Spot where plane went down in woods in south WarsawTwenty four years ago today, the LOT Polish Airlines passenger plane ‘Tadeusz Kosciuszko’ crashed into woods near Warsaw, after an engine explosion, killing all 173 people on board.
The captain, Zygmunt Pawlaczyk, who had thirty-two years of experience under his belt, maintained a collected, focused demeanour until the last.
His parting words were: “Bye, we're dying.”
The Tadeusz Kosciuszko, which took off from Warsaw on the morning of 9 May, 1987, was set to fly to New York. 155 Poles were on board, and 17 Americans.
However, 23 minutes after take-off, an explosion occurred, and the crew was compelled to attempt an emergency landing.
The pilot tried to return to Warsaw, but minutes before arrival, he lost control of the craft, which began a nosedive into the Kabacki Forest. There were no survivors, and at 183 people, the number of victims remains the largest air catastrophe in Polish aviation history.
The reasons for the crash were engine failure and loss of flight controls, according to the official Polish investigation.
With the Iron Curtain still in place, it was obligatory that all Polish planes were Russian, in this case an Ilyushin II-62M, and the crash prompted an intense stand-off between Polish and Russian aviation authorities, although this was not widely aired at the time.
The Poles held that there was a defective mechanism in the engine, resulting in high risk if not replaced after extended use.
The persistence of Polish investigators ultimately resulted in a series of construction improvements to the Russian model. (nh/pg)