RFT 351: Suicide By Pilot

From Wikipedia:

	Crash date	Perpetrator	Flight Type	Flight	Victims	Aircraft
	September 26, 1976	Pilot	General aviation	Stolen aircraft	5 (pilot, 4 on the ground)	Vladimir Serkov attempted to pilot his Antonov An-2 plane into his ex-wife's parents' apartment where she and his two-year-old son were visiting. See An-2 incidents.
	January 5, 1977	Pilot	General aviation	Connellan air disaster	5 (pilot, 4 on the ground)	A disgruntled former employee of Connellan Airways (Connair) flew a Beechcraft Baron into the Connair complex at the Alice Springs Airport, Northern Territory, Australia.
	August 22, 1979	Pilot	General aviation	Stolen aircraft	4 (pilot, 3 on the ground)	A 23-year-old aircraft mechanic working at Bogota El Dorado Airport stole a Hawker-Siddeley HS-748 and crashed it into a Bogota suburb.
	June 1, 1980	Pilot	General aviation	Barra do Garças air disaster	7 (pilot, 4 passengers, 2 on ground)	After an argument with his wife and mother-in-law, Brazilian pilot Mauro Milhomem attempted to crash his Embraer EMB 721 Sertanejo, which was also carrying four passengers, into a hotel owned by a family member after he discovered that his wife had cheated on him. He failed to hit the hotel, and instead hit several objects before crashing the plane into another building. His wife committed suicide a few days later. In total, seven people were killed and four were wounded.
	February 9, 1982	Pilot	Commercial flight	Japan Airlines Flight 350	24	Pilot engaged number 2 and 3 engines' thrust-reversers in flight. The first officer and Flight Engineer were able to partially regain control.
	September 15, 1982	Pilot	General aviation	Bankstown Airport incident	1	The pilot of a stolen SOCATA Tobago committed suicide by deliberately crashing into Bankstown Airport in the City of Bankstown, New South Wales, Australia
	March 23, 1994	Pilot	General aviation	Unscheduled solo flight from Spirit of St. Louis Airport in Chesterfield, Missouri.	1	Bob Richards was having marital and other personal problems. He allegedly crashed his Piper Cherokee single-engine airplane on purpose. He was alone in the plane, and thus the only fatality.
	July 13, 1994	Pilot	Military	Stolen aircraft	1	A Russian air force engineer stole the airplane at Kubinka air base outside Moscow. He circled the aircraft until it ran out of fuel and crashed.
	August 21, 1994	Pilot	Commercial flight	Royal Air Maroc Flight 630	44	Crashed intentionally by pilot (disputed by flight union)
	September 12, 1994	Pilot	General aviation	Stolen aircraft	1	Crashed intentionally by Frank Eugene Corder on the White House south lawn.
	April 2, 1997	Pilot	Military	Craig D. Button incident	1	While on a training mission, Button flew off course and ceased radio contact. The A-10 Thunderbolt II later crashed into a mountain in Colorado.
	December 19, 1997	Pilot	Commercial flight	SilkAir Flight 185	104	Crashed intentionally by pilot (disputed by Indonesian government)
	September 6, 1998	Pilot	General aviation	Stolen aircraft	1	Crashed intentionally by off duty flight instructor at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach, Florida.
	October 11, 1999	Pilot	Stolen commercial aircraft	1999 Air Botswana incident	1	Pilot commandeered and then crashed an Air Botswana aircraft into a group of aircraft at Sir Seretse Khama International Airport in Gaborone, Botswana
	October 31, 1999	First officer	Commercial flight	EgyptAir Flight 990	217	After the captain left the cockpit, relief first officer Gameel Al-Batouti turned off the autopilot while repeatedly saying "I rely on God" in Arabic, causing the plane to go into a dive and crash into the Atlantic Ocean. The reason for his inputs was not determined (U.S. National Transportation Safety Board); Mechanical fault in elevator control system (Egyptian Civil Aviation Authority) (cause is still disputed)[28]
	January 5, 2002	Pilot	General aviation	2002 Tampa airplane crash	1 (pilot, damaged an office)	Crashed into Bank of America Plaza. The pilot, teen Charles J. Bishop, credited and praised Osama bin Laden for September 11, 2001 attacks in his suicide note.
	July 22, 2005	Pilot	General aviation	2005 Berlin airplane crash	1	A 39-year old pilot deliberately crashed his own light aircraft, a Platzer Kiebitz, in a field right in front of the Reichstag in Berlin.
	February 18, 2010	Pilot	General aviation	2010 Austin suicide attack	2 (pilot, 1 on the ground)	Andrew Joseph Stack III deliberately crashed his single-engine Piper Dakota light aircraft into Building I of the Echelon complex housing IRS offices in Austin, Texas, United States.
	November 29, 2013	Pilot	Commercial flight	LAM Mozambique Airlines Flight 470	33	The pilot intentionally crashed the aircraft. The co-pilot was locked out of the cockpit, according to the voice recorder.
	March 24, 2015	First officer	Commercial flight	Germanwings Flight 9525	150	Co-pilot Andreas Lubitz, previously treated for depression and suicidal tendencies, locked the captain out of the cockpit before deliberately letting the plane crash into a mountain near Prads-Haute-Bléone, Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, France.
	October 11, 2016	Student pilot	General aviation	East Hartford, CT Piper PA-34 Seneca crash	1	Jordanian student pilot Feras Freitekh was killed and his instructor injured after they argued and wrestled for control of the airplane on landing approach; the plane crashed into a utility pole near the Pratt & Whitney headquarters. Investigators concluded the crash was an intentional act motivated by suicide based on the surviving instructor, who said there was an argument and struggle for control. The FBI was investigating, but he was not known to intelligence agencies, no religious statements were heard, and nothing else pointed to terrorism.
	March 15, 2017	Pilot	General aviation	Manitouwadge Cessna crash	1	Xin Rong, an experienced pilot, departed from Ann Arbor, Michigan, United States in a Cessna 172P and disappeared. The aircraft was found wrecked near Manitouwadge, Ontario, Canada with the right-hand door open, but no human remains nor footprints in the snow were found at the crash site. Investigators believe that Rong deliberately jumped out somewhere en route and the Cessna subsequently ran out of fuel. His body has not been found and he was subsequently declared dead.
	August 10, 2018	Ground service employee	Stolen commercial aircraft	2018 Horizon Air Q400 incident	1	Horizon Air ground service employee Richard "Beebo" Russell conducted an unauthorized take-off in a Bombardier Dash 8 Q400 from Sea-Tac International Airport, performing aerobatic maneuvers over SeaTac and Puget Sound whilst being pursued by fighter jets, before crashing the plane into Ketron Island in the South Puget Sound.
	August 13, 2018	Pilot	Stolen private aircraft	Stolen Cessna 525 CitationJet	1	A man who was released after arrest for domestic assault charges stole an aircraft then crashed at his own home in Payson, Utah in an attempt to murder his spouse. The man, who was an experienced pilot, was killed while no one in the house was harmed.
	March 23, 2019	Pilot	General aviation	Beechcraft B200 Super King Air	1	A man who was an uninvited guest at a private party earlier that day crashed the airplane into a clubhouse at Matsieng Air Strip, Botswana. The clubhouse was evacuated prior to the crash, so that the perpetrator remained the sole fatality.

https://youtu.be/XcupjvtHBSM

There are programs to assist pilots with emotional issues, such as this Pilot-Directed-Assistance Program and airline Employee Assistance Programs (EAPs).

Ensure that you and your flying partners always adhere to the IMSAFE checklist:

I - Illness

M - Medication

S - Stress

A - Alcohol

F - Fatigue

E - Eating/Emotion

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