Mandala Airlines Flight 091

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Location of Medan in Indonesia.

On 5 September 2005 (10:06 a.m. UTC+7), a Jakarta-bound Boeing 737-200 jetliner operated by Mandala Airlines crashed into a heavily-populated residential area seconds after taking off from Polonia International Airport in Medan, Indonesia.

Dozens of houses and cars were destroyed, and at least 39 persons are reported to have perished on the ground. Later it was reported that at least 16 persons have survived the accident, with 104 of those on board known to have died including 3 babies. Most of the survivors are thought to have been seated at the rear of the aircraft, though some have reportedly since died from their injuries. At least one Malaysian Ti Teow Chuan from Sabah was reported dead and one from Japan. No Singaporeans were reported to be amongst the dead. The Singaporean Embassy in Jakarta and Consulate in Pekan Baru are also in touch with the local authorities there and will continue to monitor the situation closely.

Rizal Nurdin, the governor of North Sumatra at the time, and Raja Inal Siregar, the former governor, are among the dead.

The crash was the sixth major incident involving commercial airliners since August 1. The others were, in chronological order: Air France Flight 358; an ATR-72 crash in the Mediterranean Sea; Helios Airways Flight 522 crash, killing 122 in Greece; West Caribbean Airways Flight 708's crash in Venezuela, killing 160; and TANS Peru Flight 204, killing 41 out of 100 people on board when it crashed in Peru.

1 Survivors
2 Aircraft and Airline
3 Causes
4 Similar incidents
5 Sources
6 External links

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Survivors

Passenger Rohadi Sitepu told Metro Television from hospital that he and five other people seated in the back of the plane in Row 20 had all survived. "There was the sound of an explosion in the front and there was fire and then the aircraft fell," he said. Rohadi said he escaped the blazing wreck by jumping through the torn fuselage and fleeing on foot as four large explosions erupted behind him.

Another survivor, Freddy Ismail, told El Shinta Radio from his hospital bed that the aircraft seemed to be experiencing mechanical difficulties after take-off. "After take-off, the noise of the engine suddenly became very loud and the aircraft began shaking intensely before it suddenly fell," he said.

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Aircraft and Airline

The aircraft, registration PK-RIM, was built in 1981 and formerly belonged to Lufthansa where it was registered as D-ABHK "Bayreuth". The aircraft had passed extensive safety tests in June and should have been airworthy until at least 2013.

Mandala Airlines was established in 1969 and is one of several low-cost airlines that serve the vast Indonesian archipelago. It is 90-percent owned by a foundation set up by the Indonesian Army strategic reserve Kostrad (Komando Strategis Angkatan Darat).

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Causes

The airline said it was too early to know the cause of the crash. Witness statements are contradictory, with some claiming that the plane rose to an altitude of 90 metres before appearing to shake (possibly indicating a stall) and veer to the left, while others say that the aircraft failed even to clear the landing lights (not ILS antenna as mentioned in many media) at the end of the runway before veering to the right and crashing immediately.

It has been suggested that illegal overloading (apparently a known problem in Indonesia and many other countries) could be responsible for the aircraft's apparent inability to climb, but confirming this will be almost impossible given the intense fire produced and the presence of large amounts of debris from the houses which were destroyed. Some local newspaper said that the airplane was filled with durian fruit. A preliminary probe into the crash has found a fuel problem with one of the plane's engines. Other causes, including engine failure and pilot error, are undoubtedly under investigation. The 'black boxes' have been recovered and sent to the US for analysis.

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