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In aviation the term ditching refers to an emergency landing on water. As there's
no practical way to practice the maneuver, it's considered to be extremely dangerous,
and it is only used as a last resort. It's relatively more often used with private aircraft,
which usually only have one engine, and have fewer redundant systems, but it has happened a
handful of times with commercial aircraft. For example, United Airways flight 1541 in 2009,
the so-called Miracle on the Hudson. There have been less than two dozen ditching of commercial
aircraft in the era of commercial aircraft, and each one is an interesting and compelling story,
but none perhaps is more unique than the 1963 ditching of an Aeroflot Tupolev Tu-124
into the river Neva in Leningrad. It is a story that deserves to be remembered.
Andrei Tupolev was born in Russia in 1888, and studied Aeronautics at the Imperial
Russian Technical School, where he helped to establish an aerodynamic laboratory. He
became a leading designer at the Moscow based Central Aero and Hydrodynamics Institute,
where he worked from 1929 until his death in 1972. There he was instrumental in the design of some of
the most important aircraft of the 1930s, such as the TB-1, considered one of the most advanced
aircraft of its day, and the massive eight engine Maksim Gorki, the largest aircraft of the 1930s,
with a wingspan similar to a modern 747. Tupolev made a significant contribution to
commercial air travel with the introduction in 1955 of the Tu-104, only the second commercial
jet airliner in regular service, following the de Havilland Comet. The Tu-104 cut the flight time
from Moscow to Sverdlovsk nearly in half, versus the piston-engined aircraft it replaced. For two
years, from 1956 to 1958, the Tu-104 was the only jet-powered commercial airliner in regular
service, as the Comet was grounded due to safety issues. The Tu-104 continued in regular service
with the Soviet airline Aeroflot clear until 1979. In 1962 the Tu-104 was the basis of the
design for the Tu-124, shown here bearing the NATO designations for the military versions of the two
aircraft. The Tu-124 was smaller than a Tu-104, but used more fuel-efficient D-20P turbofan
engines that allowed a cruising speed of seven to nine hundred kilometers per hour at 10,000 feet.
It was a regional aircraft with the initial design carrying 44 passengers. As airports were generally
not designed for jet aircraft, both the Tu-104 and the Tu-124 carried the drogue parachute that could
be deployed for short, or slick runways, and wheels designed for earthen runways.
Overall, the Tu-124 had a good safety record, at least comparable to other aircraft of the time,
and it was actually somewhat more reliable than its predecessor,
the Tu-104. Over its 30-year service history, 14 Tu-124s were written
off due to crashes. The first of those crashes occurred August 21st, of 1963.
The Tu-124 began its first scheduled passenger service in October of 1962,
flying between Moscow and Tallinn, the capital of the Baltic state of Estonia. At the time of
the accident the model had been in service less than a year. The flight took off from Tallinn
Airport at 8:45 a.m. destined for Moscow. It was a full flight, with forty four adult passengers,
one child, and seven crew. The plane was under the command of 27 year old Captain Victor Mostovoy.
The flight encountered troubles immediately after takeoff, as a crew went to retract the forward
landing gear a loud bang was heard. A bolt, part of the carriage mechanism sheared off,
as a result the front landing gear was jammed and not able to fully retract. This presented a
significant risk for flight, but fog was forming at the Tallinn Airport, so the tower at Tallinn
instructed the crew to proceed to Leningrad, less than 200 miles away, where emergency
services had been alerted. They kept the plane at a low altitude, both to reduce the risk of
decompression should the damaged gear puncture the aircraft, and help burn fuel, as they would
want the plane to be as low on fuel as possible to reduce the risk of fire in a crash landing.
The passengers weren't even told about the problem, they seemed to think that
they had been redirected to Leningrad because of bad weather in Moscow. The plane arrived
over Leningrad around 10 a.m. and immediately began circling in order to burn our fuel. The
captain had the heavier bags moved to the back of the plane to put less weight on the front
landing gear, and the crew went down below the aircraft to see if they could manually get the
landing gear to lock down. At one point they were even using a rod that they had taken from
the airplane's closet for leverage. Now I'm no expert on airplane mechanics, but if the flight
crew is using a clothing rod to try to fix the airplane in flight, that cannot be a good sign.
The plane was circling at just 2,000 feet over a heavily populated city, crossing over its ancient
churches, and historical buildings. Disaster struck on the eighth, and final circuit around
the city. The port engine suddenly stopped, the engine had apparently run out of fuel. A
co-pilot later speculated that the crew may have been distracted trying to fix the landing gear,
but there was also a report that the fuel gauge was incorrect, and still showed that there was
fuel. Captain Mostovoy tried to turn the plane for an immediate approach to the airport when
the starboard engine also failed. The situation was desperate, the plane was gliding unpowered.
It was at an extremely low altitude, unable to make it the 13 miles to the airport,
and was over a major population center. Mostovoy made the only choice that he could,
turning to try to land on the Neva River, less than a thousand feet wide. But the river was
crossed here by two spans, the Liteiny Bridge, and the Alexander Nevsky Bridge,
then under construction. Because of the hard turn the plane crossed diagonally over the
Liteiny Bridge, clearing the span by less than a hundred feet. It then crossed so low over the
Alexander Nevsky Bridge that construction workers had to die for cover! Mostovoy set the plane down
in the Neva River just 14 seconds after the starboard engine failed, less than a hundred
yards past the Alexander Nevsky Bridge. The plane settled near a tugboat, an old steamer
that had been built in the 19th century. The crew of the boat was so shocked by the sight
that they reportedly surmised that the plane was some experimental design made for water landings.
But the passengers, and crew were not out of danger. The plane was equipped with neither
life vests, nor life rafts, and there was a very real chance of drowning. In previous ditchings,
more passengers had died from water, than from the accident.
The sheer luck was the proximity of the tugboat. Quickly realizing that the plane was in danger,
the tugboat towed the plane to shore, using a line attached to the control column. In the end, the
passengers, and crew were able to exit the plane via an access hatch in the roof, and step right
onto dry land. Passersby stood, and applauded the crew. The luggage was removed, and neatly
stacked on the asphalt, within a few minutes a bus arrived, and took them to the airport.
Subsequent analysis credited the captain who put the plane down not just with pinpoint accuracy,
but with little damage to the structure. If the fuselage had been damaged,
the plane might have sunk in seconds. If the plane had crashed on takeoff with the fuel tanks full,
it also would not have floated nearly as long. And finally, had it not landed so close to the
tugboat, it's quite possible that the passengers, and crew could have drowned before rescue could
get to them. It is a strange irony that one of the newest aircraft in the world was towed to shore by
a nearly 70 year old steam tugboat. And finally, if there had been bad weather, bad visibility,
which is quite possible in Northern Europe, then the pinpoint landing might not have been possible.
Because of mechanical issues with its predecessor, the Tu-104, the Tu-124 had a relatively short
production record. It finished production in 1965, and only 164 of the aircraft were produced,
but it continued in service with Aeroflot clear through 1979, and with the Soviet Air Force clear
until 1992. The plane crashed because of a mix of mechanical, and human error, and then it survived,
unpowered gliding, and a water ditching, both which are extremely dangerous because of a
combination of great skill, and blind luck. The accident is absolutely unique in aviation
history. There is no other record of an airplane in such circumstances being towed to shore with
the passengers, and crew still inside. It is history that deserves to be remembered.
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