[[Category:February 1988 in Europe]]
[[Category:February 1988 in Europe]]
[[Category:Airliner accidents and incidents caused by lightning strikes]]
[[Category:Airliner accidents and incidents caused by lightning strikes]]
[[Category:Airliner accidents and incidents caused by pilot error]]
[[Category:1988 disasters in Germany]]
[[Category:1988 disasters in Germany]]
1988 aviation accident in West Germany
Nürnberger Flugdienst Flight 108 was a scheduled regional flight which crashed near Essen, West Germany, on 8 February 1988 with the loss of all 21 occupants. The flight was operated by Swearingen SA-227AC Metroliner III D-CABB for Nürnberger Flugdienst, from Hannover Airport to Düsseldorf Airport. It is the deadliest aviation accident involving the Swearingen Fairchild Metroliner.
The Swearingen SA-227AC Metro III involved in the accident was 6 years old. It had the manufacturing number AC-500 and was equipped with two Garrett TPE-331-11U-601G. This aircraft had 9184 total flight hours.[1]
The captain was Ralf Borsdorf, 36, with 2473 total flight hours, 277 of those hours were on the Metroliner. The first officer was Sibylle Heilmann, 29. She had 2544 total flight hours, with 1344 being on the Metroliner.[2]: 11–13
The aircraft took off from Hannover Airport at 07:15, and was on approach to runway 24 at Düsseldorf Airport. By 7:50 am, the crew had flown into a thunderstorm. At 07:55:55, both flight recorders abruptly stopped recording and the aircraft disappeared from secondary radar.
The aircraft then entered a dive, before briefly recovering, likely after seeing the ground, before diving again. They then flew into the clouds before breaking up and crashing at 07:58.[2][3]
The investigation revealed that the aircraft had been hit by lightning during the approach to Düsseldorf Airport, which disrupted the electrical system and therefore the flight instruments. The pilots became disorientated and blindly entered a high speed descent. Witnesses on the ground described the plane as coming out of the clouds briefly and entering a climb, which suggested that the crew briefly regained orientation of the aircraft upon seeing the ground. However, once it re-entered the clouds the crew likely became disoriented again. After almost 2 minutes of “predominantly uncontrolled flight,” one of the trailing edge flaps (which could not be retracted without electrical power) failed due to overloading, sending the aircraft into an unrecoverable spiral during which it disintegrated in mid-air.[2]
The crash was featured in season 26, episode 3 of the Canadian documentary series Mayday, also known as Air Crash Investigation, titled “A Perfect Storm”.[4]
