Crash of E-190 in Bwabwat

Embraer ERJ 190-100IGW (registration number C9-EMC, serial 581) was released in October 2012 (the first flight was made under test b / n PT-TGP). On November 1 of the same year, it was transferred to LAM Mozambique Airlines , in which it received the name Chaimite . Equipped with two General Electric CF34-10E5 turbofan engines . On the day of the disaster, it made 1877 take-off and landing cycles and flew 2905 hours ^{[1] [2]} .

The crew of flight TM470 was as follows:

• The commander of the aircraft (FAC) is the 49-year-old Erminho dos Santos Fernandes ( born Herminio dos Santos Fernandes ). 9052 hours flew, 2519 of them on the ERJ-190.
• The co - pilot - 24 years, flew 1183 hours, 101 of them on the ERJ-190.

Three cabin crew worked in the cabin . The crew also included aircraft.

Flight TM470 departed from Maputo at 11:26 AM CAT (09:26 UTC) and headed for Luanda. It was performed by the Embraer ERJ 190-100IGW on board the C9-EMC, on board were 27 passengers and 6 crew members. At about 11:09 UTC, when the liner was over the northern part of Namibia, the radio connection with the crew suddenly interrupted, then the liner began a slow decline and 7 minutes later, the mark of flight 470 disappeared from the radar screens. At the estimated time of landing in Luanda (15:10 CAT, 13:10 UTC), the plane did not land, and there were no reports of unplanned landings from any airport on route 470.

After 14:00, LAM Mozambique Airlines issued a press release stating that it had information that the TM470 flight had landed in Rundu, Namibia. Mozambique's airline and aviation authorities have tried to contact airport services to confirm or deny this information. On the evening of the same day, LAM Mozambique Airlines announced that it did not have data on the whereabouts of the aircraft.

The authorities of Namibia organized a search for the disappeared airliner (according to them, the plane crashed about 200 kilometers from Rundu, in the Bwabwat National Park, where there are many swamps and jungles).

The government of Mozambique, in turn, reported that flight 470 crashed in the border area between Namibia and Botswana , so searches were organized in both countries; however, the search was soon complicated by bad weather and darkness. On the next day of the search, November 30, the wreckage of flight TM470 was discovered in the territory of the Bvabvat National Park, all 33 people on board died (initially the media reported 34 dead).

The Directorate of Aircraft Accident Investigations Namibia (DAAI) commission investigates the cause of the TM470 flight crash.

According to the head of the commission, the weather conditions on the day of the disaster were good, flight 470 followed the route on the cruising level FL380 (11,600 meters), but then began to decline at a speed of more than 30 m / s and remained on the radar screens to an altitude of 180 meters. The location of the debris indicated that the liner after hitting the ground slipped over it several hundred meters, completely collapsed and burned down. Both flight recorders were found (speech was found on November 30, parametric - on December 3), they were sent to the NTSB for decryption.

On December 21, 2013, the Mozambique Civil Aviation Authority held a press conference at which it was announced that as a result of the analysis of data obtained from the flight recorders, it was found that only the crew commander was in the cockpit of TM470 flight during descent and collision with the ground and the cab door was locked.

The final report of the investigation was published on March 30, 2016.

According to the report, after the co-pilot of flight TM470 left the cockpit (went to the toilet), the FAC closed the cockpit door, then manually changed the autopilot settings (setting it to reduce the aircraft at a vertical speed of 30 m / s; the settings were changed 3 times) and turned the engine control levers to the “low gas” position (on the recording of the voice recorder, sounds and clicks were heard that were characteristic of the work of a person familiar with the operation of aircraft systems). According to the recorder, until the collision with the ground, the PIC did not take any actions in response to numerous warnings and alarms, and in the background there are knocking on the cockpit door and desperate screams of the co-pilot.

Subsequently, the Mozambique police found that the commander of Flight 470 dos Santos Fernandez suffered some emotional upheaval - his divorce proceedings lasted more than 10 years, his son died in a car accident in November 2012 similar to suicide (the commander was not present at his funeral), and his daughter was in the hospital after heart surgery.

The crash of flight 470 LAM Mozambique Airlines will be shown in the 20th season of the Canadian documentary television series Investigation of the crash .

• The crash of a Boeing 767 near Nantucket
• Accident ATR 42 near Agadir
• Accident A320 near Digne-les-Bains

• Description of the disaster on the Aviation Safety Network
• Final report - Directorate of Aircraft Accident Investigations Namibia (DAAI )
• LAM Mozambique Airlines - Index of press releases related to the crash
  • Voo TM 470 (Archive) (Port.)
  • FlightTM 470 (Archive )
• Embraer
  • COMUNICADO ( Archive ) November 30, 2013. (Port.)
  • COMMUNIQUÉ ( Archive ) November 30, 2013. (English)