Site Near Beirut, Lebanon Crew 5 Aircraft type Douglas DC-4 Number of deaths 24 Operator Ariana Afghan Airlines | Passengers 22 Fatalities 24 Date 21 November 1959 Injuries (nonfatal) 3 Location Lebanon | |
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Survivors 3 (2 died later at hospital) Destination Hamid Karzai International Airport Similar Southeast Airlines Flight 308, TAI Flight 307, 1959 Transair Douglas, American Airlines Flight 514, Braniff Flight 542 | ||
Ariana Afghan Airlines Flight 202, a Douglas DC-4, registration YA-BAG, was an international scheduled flight from Lebanon, bound for Afghanistan with scheduled stops in Mehrabad Airport, Iran, and Kandahar International Airport, Afghanistan. On November 21, 1959, two minutes after takeoff on runway 18, the aircraft crashed into the side of a hill at hills of Aramoun near Beirut. A small cabin fire erupted shortly after the crash, killing 24 of the 27 passengers on board. The 3 surviving passengers were taken to hospital in Beirut. 2 of them later died at the hospital.
Cause
The investigation found that the day before November 20, 1959, after a flight from Frankfurt, the flight was delayed for 20 hours due to technical difficulties. Two causes were proposed: