Pilot’s haunting final words before plane with mystery cargo onboard crashed into apartment block leaving 200 dead
Six years after the crash, the plane's mystery cargo was revealed
A PILOT’S chilling last words as he struggled to regain control of a plummeting Boeing 747 were: “Going down, going down.”
Two-hundred people died when two-legged cargo flight El Al 1862 crashed into a block of flats shortly after departing Amsterdam.
It was the deadliest aviation disaster to ever happen on Dutch soil.
The flight started at New York JFK Airport on October 4, 1992 and was supposed to end at the Israeli flag carrier’s hub at Tel Aviv Ben Gurion Airport, following a stopover at Amsterdam Schiphol (AMS).
But tragedy struck just seven minutes after the flight left Schiphol and two of the plane’s four engines fell from the right wing.
Witnesses on the ground heard a bang and saw falling debris, a trail of smoke, and a flash of fire as the jet ascended to 6,400 feet.
One of the engines had separated from the wing and damaged a wing slat before striking another engine and tearing it off, too.
The first officer, Arnon Ohad, radioed air traffic control and said: “Going down, 1862, going down, going down, copied, going down.”
Captain Yitzhak Fuchs was heard in the background instructing Ohad in Hebrew to raise the flaps and lower the landing gear.
The plane nose-dived from the sky and crashed into two high-rise apartment blocks in the Bijlmermeer neighbourhood of Amsterdam, at the corner of a building where two complexes met.
Dozens of apartments were destroyed when the plane exploded in a fireball and the building collapsed inward.
All four people on board the plane and at least 39 people on the ground died in the tragedy, although exact figures are impossible to know as many of the apartments’ residents were immigrants.
Police said they believed more than 200 people died.
One of the four crew members who died was a 23-year-old El Al employee who was travelling to Tel Aviv to be married.
Among the victims on the ground were the teenage children of Marlene and Stanley Truideman who were watching TV in their flat.
Marlene and Stanley had left their home just before the crash and watched in horror as the plane struck their building.
The crash led to 26 injuries, 11 of which required hospital treatment.
Six years after the crash, it was revealed that the plane’s mystery cargo included at least one of the ingredients needed to make the human-made chemical warfare nerve agent sarin – sparking theories about a potential cover-up.
Sarin is one of the most toxic nerve agents known to man.
Hundreds of local residents reported health problems following the crash including depression, listlessness, and respiratory problems.
Investigators found that the fused pins keeping two of the engine pylons in place had fatigue cracks due to overloading.
The government was condemned in a 1999 official report for failing to properly investigate the crash and initiate health checks.
World's Worst Air Disasters
Tenerife Airport Disaster, 1977
On March 27, 1977, on the island of Tenerife two Boeing 747 jets collided on the runway in the deadliest accident in aviation history.
The accident occurred as a result of heady mix bombings, organisational issues and fog.
A bomb explosion at the airport on Gran Canaria caused many flights to be diverted Los Rodeos Airport on the popular holiday island.
Among two of the flights affected were KLM Flight 4805 and Pan Am Flight 1736, neither would leave the island.
Tragedy struck due to radio miscommunication causing the Dutch plane to rocket down the runway at take-off speed while the US aircraft was taxing in the opposite direction.
The resulting collision resulted in the death of 583 people.
Malaysian Airlines 370, 2014
The MH370 Boeing was seen for the last time on military radar at 2.14am, close to the south of Phuket Island in the Strait of Malacca.
Half an hour later, the airline lost contact with the plane. It had been due to land at around 6.30am.
On July 29, 2015 – more than a year after the plane’s disappearance – debris was found by volunteers cleaning a beach in St Andre, Reunion.
A week later investigators confirmed the debris did belong to MH370, but it did not help to locate the plane as it had drifted in the water.
Theories abound about what happened to the missing jet but the true cause of the crash may never be known.
Malaysian Airlines 17, 2014
Flight MH17 was as passenger flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur that was shot down over eastern Ukraine on July 17 2014.
All passengers and crew perished putting the death toll at 298 in the deadliest case of “airliner shootdown” in history, 80 children was on board when it went down.
It was hit by a Russian made Buk surface to air missile fired from Ukrainian separatist held land near Donetsk.
Air France Flight 447, 2009
On June 1 2009 Air France Flight 447 disappeared off the radar off the coast of Brazil.
The airline took six hours to acknowledge the loss of the plane and no trace was found for days.
All 216 passengers and 12 crew were never seen again after the Rio to Paris flight crashed out of the sky.
Investigations went on to prove that the crash was caused by the pilot flying to high and stalling the engines causing the plane to fall out of the sky and into the Atlantic ocean.
Uruguayan Flight 571, 1972
The chartered Air Force plane carrying 45 people, including a Uruguayan rugby team, crashed in the Andes in South America.
More than a quarter of the passengers lost their lives on impact and a number of others quickly succumbed to the cold of the mountains or injuries sustained in the crash.
Of the 27 who survived the initial impact and cold a further eight were killed in an avalanche a few days after the incident.
Eventually 16 people were rescued after spending more than two months in the freezing conditions of the mountains.
But those survivors had been forced to eat the corpses of their fellow passengers when faced with starvation.
JAT Yugoslav Airlines Flight 367, 1972
The McDonnell Douglas DC-9-32 model aircraft was blown up by a bomb placed on board by Croatian fascist militant group the Ustase as it made its way back to Yugoslavia from Sweden.
All but one of the 28 passengers and crew died on the plane but one stewardess made it into the record books.
Lockerbie Bombing, 1988
Pan Am Flight 103 was flying from Frankfurt to Detroit via London and New York on 21 December 1988.
While over the Scottish town of Lockerbie a bomb was detonated aboard the flight, killing all passengers and crew.
Eleven of the town’s residents on the ground were also killed by falling debris, bringing the death toll to 270.
American Airlines Flight 191, 1979
Moments after take-off the left engine of Flight 191 from Chicago to Los Angeles fell off.
The plane rolled over upside down and smashed into a field near O’Hare international airport.
A firefighter on the scene was quoted as saying that not a single complete body was found.
