17th anniversary of plane crash over Boden See

UFA, 2 July 2019. /Bashinform News Agency/ translated by Tatiana Aksyutina/.

Today it is exactly 17 years since the plane crash over Boden See. The terrible tragedy occurred on the night of July 2, 2002. At 01.35 Moscow time (23.35 local time), the Tu-154 jet by Bashkir Airlines and the Boeing 757 collided in the air. 71 people died, most of them were children from Bashkortostan - 52 gifted schoolchildren flew to Spain for holidays.

A monument “Die zerrissene Perlenkette” was installed at the site of the crash near the town of Überlingen.

A memorial was opened at the Ufa Southern Cemetery, where almost all the dead are buried - children and crew members. The graves are located in the way the dead had seats in the plane.

The investigation called an error of the dispatching service of the Skyguide Company as the main reason for the accident. The dispatcher was late to notice that both aircraft reached the same level. The Russian aircraft was given a command to descend with a delay. In the last seconds, the pilots of both aircraft attempted to prevent a collision by completely deflecting the controls, but this did not help. The Tu-154 and Boeing 757 collided almost at right angles.

Eight employees of the SkyGuide air traffic control in Switzerland appeared before the court. The decision on the accusation of SkyGuide employees was made in September 2007.