Tragedy of Aeroflot Flight 593
When Aeroflot Flight 593 to Hong Kong encountered an unexpected crisis, the pilots son, a 15-year-old, found himself at the controls. This gripping episode dives into the chaos that unfolded, the pilot's errors, and the autopilot failure that led to a tragic aviation disaster.
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TVTranscript
00:00A Russian flight to Hong Kong is in serious trouble.
00:16Gravity has become a deadly force as the crew fights to keep the plane from falling to earth
00:20from 10,000 metres.
00:24The cause of all the chaos, a 15-year-old is at the controls.
00:40We are in an emergency.
01:03It's a family outing.
01:05A proud pilot taking his kids on their first trip abroad.
01:09But in just a few minutes, their vacation will turn into a terrifying fight for their lives.
01:25Hold the control column. Just hold it.
01:29Investigators would be amazed.
01:32How did a 15-year-old kid end up in the pilot's seat flying a brand new passenger aircraft?
01:41The other way. Back.
01:50March the 22nd, 1994. Moscow.
01:5515-year-old Eldar Kudrinsky is going abroad for the first time.
01:59He needs every gadget he has.
02:05But this is no ordinary kid. Eldar's father is Captain Yaroslav Kudrinsky, an international airline pilot.
02:12In Russia, that means membership of a privileged group and access to luxuries most of the country can only dream of.
02:26The plane is here. Now we can take off.
02:31Aeroflot allows pilots' families to travel once a year at a discount.
02:35So Captain Kudrinsky is taking his children on a four-day holiday to Hong Kong.
02:42Anybody would think we're going for a year.
02:45Where is your daughter?
02:47Listening to the music in the car.
02:49By the time they're our age, these kids are going to be deaf.
02:53What?
02:54Deaf.
02:55Pardon?
02:56Captain Vladimir Makarov, Volodya to his friends, is an aeroflot pilot too.
03:01He's also going to Hong Kong on holiday and will be keeping an eye on the kids during the flight.
03:07Mrs. Kudrinsky is only going as far as the airport to see them off.
03:11Eldar, Yana, promise you'll call as soon as you get there.
03:16Volodya, you will make them call me?
03:19Um, yeah.
03:21We'll call as soon as we can, OK?
03:23Come on, come on, come on.
03:32Yaroslav and I love to travel, and so do the kids.
03:37They love seeing new places, learning new things.
03:43There was a chance for them to come along with their father, and they jumped at it.
03:54Eldar and Yana aren't the only ones boarding flight 593.
03:58Most of the 63 passengers are businessmen from Hong Kong and Taiwan,
04:03looking for opportunities in the new Russia.
04:07Others, like Adrian Deville, have come from London flying aeroflot
04:11because it offers a cheap connection to Asia.
04:13He's the manager of a camera shop in northern England and has a passion for aircraft.
04:18In fact, he's going on a two-week holiday to Hong Kong
04:21to photograph the new airport they've just built.
04:27He'd go as far as he could.
04:29If he thought there was a good airport somewhere in the world,
04:32he'd try his best to get to that airport just to go and make some nice photographs.
04:38And the trip to Hong Kong grew from that
04:41because he wanted to see this brand-new airport,
04:44which was a feat of engineering at the time.
04:48Mark Newport is a British sports promoter who lives in Hong Kong.
04:53Mark was in the army, was in the forces,
04:56and he went to Hong Kong and he just loved it and got married out there.
05:05He chose an aeroflot, and I'd never heard of it until then
05:08because it was just a cheap flight home.
05:12In 1994, Russia is in a state of great change.
05:16Three years earlier, the old Soviet Union finally collapsed.
05:20A new Russia is bursting out from behind the torn iron curtain.
05:25Its people want the freedoms of the West,
05:28the lifestyle, the international travel.
05:33But Russia's state-owned airline, Aeroflot, is getting a makeover too.
05:37They struggle to buy five new aircraft from the company Airbus Industry,
05:41the $70 million state-of-the-art Airbus A310-300.
05:50Though it seats fewer than 200 passengers,
05:53it can fly three times further than any of Russia's biggest passenger aircraft.
05:57The A310 is a fully automated aircraft
06:00equipped with sophisticated fail-safe systems.
06:03Aeroflot hopes it will help improve the company's checkered safety reputation.
06:08Any time there is a national carrier supported by their particular government,
06:13if that government is in turmoil,
06:15whether it's financially or political turmoil,
06:19it affects everything that's associated with that core government.
06:23Aeroflot is a national carrier,
06:25and so there's always the perception that they may not be able to fly.
06:29Aeroflot has created a new, prestigious division around the Airbus fleet,
06:33Russian international airlines.
06:37Pilots wear special uniforms,
06:39they fly state-of-the-art planes,
06:41and travel to the world's top destinations.
06:45The Aeroflot team is the only one in the world
06:48to have a full-fledged aircraft carrier.
06:51It's the only company in the world
06:53to have a full-fledged aircraft carrier.
06:56Pilots wear special uniforms,
06:58they fly state-of-the-art planes,
07:00and travel to the world's top destinations.
07:03RIA represents a new, modern Russia to the world.
07:08After the collapse of the Soviet Union,
07:11Aeroflot, still controlled by government,
07:15was forced to look for profits
07:19and develop a network which would be commercially justified.
07:25Aeroflot is an elite corps of first-class pilots.
07:28Each of them has thousands of hours of flying time,
07:31impeccable safety records, and fluent English.
07:34They're given special training
07:36by the manufacturers of the aircraft, Airbus industry.
07:42The airline had around 3,000 pilots at that time.
07:46Only 16 men were to be sent to be trained first.
07:50Only the best of the best made it.
07:56Kudrinsky and I started working here at Sheremetyevo at the same time,
08:01and naturally, we first got acquainted simply as neighbors.
08:05Then we found out we were both pilots.
08:08Later, we both trained for the A310.
08:11We studied together.
08:16I remember how hard it was for them to master it,
08:20because the technology was quite different.
08:23They were working very hard,
08:25but they all got through it and started to fly.
08:34Yana and Eldar are finally on board the new plane
08:37they've heard so much about from their father.
08:47Kudrinsky has 900 hours of flying the A310 under his belt.
08:54It was their first trip abroad,
08:57but naturally, they had come along with him on other trips within Russia.
09:02They were quite well-traveled for their age.
09:09First, Captain Danilov will command the flight
09:12through the busy flight corridors out of Moscow.
09:15Relief Captain Kudrinsky will then take over.
09:18When he does, First Officer Piskarev becomes his co-pilot.
09:22All three are first-class pilots.
09:27On this new A310, the flight deck is fully computerized.
09:31Like other state-of-the-art aircraft,
09:33it's equipped with a sophisticated autopilot
09:36that can fly the plane for long stretches of the flight.
09:40International routes like this one to Hong Kong are Aeroflot's lifeline.
09:45They bring in precious hard currency
09:47at a time when the domestic market is struggling to turn a profit.
09:53Flight 593 takes off at 4.39 p.m. local time.
10:01Then it will join the Trans-Siberian Airway
10:04flying east towards Mongolia and China.
10:10It's a smooth flight.
10:12Only four hours into the ten-hour trip,
10:15they've just passed over Novosibirsk in Siberia, almost halfway.
10:19But Eldar and Yana are too excited to sleep.
10:28Having negotiated the busy airways out of Moscow,
10:31First Captain Danilov takes a rest break.
10:36He hands over control to Relief Captain Kudrinsky,
10:39who now becomes acting captain for the next leg of the journey.
10:43You have control.
10:45I have control.
10:50SNORING
10:54Still awake? Yes, why?
10:57Should we surprise your father?
11:00The cockpit? Oh, yes.
11:02Would you like that?
11:08Aeroflot's most technically advanced aircraft
11:11is now cruising on autopilot at 10,000 metres.
11:15It's a calm, windless night.
11:17But the peace will not last.
11:19The pilots and crew will soon be fighting
11:22to save the lives of everyone on board.
11:29One of Aeroflot's new airbuses
11:31is on a direct flight from Moscow to Hong Kong.
11:34Captain Kudrinsky is taking his children on their first trip abroad.
11:38They're about to pay him a surprise visit.
11:41We have some very important visitors.
11:43Shall I bring them in? OK.
11:48Hello. Come on in.
11:51Hi, Dad.
11:52This is First Officer Igor Vladimirovich Piskarev.
11:55Hello. Hi.
11:57So, what do you think of our new airplane?
12:00It's very nice. It's amazing.
12:03So it's quite different from our old Russian planes.
12:06Daddy, what's that?
12:08Well, this is a flight computer.
12:10It flights the plane, it does everything automatically.
12:15Now, come and sit in my seat. Would you like to?
12:18Come on.
12:22It's a quiet flight.
12:24Many passengers are sleeping,
12:26unaware of what is taking place on the flight deck.
12:33Daddy, can I turn to you? Yeah.
12:38Now, Anna, would you like to pilot the plane?
12:42No.
12:44Put your hands on the control column.
12:46Come on, go on.
12:48But, you know, don't touch any buttons, OK?
12:51Especially this red one, autopilot switch.
12:54You don't touch it, all right?
12:56Kudrinsky turns the heading select knob.
12:59It doesn't disengage the autopilot,
13:02but allows him to turn the plane slightly to the left.
13:05It makes his daughter think she's flying the aircraft.
13:10The artificial horizon shows the plane is banking slowly left.
13:14This instrument is vital when you can't see the ground,
13:17as it shows the pilot how level the aircraft is
13:20in relation to the horizon.
13:22It was you. You turned the plane.
13:25Kudrinsky now puts the aircraft back onto its pre-set course,
13:29while First Officer Piskarev
13:31radios local air traffic control with their position.
13:35Flight 593 is now over 3,200km east of Moscow,
13:40near the middle of Siberia.
13:50Sierra Uniform 593,
13:52estimating Zakir and Kuznetsk.
13:55Sierra Uniform 593,
13:57estimating Zakir and Kuznetsk.
14:00Sierra Uniform 593,
14:02estimating Zakir at 1759.
14:07Now it's Eldar's turn at the wheel.
14:09He's been waiting a long time for this moment.
14:14Pilot being filmed.
14:16Are you filming?
14:18Yes, I am.
14:21Can I turn this?
14:23Yeah, but if you turn it to the left, where will the plane go?
14:26Left. Right. Look out to the left.
14:30Watching for the ground when we're turning.
14:33Eldar finds the control column quite stiff.
14:36It seemed to move easily when his sister was doing it,
14:39so he tries harder.
14:41But he can't make the plane turn
14:43because the autopilot is keeping it on course.
14:50Is the plane turning?
14:52Suddenly, the column turns easily.
14:55Is the plane turning to the left?
14:57Yes, yes, it is.
15:03Set the horizon to normal for him.
15:07Once again, his father switches the heading select knob
15:10back to its original setting,
15:12ending the turn and Eldar's illusion of flying the plane.
15:19Captain Kudrinsky then selects navigation mode.
15:22It tells the autopilot to put the plane back on course to Hong Kong.
15:26Dad? Dad?
15:28But Eldar is still holding the wheel to the left.
15:31It's become stiff again.
15:33Can I go back to my seat?
15:35What for?
15:37You'll only go to sleep and don't run in the first class.
15:41They will fire us.
15:43Eldar now turns his control column slightly to the right,
15:47enjoying his time at the controls.
15:49Well, I am going shopping on Temple Street.
15:52It's a famous market that only opens at night.
15:57TENSE MUSIC
16:09Why is it turning?
16:11Is it turning by itself?
16:13Yes, it is.
16:15It's been just over three minutes
16:17since Eldar sat down in the pilot's seat.
16:20The plane is tilting sharply,
16:22a turn that's getting steeper every second.
16:27The plane seems to be turning by itself,
16:30but no-one seems to know why.
16:32We've gone into some kind of zone.
16:34We've gone into a zone, a holding pattern.
16:36Have we? Of course we have.
16:39An arc has replaced the straight direction line on the screen.
16:43The arc looks like a plane in a holding pattern around an airport.
16:49As they study the screen, the plane continues to turn.
16:54It's now banked at 45 degrees,
16:56which is steeper than what it was built for.
16:59Suddenly the command bars disappear from the primary flight display.
17:03The crew no longer have any information about course or heading.
17:12The plane is flying at 650km an hour and banking hard.
17:17Like a quick turn in a sports car,
17:19the dramatic movement of the aircraft
17:21begins to push everyone into their seats.
17:25Guys!
17:32The A310's autopilot works to keep the plane aloft.
17:37Suddenly the nose pitches up.
17:40The increased g-force makes it difficult for Piskarev to reach the controls.
17:45He does his best, but nothing happens.
17:52Piskarev's hard turn to the left has had no effect on the plane.
17:56Hold it. Hold the control column.
17:59Eldar is the only one with both hands fully on the controls.
18:03He can only follow the most basic orders.
18:06He can't get up, because the speed of the turn is pushing him back in his seat.
18:10To the left, to the left, to the left, now to the right, to the other way!
18:15I am turning left!
18:17OK, get out!
18:20Eldar has been in the pilot's seat for just over four minutes.
18:24And now he can't leave.
18:26His body feels twice its normal weight.
18:28Get out! Get out!
18:30Kudrinsky can do nothing but struggle against the crippling g-forces.
18:34The aircraft is plunging towards the snowy earth.
18:37And there's nothing anyone can do.
18:41Crawl out to the back. Get out!
18:43Get out! Get out!
18:45Russian International Airlines Flight 593 to Hong Kong is in serious trouble.
18:50There's the ground!
18:52The pilot's 15-year-old son has been at the controls for four minutes.
18:56The plane is turning steeply and losing altitude.
18:59The other way!
19:01Captain Kudrinsky desperately needs to get back into the pilot's seat.
19:04But he can barely move.
19:06The plane is turning so steeply and so quickly,
19:09the g-forces on his body make it feel like it's twice its normal weight.
19:16Everyone on board now feels the force of the plane's dramatic movements.
19:21His plane is in a serious crisis,
19:24but Captain Danilov can't get to the cockpit.
19:28He too is squashed by the powerful forces created by the plane's extreme bank.
19:34The plane still isn't responding.
19:37To add to their confusion, an alarm begins to sound.
19:40It signals the complete shutdown of the autopilot.
19:43The plane is now completely in the hands of Biskarev and Eldar.
19:49And to make matters even worse, there's another alarm.
19:53The other way! The other way!
19:55The plane is about to stall.
19:57To the left!
19:59An automatic safety system kicks in to keep the plane flying.
20:03It lowers the nose and puts the airbus into a steep dive to regain speed.
20:07To the left! There's the ground!
20:09The plane dives at a frightening 40,000 feet per minute.
20:13For the people on board, it's like having an elevator fall out from under them.
20:18In just seconds, the heavy pressure of the high-speed turn is replaced by near weightlessness.
20:24As the plane suddenly drops away, it's now a very dangerous environment.
20:29People and objects that are not secured will land anywhere once gravity returns.
20:35They'd been flying at 10,000 meters, but now they're falling fast.
20:39Unless they do something quickly, they will hit the ground in less than a minute.
20:46Biskarev pulls back on the control column as hard as he can to bring the airbus out of the dive.
20:54The nose finally comes up, and the aircraft begins climbing quickly.
21:04Gravity now returns with a shock.
21:07As the plane climbs, the rapid acceleration pushes people down relentlessly.
21:12The dramatic change in speed makes everyone feel four times heavier than normal.
21:20Meanwhile, First Officer Biskarev is still trying to gain control of the aircraft.
21:28Biskarev has pulled the aircraft out of the dive, but it's climbing too quickly.
21:33The engines on the A310 don't have enough power to push it almost vertically into the sky.
21:40The airspeed drops dramatically.
21:44The plane strains to climb, but it's been pushed too far.
21:49As the force of the acceleration eases, Kudrinsky leaps into action.
21:56But Biskarev has stalled the plane.
21:59The nose drops into a corkscrew dive.
22:04Now the airbus is twisting towards the ground from 6,000 meters at a breathtaking 70 meters a second.
22:13For the first time since the crisis began, Captain and co-pilot can work together to save the plane.
22:23Kudrinsky pumps the rudder, the vertical surface on the tail, to help break out of the spin.
22:29At last, the plane seems to be responding.
22:35Working the rudder, Kudrinsky has nearly stopped the corkscrew dive.
22:48After a desperate struggle, the two pilots have managed to pull the plane out of its terrifying spin.
22:53They're starting to level out, but still not completely in control.
23:03In all the chaos of the past few minutes, the pilots don't know exactly how far they've fallen.
23:09Suddenly they run out of time.
23:24Sierra Uniform, 593, this is Novokuznetsk area control, please come in.
23:29500 kilometers north of the Mongolian border, air traffic controllers in Novokuznetsk wait for flight 593 to radio that it's left their control area.
23:38Novokuznetsk area control, please come in.
23:45Less than two hours later, the first search party goes out to look for the Airbus in the frozen, rugged Siberian wilderness.
23:53They finally locate the remains of flight 593 on a wooded hillside about 100 kilometers east of Novokuznetsk.
24:02It's soon clear there are no survivors among the 75 passengers and crew.
24:09This was a brand new aircraft, fitted with the latest technology.
24:14What could have brought it down? Why was there no warning, not even a distress signal?
24:20The Russian media are quick to speculate. Could it have been a terrorist bomb?
24:28When I was in Moscow, the news we had that it could have been a terrorist act, because we had terrorist acts on aircraft previously,
24:38we were completely unaware, other than that nobody had survived it.
24:52For some time, they wouldn't tell me anything specific.
24:56And only on the next day, the airline director told me there was no hope whatsoever.
25:03It was a horrible moment, of course.
25:09Horrible.
25:12It's hard to believe.
25:19Aeroflot flies the families of the deceased out to Moscow.
25:24Among them is Brenda Clark, the mother of British passenger Mark Newport.
25:29We met my daughter-in-law there. They told us, you know, it's cordoned off, we can't go down there.
25:35And she said, you can go down there, Brenda, because the Chinese are down there.
25:40They have to do rituals and things, you know.
25:45And so she said they're down there.
25:49That's when I knew they had lied to me and said that it's cordoned off.
25:52And that's when I told them, I want to go down, and if you don't take me down, then I thumb a lift.
25:59The authorities take them to where the plane crashed.
26:05Relatives of Chinese victims drop pieces of paper with messages written on them.
26:10Others throw flowers.
26:13Yeah, that was really moving.
26:16We had the flowers, they had the little...
26:19They wrote messages, I think, on these pieces of paper.
26:22And they threw them out. It's lovely. Yeah.
26:28The Russians take the families to a morgue in a town near the crash site,
26:32where the recovered bodies are being held.
26:35Many are too badly mutilated to be identified.
26:38They ask the families to look at recovered items of clothing to help identify the bodies.
26:43Brenda Clark finds her son's family photographs.
26:47It sends a chill through her.
26:50For the first time, she knows for certain he was on the flight.
26:59The recovery operation gets underway.
27:02The Russian government mobilizes 238 soldiers, police, investigators and rescuers.
27:08Everyone in the aviation world wants to know how a brand new state-of-the-art airbus
27:13could fall out of the sky without any warning.
27:16Does the A310 have problems no one knows about?
27:19They need to find out fast.
27:22Chief accident investigator Ivan Mashkivsky is in charge.
27:27The crash site itself offers few clues.
27:30The ones he does have are puzzling.
27:33Unbroken bottles of champagne, a flight attendant in an oxygen mask,
27:37and finally the body of at least one child thrown into the cockpit.
27:45The plane's digital flight data recorder indicates the engines were running
27:48when it hit the ground. He rules out engine failure.
27:52Mashkivsky needs the expertise of a man who knows the A310 well.
27:57Someone who can also recreate the fatal flight and find out what exactly went wrong.
28:06Vladimir Biryukov is an experienced test pilot and crash investigator
28:10at the Gromov Institute in Moscow.
28:13He's an expert on the A310 airbus.
28:15Biryukov was directly involved in testing and certifying the aircraft
28:19prior to the Russians buying it.
28:25Because of the fate of this plane, the fate of this airline,
28:29my first reaction was shock.
28:32How could such a thing happen?
28:36All I knew was that the plane had crashed somewhere over Siberia.
28:40I remember spending a sleepless night, distraught,
28:44and trying to figure out what might have happened,
28:47and what could have caused it.
28:54Come!
29:00I think you should come and listen to this.
29:04Each investigation begins with a complete analysis.
29:08Each investigation begins with a complete analysis
29:11of the plane's cockpit voice recorder.
29:14This time it reveals something disturbing.
29:17Now, come and sit in my seat. Would you like to?
29:24Daddy, can I turn to you?
29:30Kudrinsky was in the pilot's seat, wasn't he?
29:33According to the diagram.
29:38Can I turn this a bit?
29:41Yeah, but if you turn it to the left, where will the plane go?
29:44Left.
29:46Look out.
29:50Again.
29:54Can I turn this a bit?
29:56Yeah, but if you turn it to the left, where will the plane go?
29:59Ten years ago it wasn't unusual for people to be invited up to the cockpit.
30:03Of course, since 9-11 it's become a lot tighter,
30:06and you will find cockpit doors are locked generally throughout the flight.
30:11Every country sets its own rules as to who has the authority
30:15or the access to the cockpit.
30:18In some countries it's up to the captain,
30:21so the captain can invite guests up to the cockpit,
30:24but to have them actually manipulating the controls of an airplane,
30:28regardless of whether they have people on it or not,
30:30the fact that this was allowed to occur is definitely an exception in the industry.
30:35Dad, can I go back to my seat?
30:38The two investigators are stunned by what they hear on the cockpit voice recorder.
30:42It's unbelievable.
30:45These two youngsters, the ones who we couldn't identify,
30:48they were not thrown into the cockpit by the crash.
30:53They were his kids.
30:56And they were flying the plane.
30:59The investigators are speechless.
31:02How could three experienced pilots allow children to fly a commercial airliner?
31:07They're about to learn something even worse.
31:10The children are only part of the problem.
31:13A little-known feature of the plane proved deadly.
31:17Why is it turning?
31:20Is it turning by itself?
31:23Turn it! Turn it!
31:26Turn it to the left!
31:29The other way! The other way!
31:32To the left, now to the right! The other way!
31:35I am turning it left!
31:37OK, get out!
31:39Get out! Get out!
31:42Get it left! The ground is right there!
31:45Russian investigators listen to the cockpit voice recorder
31:49of an Aeroflot Airbus that has crashed in Siberia.
31:51What they hear makes their blood run cold.
32:02You should understand the frame of mind of the father.
32:06He is very proud of what he's doing.
32:09He invites his kids into the cockpit.
32:12Strictly speaking, it's a violation, of course.
32:15But I know such violations do occur in real life.
32:18I'm not condemning him or defending him here.
32:21What I'm trying to say is that no disaster occurs
32:24for just any single reason.
32:27There's always more than one, all coming together.
32:30But this time, it really does look like a single cause.
32:34A child flying the plane.
32:37And it sends shockwaves through Aeroflot's higher echelons.
32:41No, I think it would benefit them.
32:44Investigators feel the pressure.
32:46The media has learned that Eldar was at the controls.
32:49Aeroflot, trying to improve on its Soviet-era image,
32:53wants to minimize the damage.
32:56Boris Rybak is an aerospace consultant in Moscow.
33:00Aeroflot managers and executives
33:04indeed try to conceal results
33:08and try to downplay the importance of this accident
33:13because it was very embarrassing.
33:18Managers at Aeroflot aren't the only ones
33:21following the investigation.
33:24Airbus, the European company which made the plane,
33:27is also intensely interested.
33:30Ivan Efremovich, what's wrong?
33:34Nothing.
33:37If the accident was caused by Eldar, it will vindicate Airbus.
33:40At the same time,
33:43grieving families are also clamoring for answers.
33:46Are you sure?
33:49For Mashkovsky and his team, it's a delicate balance.
33:52There is always more than one reason for a plane to crash.
33:55We must find it.
33:58I'll do my best.
34:01His reputation, the reputation of Airbus as well as Aeroflot,
34:04all now depends on finding this other cause.
34:08This was an international flight.
34:11It was a Western-built aircraft.
34:14And it was inevitable that the investigation
34:17that would be conducted by the authorities
34:20and the inquiries that would be conducted by claimant lawyers
34:23would expose information.
34:26At the same time, the manufacturer of the aircraft,
34:29the Airbus industry, was very keen
34:32to get as much realistic explanation of what happened,
34:41because the reputation of this aircraft was at stake.
34:45What I objected to was the way we were treated by Aeroflot.
34:49After the accident, they wouldn't tell us anything,
34:52what was going on. They denied everything.
34:55I wanted to know why my son died.
34:58I wanted to know why these men had been allowed to do such a thing.
35:01But all we got from Aeroflot was blank, blank, blank.
35:05Every time we tried to find something out,
35:08they just didn't want to know.
35:11Families aren't the only ones desperate for answers.
35:14Vladimir Biryukov continues trying to learn all he can
35:17about why the Airbus fell out of the sky.
35:20Analyzing information from the flight data recorder,
35:23he can trace and repeat every command
35:26given to the aircraft during the flight.
35:29We were trying to get as close to the truth as possible,
35:34to find the cause.
35:37Because that was the precedent,
35:40the first foreign-produced plane to crash
35:43while flying for a Russian airline.
35:46The investigation confirms the autopilot was on
35:49when the plane got into trouble.
35:52Even with the children in the cockpit,
35:55the plane should have flown on course,
35:58what went so terribly wrong?
36:01So, any new developments?
36:04We can discount Kudrinsky's daughter.
36:07She sat in the chair, but she didn't fly the plane.
36:13At 17.47.06,
36:17Captain Kudrinsky tells her not to touch the autopilot switch.
36:20Her father gave the autopilot the command to turn,
36:24while Jana just rested her hands lightly on the controls.
36:27It was you! You turned the plane.
36:31But when Eldar took the controls, Biryukov discovers,
36:35something dramatically different happened.
36:39No one could possibly have guessed.
36:42Not even the three pilots in the cockpit.
36:45Biryukov may have found the key to the puzzle.
36:48The plane's flight data recorder shows
36:51that two and a half minutes before the crash,
36:53while Eldar was at the controls,
36:56the autopilot partially disconnects.
36:59This is the start of all the plane's troubles.
37:02But how did that happen?
37:05The autopilot is a sophisticated computer
37:08which manages an aircraft's speed, altitude and heading.
37:11Altitude and heading are controlled by three key functions.
37:15The rudder, which controls sideways movement.
37:19The elevators, which control vertical movement.
37:21And the ailerons, which are for turning.
37:24On flight 593, the autopilot had disconnected itself from the ailerons.
37:30The autopilots that were used in transport airplanes years ago
37:34were an on-off.
37:37In today's sophisticated flight management systems,
37:40you can literally take fragments of the autopilot
37:43and disengage them, but not necessarily turn the switch off
37:46and turn it all off, unless you want to.
37:51The question that really worries accident investigator Biryukov
37:55is how did the autopilot become partially disconnected?
37:59There's no mention of it in the cockpit voice recording.
38:02If this is a fault with the aircraft,
38:05it could prove fatal to future flights.
38:11The only way to know for certain
38:14is to reconstruct the accident on a flight simulator
38:17at Airbus Industries headquarters in Toulouse, France.
38:22Biryukov's experience as a test pilot
38:25and his detailed knowledge of the A310
38:28is crucial to the investigation.
38:31Using information from the flight data recorder,
38:34Biryukov reconstructs the events,
38:37beginning at the moment Captain Kudrinsky
38:40allows his son to sit at the controls.
38:43A co-pilot will help replicate Piskarev's actions.
38:46Look out to the left,
38:48look for the ground when we're turning.
38:52Unlike his sister, Eldar turns the wheel
38:55before his father can tell the autopilot to turn the plane.
38:58The controls are stiff because he's fighting the autopilot.
39:05In the simulator, Biryukov reproduces Eldar's every movement.
39:09Now, it's starting to go.
39:13Going, going.
39:18There.
39:21Hold it long enough and it disconnects.
39:24How long?
39:2730 seconds.
39:30And it disconnects smoothly.
39:33Now, it's time for the autopilot.
39:35It disconnects smoothly.
39:38No warning.
39:41No.
39:44No one in the cockpit knows it, but this is a critical moment.
39:47Eldar's resistance actually turns part of the autopilot off.
39:51It takes just half a minute, but from here on,
39:54Eldar is controlling the ailerons.
39:57Eldar is actually steering the plane.
40:00Why is it turning?
40:02Yes, it is.
40:05What seemed like an open and shut case is suddenly much more complex.
40:08To the left, to the back.
40:11The 15-year-old flying the plane isn't the only reason they crashed.
40:14The discovery highlights an apparent flaw
40:17in how pilots are trained on the A310.
40:20I got it. I have full throttle.
40:26Accident investigator Vladimir Biryukov
40:29has finally discovered the terrifying sequence of events
40:32as Flight 593 fall to Earth.
40:35Captain Kudrinsky's 15-year-old son
40:38had turned the plane's control column
40:41against the programmed flight settings.
40:44This disconnected the autopilot, without warning,
40:47from the ailerons which turned the plane.
40:50There. Hold it long enough and it disconnects.
40:53How long?
40:56The aircraft then began an uncontrolled turn to the right,
40:59which got steeper and steeper.
41:02Then it disconnected.
41:05Another peculiarity of the plane
41:08is that it has no alarm signaling the disengaging
41:11of the autopilot in the list channel,
41:14while our Russian planes
41:17have an alarm sounding in such an event.
41:20So I think that the captain allowed the boy to do it,
41:23irregular as it was,
41:26believing that even if the autopilot got disengaged,
41:28the crew would be alerted to the fact.
41:37The A310 airbus has only a small light
41:40to tell the crew the autopilot has disconnected.
41:43There's no alarm.
41:46And the Russian crew was obviously unaware of it.
41:49But there's also another reason
41:52why no one realized what was happening.
41:55The autopilot still appears to be working normally
41:58and the plane functions.
42:01Although the plane is now banking,
42:04the situation isn't yet critical.
42:07At this point, if the crew takes the proper action,
42:10they can still stabilize the plane.
42:13Eldar is the first to notice
42:16that the artificial horizon is at an angle.
42:19Why is it turning?
42:22Is it turning by itself?
42:25Yes, it is.
42:28Eldar Karov offers an explanation.
42:31Going into some kind of zone?
42:34We've gone into a zone, a holding pattern.
42:37Have we?
42:40Of course we have.
42:43Increasing one degree per second.
42:4627 degrees.
42:49Now we should be entering into the zone.
42:52What's that?
42:55A strange arc now appears on the navigation panel.
42:58It's the course a plane would take
43:01circling an airport waiting to land.
43:04There appeared an arc
43:07very much resembling the arc that appears on the display
43:10when a plane enters a waiting zone.
43:13There are waiting zones around airports.
43:16When too many planes accumulate,
43:19they enter such a zone and circle around while they wait.
43:22But there could be no such zone at that point on the route.
43:25And yet we hear in the voice recording,
43:28we're entering a zone.
43:32This false holding zone
43:35distracts the crew for nine seconds.
43:38In that time, the plane crosses a critical threshold.
43:41The Airbus is now banking at 45 degrees,
43:44far beyond its design limits.
43:47It cannot turn this steeply and maintain height.
43:50It's now losing altitude.
43:53Guys!
43:55But the Airbus autopilot is no longer controlling the ailerons.
43:58Its other functions try to compensate
44:01by pulling the plane's nose up and increasing power to maintain altitude.
44:04Passengers are pushed back into their seats.
44:07It's on the verge of stalling.
44:10It starts to shake like a leaf.
44:13Just hold it!
44:16Part of the flight control panel now goes dark.
44:19It's a warning sign that the plane has gone beyond its design limits.
44:22From here on, the Airbus is out of control.
44:26By recreating the fatal flight,
44:29Biryukov has worked out how a lapse in judgment and concentration
44:32has resulted in a catastrophic crisis.
44:35But could the crew have saved the plane and its passengers?
44:38The pilots of Flight 593
44:41tried to bring the plane out of its fatal dive by pulling up.
44:44But they go too far.
44:47The plane climbs steeply and stalls.
44:50We're losing altitude.
44:52Now we've started to spin.
44:55So what do we do?
45:04It's coming out of the corkscrew.
45:07Now we're leveling out.
45:10In a moment we'll come out of the dive.
45:13All they had to do was let go.
45:16The plane has an inbuilt survival mechanism
45:19which allows it to survive the dive.
45:22A mechanism which won't allow it to stall,
45:25even at very low speed.
45:28But the pilot has to know that.
45:31But the situation is totally new to them,
45:34something they weren't accustomed to handling.
45:37A stressful and incomprehensible situation.
45:40It would have taken special skills
45:43to act correctly in such a difficult situation.
45:46It was not the crew's fault, but their misfortune.
45:49Because if a person doesn't know how to do something
45:52they can't really blame him.
45:59The team's perseverance in an open and honest investigation
46:03did show that there was more than one simple cause behind the accident.
46:07Their findings benefited the whole industry,
46:10especially the revelation that the autopilot can partially disconnect.
46:14This remains a feature of the A310,
46:17as it enables pilots to control certain elements of a flight
46:20while leaving the rest to the computer.
46:23But crews are now made aware of this.
46:26Captain Kudrinsky's misfortune is that it was triggered
46:29in a way that was unexpected and difficult to detect.
46:36The crash of the Russian plane
46:39comes at a troubling time for the airline industry.
46:43In 1994, the same year that Flight 593 went down,
46:47a series of crashes in the United States
46:50raised questions about how commercial pilots handle upsets,
46:54situations in which an aircraft finds itself in extreme flying conditions.
47:00When we think about upset in a large airplane,
47:03we think about an attitude of the airplane
47:06that's beyond what normal flight regimes would be.
47:09That is, greater than 20 degrees nose up,
47:12greater than 10 degrees nose down,
47:15and bank angles greater than 25 degrees.
47:17Within a year, the industry had begun offering pilots upset recovery training,
47:22teaching them skills to handle extreme situations
47:25like the one on Flight 593.
47:28The tragedy of one trip to Hong Kong
47:31may have contributed something to the safety of other passengers and crew.
47:35For parents and friends of those on board, though,
47:38what happened that night is never far from their minds.
47:41Adrian Deville's body was one of 22 that were never identified.
47:46Their remains were cremated together by the Russian authorities.
47:51In mine, he was asleep, and that's the way I deal with it,
47:55and, you know, he didn't know much about it.
48:03The crew of the Airbus are buried in Mitinskoye Cemetery in Moscow.
48:07In a hero's grave, next to the firefighters who died at the Chernobyl nuclear plant.
48:14Yana and Eldar lie next to their father.
48:26I can imagine the horror they experienced in their last moments.
48:31He knew there were not only all those people depending on him,
48:35but also his own kids.
48:42Yes, it was a violation. Yes, he did it.
48:46But how it all happened, it was just a freak accident, a bizarre coincidence.
48:55I can forgive the pilot.
48:58I can forgive the children.
49:00This man was 39 years old.
49:03And for those 39 years, he had an exemplary flying career.
49:08He had a family, he was proud of them.
49:11And it was the final five minutes of those 39 years that went awry.
49:19Yeah, children shouldn't have been allowed in the cockpit, I don't believe, but...
49:24I don't know.
49:25Yeah, children shouldn't have been allowed in the cockpit, I don't believe, but...
49:30Me saying that now won't bring my old crowd to a halt.
49:34But it might stop things happening in the future.
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