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That 45 min video sounds amazing! But, sadly, purely due to the UA-cam algorithm, I think you might be better off posting it in 3 parts of 15 minutes each, perhaps a week apart or something? You'll know better with your statistics, but I once heard that ~15 mins long videos are more likely to end up as recommendations.
Interesting how ACI titled the US downing of an Iranian 747 in international airspace “Mistaken Identity”. Not the case with this tragic shooting down over sovereign air space.
Correction 3 Korean Airlines flights were shot down in Russia during the cold war 1 Boeing 707 in the 50's 2nd Boeing 707 in the 70's 3rd Boeing 747 in 83
@@aerogamer3549 Because content creators don't just act on the whims of viewers. It takes a lot of time and effort to create videos. It's silly for viewers to believe they can make short order requests.
A request doesn’t have to be seen as a whim, nor as a demand to make the video on short notice. The channel makes good quality videos on their own time, and it’s great that people can add ideas to the list for them to make sometime in the future at their convenience. If the channel is already working on a particular incident, then great minds think alike and no harm done, right?
I flew as a child over the similar route as KAL 007 enroute to HK on JAL one month after the shoot down in 1983. While I was oblivious being 7,my parents were keeping an eye out the window from time to time as details were still coming out on what happened at the time. Fortunately JAL didn’t seem to have navigation issue KAL seemed to…
The crew flying the plane you were on were probably as nervous as your family was. It was after the 007 incident that Ronald Reagan pushed for GPS to be open to civilian use. Sadly, it seems that like most other safety improvements, people have to die or be murdered before something is done.
Good video! When I saw the thumbnail of this video, I first thought that this was a remake of the flight 007 video, but I was surprised to learn that this was an entirely different Korean Air flight. Not only was it surprising to hear about another Korean Air flight being shot down by the Soviet Union, but also that it happened so close to where I live (Finland). To me, this incident reminded me of Finnair flight 915, which was also allegedly shot at by the Soviets. It could make for an interesting video, although the incident hasn't been reported about all that much, and much of what actually happened on that flight is up to speculation.
None of these incidents would have occured , if the american spy planes hadnt violated soviet airspace with airplanes that look similar to passenger planes and if the pilots would have interacted with the soviet airspace control
On one hand yes...on the other it's this crew who did a U turn and then kept going for 3 hours (even though they suspected they were on the wrong heading) bringing their passengers in hostile territory
I would like to say that your dedication to research, scripting, animations and "very sympathetic and respectful method towards the victims" way of doing your videos is commendable Chloe, fantastic job!! I've clicked on your "every video from most recent" playlist of 159 videos and I'm absolutely loving every minute of it. I'm just over half way through it and I've been binge watching the playlist for about 2 days!!!!
your voice is so soothing and the way the information is presented, it really helps me wind down and clear my mind for sleep. i watch a couple of these every night before i rest. please don’t stop these.
I'm surprised there aren't more documentaries regarding this disaster. I rewatched a news report about the KAL 007 disaster. They mentioned this one a few times in that report. I was a kid during both incidents but hadn't heard of the 1978 incident. There should be more documentaries regarding this incident, since it's very much related to the KAL 007 incident. Or, at least, documentaries should include specific info regarding this incident when covering the KAL 007 one. Anyway, thanks for being pretty much the one and only person to cover this incident!
it was actually so relieving to see a photo of the damaged wall/window of the passenger plane, as it alone confirmed that there was no crash and that the aircraft cabin was intact so that people could later come in to investigate and take pictures
if you're considering doing any more videos on these passenger planes that have been shot down, i think one on iran air flight 655 would be really interesting. think it's important for people to realize that it wasn't just the soviet union making hasty decisions that cost civilian lives, and that one's particularly crazy given that the US shot the plane down in iranian waters. it's brushed last a lot and it really goes to show how US military dominance is so profound that even after that incident, countries were unwilling to go to war directly with the USA.
I really do want to make a video on the Iran Air shoot down. Thankfully the correct plane in the flight simulator just dropped a little while ago. I'm going to put in on my list soon.
You want countries to go to war with USA ??? Although it was an insult that the personnel of the US Navy ship that shot down the Iranian commercial jet were given medals ( I’m unclear as to why ) it still was an accident. They truly thought it was a military jet from what their instruments were telling them. In both the Soviet incidents they knew it was a commercial jet because they were looking directly at it and still shot them down
@@krapeevids6992the second incident happened at night - and the Korean airliner was flying over the Soviet Union in an area where real US spy planes (also made by Boeing, also quadjets) operated and regularly violated Soviet airspace. Given that letting a US spy plane evade could get a Soviet military commander fired, it's really not that strange that they thought it was a legitimate target.
Love your videos! 😁 I used to watch Air Crash Investigation on Discovery channel every day when I was young and your videos makes me feel just as intrigued and interested as they did ✈ hello from Shetland! 👋
you know part of why the Soviet Union was so on edge was because the US made a habit of flying our bombers just within range of their early warning systems before turning around again. (If I'm listening correctly, this video is about the cold war incidents)
So the Koreans flew in the wrong direction and broke into restricted airspace, not once, but TWICE in less then 10 years, and people think and expected the soviets to do nothing?
@@dout0rm942the pilot who shot down flight 902 knew fully that it was a passenger plane and try to convince his commander that it was not a threat but failed, USSR fault. In the kal007 case, the ussr never made any successful communication with the plane and still shot it down
2:28. Why is Finland being painted purple? Finland's airspace has never been restricted nor it was a Soviet allie during the cold war. Finnair had to fly northbound as well when flying to Asia.
I've read that the captain later told the passengers that during the flight he began to distrust his navigation equipment, but proceeded anyway. The *sun* should have been slightly ahead of him, off his left wing as he passed Ellesmere heading to Alaska... instead it was off his right wing and _behind_ him as he approached the Kola Penninsula, one of the most militarised parts of the Soviet Union, home to army, airforce and navy bases including the fleet of nuclear armed submarines... well done to him on landing the plane, but his attitude stinks as regards making sure the plane is actually going where it's supposed to be going. It's a good thing we have more modern navigation equipment now, as well as an entirely different culture inside the flight deck where both pilots must double check each other, rather than the captain decide to push on rather than risk 'losing face'.
This Korean airliner was equipped with the LORAN navigational system which relied on transmitting stations around the world. The more reliable INS which used three computers and a gyroscope on board the plane was just coming into vogue.
The internet wasn't around back then, their only exposure was whatever pamphlets they gave out that one time to the pilots about what a maple leaf looks like. And they're flying at a distance from each other.
@@infiltr80r Didn't notice them until you've mentioned it, my gaze was take by the large bold English letters. My point still stands, what's common knowledge now was not back then. Add to it, the conditions to see details is not great. From the Soviet's perspective, the plane was coming from North America, with some shape that isn't a U.S. flag on the tail.
@@LunaticTheCat Lying to his superiors? What for? What does he have to gain from it? If he was trying to get the plane shot down then why did he argue with command? These are not public record recordings for propaganda purposes, they were acquired post Soviet collapse.
Very good point. On April 20th, the sun would have been in the sky all day that far north, but maybe they weren't used to caculating that, but you are right, it should have been off their left wing, slightly ahead of them, almost due south of them, but the heading they took, the sun would have been behind them and off their right wing. Maybe they were over reliant on instruments. When they reached Russian airspace it was about 8pm I'd be interested in finding the report on the incident. I've read a lot of reports due to my previous job, and there was an issue in the past with not double checking things with the other crew because the captain was 'king' . This was especially true in cultures where saving face was very important and where ex military pilots were given senior positions, even above more experienced and careful pilots. There have been many avoidable accidents where a co pilot says he doesn't trust the instrument, and the captain over rules him, even though there exists a reason to doubt the instrument, take time to double check their speed altitude and heading so that they can be sure they are actually going where they think they are going.
@@dout0rm942 Flight 902 was trying to communicate with the jet, the su15 pilot even try to convince his commander it was not a threat lol, ussr fault. In kal007 case, the ussr never made any successful communication with the plane and still shot it down
a crucial piece of information which is missing from this video and which could explain (no means justify) soviet aggression against airliners violating their airspace is the fact of regular overflights of U-2 (by CIA) and later SR-71 deep into soviet airspace. Pakistan was the main base of US overflights into soviet territory but Iran was also cooperating in ELINT operations against the soviet to gather radar data. not being able to intercept and prevent SR-71 overflights into their airspace the soviets were extremely frustrated and were taking no chance at anything else they could intercept. the shooting down of Korean Airlines Flight 902 was also embarrassing for soviet air force because against all their efforts, they still barely managed to force the airliner into crash landing and demonstrated the vulnerability of soviet air defences.
But I'm still left wondering, what really made the plane go to the Soviet Union? Did flying right above the magnetic north pole mess up the instruments? Was it pilot error? What was it?
In a way. Remember, the magnetic north pole had shifted slightly, so they may not have known they were actually at the mag N pole. Think of what a compass would do at the mag N pole. No matter which direction you went from there, the compass would be reading that you're heading south. Once off course, there would be no way to know where you actually are anymore until a radar or some kind of fixed radio gave you a position, and there weren't any up there at the time because nobody flew up there.
Also, they were probably not actually quite at the mag N pole, so their navigation told them to make a hard right since that appeared to be the course they were supposed to follow. If just to the left or right of the mag N, the compass would show drastically different readings.
Cracks me up. Russia does all of this dumb ass crap all the time, and then, with a perfectly straight face says on national television, Why does everybody think so badly about us.
@@shanablack5737 I’m not attacking all Russians so what are you talking about? My family comes from the Soviet Union, so I don’t hate Russians. Instead I only hate communists.
I wonder if somebody tried to analyse as to why the same airliner (KA) twice (this and 007) made such dramatic "mistakes" - moving aways for hundreds of kilometres from the courses and such experienced pilots didn't notice.... and in both cases crossing some very restricted military areas.
One thing that should be noted about Soviet pilots is the fact that the pilot was never allowed to make an independent decision. The pilot was basically at the mercy of superior officers on the ground... a remote controlled fighter puppet, for a lack of a better comparison.
Few fact to fullfill story, which makes its more fishy: 1) Usualy this route was served by DC-10 with no military counterpart, this time was used, very used (cheaply sold by PANAM to KAL) Boeing 707, RC-135 long range reconnaissance (spy) plane based on 707. 2) Kim Chang-Kyu retired colonel of Korean military tranport force, Korean War veteran. New in KAL. KAL 902 captaing was replaced by him in France few hours before flight. 3) That day, 3 hour before KAL902 violated USSR border, 600 km from place KAL902 was landed, Kosmos 1003 spy satelite was launched from Plesetsk launch pad. Some others facts: 1) Su-15 have no integral canon, canon pod wasn't attached in time, so plane was armed two different AA rockets. 2) Alexander Bosov identified plane as civilian but received order took it down. He used heat seeking missile, which hit engine, KAL902 lost air tightness and brough down to low altitude. Soviet radar lost it, but broken part of wing "flying" was still on radar and considered cruise missile, intercepted and "destroyed" with rocket by another Su-15. After that 18 more Su-15 searching for KAL902 remains, it was found at 500m altitude searching place for landing. 80(100min by passangers statements) min after first hit, KAL902 landed, and Su-15 pilot transmited coordinates to base, 2 hrs later first searching parties board KAL902. 3) Yoshitaka Sugano died from blood loss during evacuation in helicopter. 4) Su-15 carry two different R-8 rockets, one heat seeking, one radar hooming. KAL007 was also intercepted by Su-15 with same rockets, heat seeking rockets hit engines, radar hooming rocket shot from behind hit tail feathers, which is fatal, that moment KAL007 was doomed. Same as JAL123 later.
So, who else thought…wrong flight number….WRONG aircraft!🤣 Boy, sure hope there’s room in my mouth for the other foot! Lol Great video and collection of info and pics💕🇨🇦
It amazes me flying is considered the safest way to travel. I call bs. If today if we heard the number of fatalities traveling via air vs automobile I choose stay where you are. Hitchhike. Or walk. You’ll get arrested for hitchhiking these days, but at least you’re alive. I thank these air travel channels.
I heard about one incident where the Soviet Union shot down a plane which strayed into Russian territory - not sure if it was this or the slightly later one. I remember when the USSR collapsed, the minister who had kept the black boxes in a safe in his office, handed them over to the US as a peace gesture saying he’d never felt comfortable keeping them. One of the best videos you’ve made, or rather one I personally found really interesting. I’d love to see more videos of planes shot down.
I remember seing a picture of that plane at the frozen lake in my granfather's old car magazine with had a story about that crash. I remember being amazed by how the ice didn't breake underneath that plane😲😮
Great video! Im noticing this was released about 5.5 months ago. you say you are working on a 45min+ video (I'm super excited to see it). I have noticed you don't have any videos around this size, so I'm assuming it has not come out yet. Is that video still going ahead? :)
I read in the Russian sources he was actually second in line to shoot down the KAL-007. His plane was raised, but it was other pilot that fired the missile. He was transferred to the Soviet Far East, Bosov was his name.
If I had a nickel for every time the Soviet Union shot down a Korean passenger plane, I'd have two nickels. Not a whole lot, but it's weird that it happened twice.
Hi Chloe….brilliant narration of the very under the radar story that I can barely remember from 1978. The KAL007 is prominent though as it was a horrendous incident and the then, USSR, seemingly just got away with it. Does that sound familiar? I hope you do a vlog on that one? I fully endorse your work as first-rate and thank you for the professional approach you take to a special vocation to many of us, and treat so respectfully. Best Beau
Accoroding to what I read in the late Russian accounts of this incident, the Soviet pilot did identify this plane as civilian with hieroglyphical inscription on its board, which means, it was not confused for being a Canadian airliner.
The R-60 missile is a small, short-range missile intended for smallish targets like fighters and, like most air-to-air missiles, is proximity-fused, so it explodes near the target and the resulting shrapnel does the damage.
The worst thing you can do when getting on a plane is take a photo onboard before takeoff and think it will never happen to you at 35’000 it’s too late your dead
at 10:00 "at the Russian Karelia". No. That is Soviet-occupied Karelia. Occupied by Soviet during WW2. My grandfather defended Finland from Soviet aggression in Karelia / Mannerheim line. Finland was the only country that the Soviets attacked during WW2 that managed to partly defend itself despite the "allies" having an arms embargo against Finland. Put the price for freedom was high. Over 5% of the population died during WW2. Almost all men 18-22 died. It is not Russian territory. Occupied Finnish territory.
There were thousands of wars that have been waged throughout the long European history and almost all of them resulted in territorial changes. You can literally point at every place on the map and tell that it's occupied because it used to belong to someone else X years/centuries ago.
7:58 Although the Su-15 is one of my fav cold war interceptors; it had poor cockpit visibility. I never knew why they where never escorted with a mig-23 for visual confirmations since it also is also more stable for slow air speeds (like escorting airliners).
The Su-15 is an interceptor whereas the MiG is an air-supiority fighter. Interceptors are fast, which makes them suitable for this kind of intercepting mission
From this egregious military act, I’m amazed to learn that Soviets were able to get their hands on a mint condition, written off 707 - right in their lap - and rather than improve the god-awful systems & avionics of the TU-154 (crew of 5 in production until ‘02), and the like , the Soviets promptly scrapped it and learned nothing. Huge fumble.
If you found this video to be interesting, be sure to subscribe as there is a new video every Saturday. This video also went out to my Patrons on Patreon 48 hours before going out publicly. Consider joining here from £3 per month: www.patreon.com/DisasterBreakdown
That 45 min video sounds amazing!
But, sadly, purely due to the UA-cam algorithm, I think you might be better off posting it in 3 parts of 15 minutes each, perhaps a week apart or something?
You'll know better with your statistics, but I once heard that ~15 mins long videos are more likely to end up as recommendations.
Interesting how ACI titled the US downing of an Iranian 747 in international airspace “Mistaken Identity”.
Not the case with this tragic shooting down over sovereign air space.
This is a reupload right?
Oh its not
I got confised with korean air 007
Thank you for differentiating the two incidents. I actually clicked thinking it was the latter incident in 1983.
There is only a limited number of aircraft incidents, but hundreds of ways to present them. I enjoy your documentary work. Hello from Nevada.
Hello from Las Vegas
Hello from warsaw Poland
Hello from earth
Hey from Coloradooooo
Hello from Pittsburgh
What a delight to see an incident of which I, at any rate, was entirely unfamiliar. Thanks for investigating these lesser known incidents.
I find the disasters with not much known about it to be the more interesting videos to make.
Seymour Hersh writes about this incident in the beginning of his book The Target is Destroyed which is about the KAL 007 shootdown.
@@DisasterBreakdown This was a real rollercoaster ride of an episode. You should be proud. Well done.
@@Bob31415
A real heresy for $H
@@minhthunguyendang9900 Please elaborate.
The “P-60” missile was actually the R-60 missile. It’s a Cyrillic R.
Thanks for the info.
Interesting. Ty
Overall they should be called C-60, as they do seem to be pretty Crap at shooting things down. In this case it proved to be a good thing though...
@@ciprian7243 it is small misille . Smaler than sidewinder
@@zepter00 It was an unguided rocket,not even a missile. Also, it did put that plane on the ground from the damage it did.
In 9/11 a Korean airline plane was nearly gonna get shot down because of miscommunication about whether it was hijacked or not
hard to believe that 2 Korean Airlines planes were shot down over Russia during the cold war
One of those “if I had a penny for each time it happened I’d have two pennies, which is not much but still weird” moments
Korean Airlines has a weird knack for being on the wrong side of intercepting fighter jets.
Correction 3 Korean Airlines flights were shot down in Russia during the cold war
1 Boeing 707 in the 50's
2nd Boeing 707 in the 70's
3rd Boeing 747 in 83
Technically only one was shot *down* per se.
This makes it suggesting that the USSR liked doing South Korea dirty. /s
Oh wait what ,you actually did my suggestion,thanks alot mate ,made my day and will probably make my day even better once I finish watching it.
As it turns out I was already working on it when you brought it up last week.
@@aerogamer3549 Because content creators don't just act on the whims of viewers. It takes a lot of time and effort to create videos. It's silly for viewers to believe they can make short order requests.
A request doesn’t have to be seen as a whim, nor as a demand to make the video on short notice. The channel makes good quality videos on their own time, and it’s great that people can add ideas to the list for them to make sometime in the future at their convenience. If the channel is already working on a particular incident, then great minds think alike and no harm done, right?
@@mhauze4all Yep.
@@aerogamer3549 I don't see anything wrong with that :/
Wait....There were 2 Korean Airlines Planes shot down by the Soviets??!!!
I honestly thought it was 1 this whole time....
Same
Yes there were two. This one on 4/20/78 with two fatalities and the one on 9/1/83 with 269 fatalities.
This one probably doesn't get talked about much since only two people died.
Even done by the same soviet interceptor (Su-15)
tradition
I flew as a child over the similar route as KAL 007 enroute to HK on JAL one month after the shoot down in 1983. While I was oblivious being 7,my parents were keeping an eye out the window from time to time as details were still coming out on what happened at the time. Fortunately JAL didn’t seem to have navigation issue KAL seemed to…
The crew flying the plane you were on were probably as nervous as your family was.
It was after the 007 incident that Ronald Reagan pushed for GPS to be open to civilian use. Sadly, it seems that like most other safety improvements, people have to die or be murdered before something is done.
weirdly another korean air lines plane almost got shot down over russia
That's understandable.
Good video! When I saw the thumbnail of this video, I first thought that this was a remake of the flight 007 video, but I was surprised to learn that this was an entirely different Korean Air flight. Not only was it surprising to hear about another Korean Air flight being shot down by the Soviet Union, but also that it happened so close to where I live (Finland).
To me, this incident reminded me of Finnair flight 915, which was also allegedly shot at by the Soviets. It could make for an interesting video, although the incident hasn't been reported about all that much, and much of what actually happened on that flight is up to speculation.
Oh wow, that's a new one to me! What an event. That was one lucky plane.
None of these incidents would have occured , if the american spy planes hadnt violated soviet airspace with airplanes that look similar to passenger planes and if the pilots would have interacted with the soviet airspace control
I signed up for air crashes and got a physics lesson, and I am totally down for this.
IKR?! Awesome video😍😍😍
Geographic, too! More proof that the earth is round for those non-believers. lol
the 2 dislikes are from the commanders who ordered the plane to be shot down...
Well looks like the pilot who shot at the plane joined them. There are 3 dislikes now.
@@LovePeaceBeer Now there are four.
@@Bob31415 Ugh is that Kim Jong-un?
@@LovePeaceBeer Lol! Yes.
Now we can't see them
Oh man I was so confused when you started talking about surviving passengers. I guess there are multiple Korean Air Russian air space incidents....
These (1978 and 1983) are the only ones where airliners were shot down.
Thanks for this Chloe, didn't know about this incident :D
The crew should have got a medal for their skills how they landed the plane in that condition and terrain
I thought the same, but everyone in the comments are still so gobsmacked it happened twice, I think they're not there yet. What a story!😬
On one hand yes...on the other it's this crew who did a U turn and then kept going for 3 hours (even though they suspected they were on the wrong heading) bringing their passengers in hostile territory
They dident get a medal but KAL still operates 902 as a 777 as a memorial that the captain landed
I would like to say that your dedication to research, scripting, animations and "very sympathetic and respectful method towards the victims" way of doing your videos is commendable Chloe, fantastic job!!
I've clicked on your "every video from most recent" playlist of 159 videos and I'm absolutely loving every minute of it.
I'm just over half way through it and I've been binge watching the playlist for about 2 days!!!!
your voice is so soothing and the way the information is presented, it really helps me wind down and clear my mind for sleep. i watch a couple of these every night before i rest. please don’t stop these.
The pilots are true heroes, shocking how fear and misunderstandings can have such tragic consequences.
I'm surprised there aren't more documentaries regarding this disaster. I rewatched a news report about the KAL 007 disaster. They mentioned this one a few times in that report. I was a kid during both incidents but hadn't heard of the 1978 incident. There should be more documentaries regarding this incident, since it's very much related to the KAL 007 incident. Or, at least, documentaries should include specific info regarding this incident when covering the KAL 007 one. Anyway, thanks for being pretty much the one and only person to cover this incident!
it was actually so relieving to see a photo of the damaged wall/window of the passenger plane, as it alone confirmed that there was no crash and that the aircraft cabin was intact so that people could later come in to investigate and take pictures
ohhh yes the legend is back. i watched a diff vid on this but it just wasnt the same, i love ur voice and ur presentation
if you're considering doing any more videos on these passenger planes that have been shot down, i think one on iran air flight 655 would be really interesting. think it's important for people to realize that it wasn't just the soviet union making hasty decisions that cost civilian lives, and that one's particularly crazy given that the US shot the plane down in iranian waters. it's brushed last a lot and it really goes to show how US military dominance is so profound that even after that incident, countries were unwilling to go to war directly with the USA.
I really do want to make a video on the Iran Air shoot down. Thankfully the correct plane in the flight simulator just dropped a little while ago. I'm going to put in on my list soon.
You want countries to go to war with USA ???
Although it was an insult that the personnel of the US Navy ship that shot down the Iranian commercial jet were given medals ( I’m unclear as to why ) it still was an accident. They truly thought it was a military jet from what their instruments were telling them. In both the Soviet incidents they knew it was a commercial jet because they were looking directly at it and still shot them down
@@krapeevids6992the second incident happened at night - and the Korean airliner was flying over the Soviet Union in an area where real US spy planes (also made by Boeing, also quadjets) operated and regularly violated Soviet airspace. Given that letting a US spy plane evade could get a Soviet military commander fired, it's really not that strange that they thought it was a legitimate target.
@@krapeevids6992ну конечно американцам всё позволено, горите в аду твари
real
Great job Disaster Breakdown! I never heard about this one. And thanks Patreons for helping. Much appreciated!
Love your videos! 😁 I used to watch Air Crash Investigation on Discovery channel every day when I was young and your videos makes me feel just as intrigued and interested as they did ✈ hello from Shetland! 👋
Thank you for watching. I would love to come to Shetland one day!
you know part of why the Soviet Union was so on edge was because the US made a habit of flying our bombers just within range of their early warning systems before turning around again. (If I'm listening correctly, this video is about the cold war incidents)
My 6th grade classmate's father was the captain on that plane. I still remember he was super distraught and emotional at the time.😥
Thank god this was less catastrophic than flight 007, I thought this would also be a case where all of the passengers died. RIP
So the USSR shot down 2 Korean Airlines jets..
So the Koreans flew in the wrong direction and broke into restricted airspace, not once, but TWICE in less then 10 years, and people think and expected the soviets to do nothing?
@@dout0rm942the pilot who shot down flight 902 knew fully that it was a passenger plane and try to convince his commander that it was not a threat but failed, USSR fault. In the kal007 case, the ussr never made any successful communication with the plane and still shot it down
Great episode, it's rare to find an airplane incident I've never heard of.
2:28. Why is Finland being painted purple? Finland's airspace has never been restricted nor it was a Soviet allie during the cold war. Finnair had to fly northbound as well when flying to Asia.
Never knew this flight before
The pilots’ skill is truely amazing
Had no idea about this event! Thank you!
I honestly thought you were meaning Korean Airlines flight 007. Thanks for the clarification
This is my favorite video that you've done so far! Your visual aids were excellent!
That's honestly incredible there were only two fatalities.
Nice vid!
I always look forward to your new videos!
Love your videos, your production is getting better and better. Keep up the great work.
I've read that the captain later told the passengers that during the flight he began to distrust his navigation equipment, but proceeded anyway.
The *sun* should have been slightly ahead of him, off his left wing as he passed Ellesmere heading to Alaska... instead it was off his right wing and _behind_ him as he approached the Kola Penninsula, one of the most militarised parts of the Soviet Union, home to army, airforce and navy bases including the fleet of nuclear armed submarines...
well done to him on landing the plane, but his attitude stinks as regards making sure the plane is actually going where it's supposed to be going. It's a good thing we have more modern navigation equipment now, as well as an entirely different culture inside the flight deck where both pilots must double check each other, rather than the captain decide to push on rather than risk 'losing face'.
This Korean airliner was equipped with the LORAN navigational system which relied on transmitting stations around the world. The more reliable INS which used three computers and a gyroscope on board the plane was just coming into vogue.
*korean writing and a logo that vaguely looks like a maple leaf*
russian pilot: “ah yes, canadian”
The internet wasn't around back then, their only exposure was whatever pamphlets they gave out that one time to the pilots about what a maple leaf looks like.
And they're flying at a distance from each other.
@@sting2death2 And the Korean letters?
@@infiltr80r Didn't notice them until you've mentioned it, my gaze was take by the large bold English letters.
My point still stands, what's common knowledge now was not back then. Add to it, the conditions to see details is not great.
From the Soviet's perspective, the plane was coming from North America, with some shape that isn't a U.S. flag on the tail.
@@sting2death2 It's also plausible that the Russian pilot was just lying about what he saw.
@@LunaticTheCat Lying to his superiors? What for? What does he have to gain from it? If he was trying to get the plane shot down then why did he argue with command?
These are not public record recordings for propaganda purposes, they were acquired post Soviet collapse.
Love your videos man, keep it up!
How does one not notice their plane made a complete reverse course and the Sun is on the other side?
Very good point. On April 20th, the sun would have been in the sky all day that far north, but maybe they weren't used to caculating that, but you are right, it should have been off their left wing, slightly ahead of them, almost due south of them, but the heading they took, the sun would have been behind them and off their right wing.
Maybe they were over reliant on instruments. When they reached Russian airspace it was about 8pm I'd be interested in finding the report on the incident. I've read a lot of reports due to my previous job, and there was an issue in the past with not double checking things with the other crew because the captain was 'king' .
This was especially true in cultures where saving face was very important and where ex military pilots were given senior positions, even above more experienced and careful pilots.
There have been many avoidable accidents where a co pilot says he doesn't trust the instrument, and the captain over rules him, even though there exists a reason to doubt the instrument, take time to double check their speed altitude and heading so that they can be sure they are actually going where they think they are going.
Sick story.... It'd be nice to see a detailed video on flight 007 as well. Keep of the good job!
He already did a video on that
@@Samsonschizovsky76 You're right! I've just looked up. Thanks!
Oh boy I have been waiting for this video
I fucking love your channel. Great videos sweetie! 🥺💖
thanks for doing this. I only knew about the other korean incident. Im enjoying your videos and very much appreciate you making them.
civilian plane : *exists*
USSR: "ABSOLUTELY UNACCEPTABLE"
A plane that ignored every single attempt of communication and invaded their airspace.
@@dout0rm942🤓
@@dout0rm942 Flight 902 was trying to communicate with the jet, the su15 pilot even try to convince his commander it was not a threat lol, ussr fault. In kal007 case, the ussr never made any successful communication with the plane and still shot it down
a crucial piece of information which is missing from this video and which could explain (no means justify) soviet aggression against airliners violating their airspace is the fact of regular overflights of U-2 (by CIA) and later SR-71 deep into soviet airspace. Pakistan was the main base of US overflights into soviet territory but Iran was also cooperating in ELINT operations against the soviet to gather radar data. not being able to intercept and prevent SR-71 overflights into their airspace the soviets were extremely frustrated and were taking no chance at anything else they could intercept. the shooting down of Korean Airlines Flight 902 was also embarrassing for soviet air force because against all their efforts, they still barely managed to force the airliner into crash landing and demonstrated the vulnerability of soviet air defences.
I really like the shakeup in thumbnail design with this one
But I'm still left wondering, what really made the plane go to the Soviet Union? Did flying right above the magnetic north pole mess up the instruments? Was it pilot error? What was it?
In a way. Remember, the magnetic north pole had shifted slightly, so they may not have known they were actually at the mag N pole. Think of what a compass would do at the mag N pole. No matter which direction you went from there, the compass would be reading that you're heading south. Once off course, there would be no way to know where you actually are anymore until a radar or some kind of fixed radio gave you a position, and there weren't any up there at the time because nobody flew up there.
Also, they were probably not actually quite at the mag N pole, so their navigation told them to make a hard right since that appeared to be the course they were supposed to follow. If just to the left or right of the mag N, the compass would show drastically different readings.
WOW! This video is amazing. What a story, and the fact the pilots landed the plane safely, amazing. Great job.
I hadn't heard of this one. When I saw it I thought it was 007. This guy does a great job finding some of the more obscure incidents. Well done.
Please do the LAPA accident in Argentina, it's I think the only accident we had that I remember off.
Cracks me up. Russia does all of this dumb ass crap all the time, and then, with a perfectly straight face says on national television, Why does everybody think so badly about us.
Sucks to be the pilot who tried to convince his superiors it was just a civilian plane. Gotta feel a lot of guilt.
If the orders are unlawful can't troops disobey?
@@twistedyogert i have no idea if they could in the USSR. I think the technically can in the US, but they are trained not to.
He probably doesn’t feel any guilt at all
@@Samsonschizovsky76 you think all russian are coldblooded?? :/ yikes.. embarassing
@@shanablack5737 I’m not attacking all Russians so what are you talking about? My family comes from the Soviet Union, so I don’t hate Russians. Instead I only hate communists.
Keep up the wonderful work mate
I wonder if somebody tried to analyse as to why the same airliner (KA) twice (this and 007) made such dramatic "mistakes" - moving aways for hundreds of kilometres from the courses and such experienced pilots didn't notice.... and in both cases crossing some very restricted military areas.
Navigational back then was not easy, they didn’t have gps and both plane was not track down by radar when they get shot down
The scientific research
is very well done & the presentation flawless.
First here! This channel is so underrated in my opinion the quality is so high compared to the subscribers
Everyone's first until they refresh
@@riliryrimaddyvia9630 Damn right
One thing that should be noted about Soviet pilots is the fact that the pilot was never allowed to make an independent decision. The pilot was basically at the mercy of superior officers on the ground... a remote controlled fighter puppet, for a lack of a better comparison.
While all other countries steered clear from soviet borders, the Koreans took the risks...and paid the price.
I'm kadonga mayundo from Zambia Ndola I'm a fan of your video
..."Rocket" is a type of unguided projectile, the R-60 (AA-8 "Aphid") is a missile (in the cyrillic alphabet, the Latin "R" looks like "P")...
Few fact to fullfill story, which makes its more fishy:
1) Usualy this route was served by DC-10 with no military counterpart, this time was used, very used (cheaply sold by PANAM to KAL) Boeing 707, RC-135 long range reconnaissance (spy) plane based on 707.
2) Kim Chang-Kyu retired colonel of Korean military tranport force, Korean War veteran. New in KAL. KAL 902 captaing was replaced by him in France few hours before flight.
3) That day, 3 hour before KAL902 violated USSR border, 600 km from place KAL902 was landed, Kosmos 1003 spy satelite was launched from Plesetsk launch pad.
Some others facts:
1) Su-15 have no integral canon, canon pod wasn't attached in time, so plane was armed two different AA rockets.
2) Alexander Bosov identified plane as civilian but received order took it down.
He used heat seeking missile, which hit engine, KAL902 lost air tightness and brough down to low altitude.
Soviet radar lost it, but broken part of wing "flying" was still on radar and considered cruise missile, intercepted and "destroyed" with rocket by another Su-15.
After that 18 more Su-15 searching for KAL902 remains, it was found at 500m altitude searching place for landing.
80(100min by passangers statements) min after first hit, KAL902 landed, and Su-15 pilot transmited coordinates to base, 2 hrs later first searching parties board KAL902.
3) Yoshitaka Sugano died from blood loss during evacuation in helicopter.
4) Su-15 carry two different R-8 rockets, one heat seeking, one radar hooming.
KAL007 was also intercepted by Su-15 with same rockets, heat seeking rockets hit engines, radar hooming rocket shot from behind hit tail feathers, which is fatal, that moment KAL007 was doomed. Same as JAL123 later.
Can’t believe they managed to land it
So, who else thought…wrong flight number….WRONG aircraft!🤣
Boy, sure hope there’s room in my mouth for the other foot! Lol
Great video and collection of info and pics💕🇨🇦
Can't wait for the big vid 👍🏻
really interesting incident and great video on it!
It amazes me flying is considered the safest way to travel. I call bs. If today if we heard the number of fatalities traveling via air vs automobile I choose stay where you are. Hitchhike. Or walk. You’ll get arrested for hitchhiking these days, but at least you’re alive. I thank these air travel channels.
I never want to fly again
If you got a flight everyday of ur life, it would take 19,000 years before you would be in an fatal accident (1 fatality or more)
I heard about one incident where the Soviet Union shot down a plane which strayed into Russian territory - not sure if it was this or the slightly later one. I remember when the USSR collapsed, the minister who had kept the black boxes in a safe in his office, handed them over to the US as a peace gesture saying he’d never felt comfortable keeping them. One of the best videos you’ve made, or rather one I personally found really interesting. I’d love to see more videos of planes shot down.
that happened in the later one for sure (maybe something similar happened with this one too though)
Thankfully majority of the passengers survived to tell the truth, otherwise there would be nasty cover up of the story.
I remember seing a picture of that plane at the frozen lake in my granfather's old car magazine with had a story about that crash. I remember being amazed by how the ice didn't breake underneath that plane😲😮
Can we just make a rule of not shooting at Jumbo jets?
Great video! Im noticing this was released about 5.5 months ago. you say you are working on a 45min+ video (I'm super excited to see it). I have noticed you don't have any videos around this size, so I'm assuming it has not come out yet. Is that video still going ahead? :)
these incidents I'm interested in. good video
I love the bonus history and earth science lessons! That was a good surprise.
Imagine how awful Russian pilot felt when he was forced to shot down a civilian airliner despite his protests
I read in the Russian sources he was actually second in line to shoot down the KAL-007. His plane was raised, but it was other pilot that fired the missile. He was transferred to the Soviet Far East, Bosov was his name.
How is this incident not more well known?
Probably because it was overshadowed by Korean Airlines Flight 007 where the death toll was much higher
If I had a nickel for every time the Soviet Union shot down a Korean passenger plane, I'd have two nickels. Not a whole lot, but it's weird that it happened twice.
Hi Chloe….brilliant narration of the very under the radar story that I can barely remember from 1978. The KAL007 is prominent though as it was a horrendous incident and the then, USSR, seemingly just got away with it. Does that sound familiar? I hope you do a vlog on that one? I fully endorse your work as first-rate and thank you for the professional approach you take to a special vocation to many of us, and treat so respectfully. Best Beau
It must've been something else to fly aboard a jet. Quiet, smooth, and fast.
Noo im 2 hours late btw great video I enjoy a lot of your content
loved the vid, keep it up!
txs for the video..till now I have heard only of KAL 007...
Accoroding to what I read in the late Russian accounts of this incident, the Soviet pilot did identify this plane as civilian with hieroglyphical inscription on its board, which means, it was not confused for being a Canadian airliner.
Yo wait, so this happened twice!?
Was it possible that the Soviet pilot intended to miss the vital part of the plane? I mean how could a trained fighter pilot missed such a big target.
The R-60 missile is a small, short-range missile intended for smallish targets like fighters and, like most air-to-air missiles, is proximity-fused, so it explodes near the target and the resulting shrapnel does the damage.
Missiles ain't reliable. A lot of them missed during Vietnam and the AIM-54 was the most expensive piece of junk to fit on a Tomcat.
Amazing landing👍
I had no idea about this one! That's crazy
The worst thing you can do when getting on a plane is take a photo onboard before takeoff and think it will never happen to you at 35’000 it’s too late your dead
at 10:00 "at the Russian Karelia". No. That is Soviet-occupied Karelia. Occupied by Soviet during WW2. My grandfather defended Finland from Soviet aggression in Karelia / Mannerheim line. Finland was the only country that the Soviets attacked during WW2 that managed to partly defend itself despite the "allies" having an arms embargo against Finland. Put the price for freedom was high. Over 5% of the population died during WW2. Almost all men 18-22 died. It is not Russian territory. Occupied Finnish territory.
Hello. Thanks for the information. My apologies, I'll do better when addressing is region next time.
"It is not Russian territory. Occupied Finnish territory" - ...Ha-ha-ha!🤣
There were thousands of wars that have been waged throughout the long European history and almost all of them resulted in territorial changes. You can literally point at every place on the map and tell that it's occupied because it used to belong to someone else X years/centuries ago.
You sure got triggered. Anyway, only a small part of Karelia can be claimed as "Soviet-occupied Karelia".
Why so salty
7:58 Although the Su-15 is one of my fav cold war interceptors; it had poor cockpit visibility.
I never knew why they where never escorted with a mig-23 for visual confirmations since it also is also more stable for slow air speeds (like escorting airliners).
The Su-15 is an interceptor whereas the MiG is an air-supiority fighter. Interceptors are fast, which makes them suitable for this kind of intercepting mission
Probably due to what available at the time. In the far east, PVO probably had more SU-15 available than Mig-23P as more su-15 were in service.
@@Magtf_hikaroo There was interceptor version of MiG-23 (P version to be exact) which was used by USSR Air Defence.
From this egregious military act, I’m amazed to learn that Soviets were able to get their hands on a mint condition, written off 707 - right in their lap - and rather than improve the god-awful systems & avionics of the TU-154 (crew of 5 in production until ‘02), and the like , the Soviets promptly scrapped it and learned nothing. Huge fumble.
I actually would like to see you cover Iran Air 655 or Malaysia Airlines 17 one day since they are the two deadliest aircraft shoot downs of all time.
The Iran Air incident is one I have wanted to do for a long time. I really should get round to it.
@@DisasterBreakdown Yeah, I mean since you have done KAL 007, it only seems natural really. But whenever you got the time to as well, of course. :)
YES 45 min MEGA upload!
"The Soviet Union did not co-operate", what a shock.🙄
Who would have guessed it?
The US refused to recognize they had shot down a passenger flight and killed 200 people for years.