of the aircraft, and so also the angle of attack of the wing. In simplified terms, they make the aircraft nose-up or nose-down...
.
Memorial
Amongst those who died were three members of Abercarn Rugby Football ClubAbercarn RFC
Abercarn Rugby Football Club are a Welsh rugby union club based in Abercarn near the city of Newport. They currently play in the Welsh Rugby Union Division 4 East having been relegated in two consecutive seasons; from Division 3 East in 2007 and Division 4 East in 2008. The club then immediately...
. Llanharan RFC
Llanharan RFC
Llanharn Rugby Football Club is a rugby union club based in Llanharan, South Wales. Llanharan RFC were formally established in 1891-92 when Llanharan was little more than an agricultural hamlet. The earliest photograph on the club house wall is dated 1898...
lost six members of their playing team. Both clubs remember the victims with symbolism on their club badges.
On 25 March in the final game of the 1950 Championship against France
France national rugby union team
The France national rugby union team represents France in rugby union. They compete annually against England, Ireland, Italy, Scotland and Wales in the Six Nations Championship. They have won the championship outright sixteen times, shared it a further eight times, and have completed nine grand slams...
at the Cardiff Arms Park
Cardiff Arms Park
Cardiff Arms Park , also known as The Arms Park, is primarily known as a rugby union stadium, but it also has a bowling green, and is situated in the centre of Cardiff, Wales. The Arms Park was host to the British Empire and Commonwealth Games in 1958, and hosted four games in the 1991 Rugby World...
, the crowd stood in silence while five buglers sounded a Last Post
Last Post
The "Last Post" can be either a B♭ bugle call within British Infantry regiments or an E♭ cavalry trumpet call in British Cavalry and Royal Regiment of Artillery used at Commonwealth military funerals and ceremonies commemorating those who have been killed in war.The two regimental traditions have...
tribute to the memory of the supporters who had died in the plane crash.
External links
- South Wales Police, Official Report
- South Wales Police Museum - crash narrative and photographs of the aftermath
- Rugby Relics Museum site
- "After the Game", TIME, 20 March 1950 – brief article includes eyewitness descriptions and survivor names
- Sigingstone Memorial – plaque dedicated in 1990 on 40th anniversary of the air disaster
- Photographs related to the accident at FlickrFlickrFlickr is an image hosting and video hosting website, web services suite, and online community that was created by Ludicorp in 2004 and acquired by Yahoo! in 2005. In addition to being a popular website for users to share and embed personal photographs, the service is widely used by bloggers to...
. Robert Ephgrave photostream. Retrieved 10 October 2009