Crash in the sky collision of planes. Collision over Lake Constance: how Ossetians took revenge on the Swiss air traffic controller. Additional system problems

A tragic story, namely: " Airplane collision in the sky took place in June 2002.

City Ufa. Both Christians and adherents of Islam have been living in peace in this city for centuries. That year, the most talented children and teenagers from Ufa were invited to a two-week vacation in Barcelona. The trip was sponsored by UNESCO. The most intelligent, developed and gifted children were supposed to take part in it. For example, Kirill Dekhtyarev has been drawing since the age of 4. For 10 years of practice he had two solo exhibitions.

Kirill's mother: It was a very interesting vacation. So we agreed to the trip. Kirill finished the 9th grade and he needed to rest. And it was a good option.

Alina Khananova, a 12-year-old gymnast, was also going on a trip. By that time, she had already won several prestigious competitions.

Alina's mother: We were very happy about the trip. There actually flew very smart and gifted children. Unusual in both beauty and intelligence.

45 children from Ufa, together with their teachers, went to Moscow by train. There they were waiting for the plane on which they were supposed to fly to Spain. But already in Moscow the first troubles began. The travel agency messed up and sent the kids to the wrong airport. The guys missed their flight and were very upset. While the agency did its best to correct its mistake, the children were given a tour of the Russian capital. It took 2 days to find another plane.

On July 1, 2002, children from Ufa boarded a plane at the Moscow airport. The Kaloev family was also on board. They were not included in the group from Ufa. They flew to Spain to meet their father, a famous architect. At that time he was finishing another project near Barcelona. The plane was flown by 5 people. Captain Alexander Gross has worked in aviation for 30 years. The co-pilot was Oleg Gregoriev. But in fact, he was the acting captain. He had to observe the actions of Gross and evaluate them.

At about 11 pm, the Tu-154 flight 2937 of Bashkir Airlines took off from Moscow. Like most modern aircraft, the Tu-154 was equipped with the TCAS dangerous movement warning system. This system works based on repeaters installed in each aircraft. TCAS detects transponder waves and calculates if there are any intersecting flights on the route. If the system detects the slightest danger of a collision, it warns the pilots and advises what action to take.

Hundreds of kilometers away in the Italian town of Bergamo, a Boeing 757 was taking off. He made a flight commissioned by the international cargo company DHL. This plane was bound for Brussels. The Russian Tu-154 had to miss a Boeing 757 in the sky over southern Germany. There were only 2 people on board the cargo plane: Captain Paul Philipps and his first officer, Brand Compioni. The Boeing 757 took off at 23:06 and headed for its last flight.

A few hours beforemid-air collision, the night shift began at the mission control center in Zurich (Switzerland). Peter Nielsen has been working in this dispatch center for 8 years. The center was responsible for the safety of flights in the skies over southern Germany and northern Switzerland. 2 operators were supposed to be working that night. But there were few planes in their zone, and Nielsen's colleague went to rest. This was a common practice in mission control. From that moment on, Peter Nilson was in charge of all air traffic, which was tracked on two screens. At 23:10 two technicians came. They told Peter that they needed to do a technical inspection of the main radar. While they were checking it, the signal on the screen came slower than usual. In addition, the collision warning signal was turned off. The technicians also cut off all telephone lines. Then no one realized that the first steps towards the tragedy had already been taken.

A Russian plane with schoolchildren flew over central Germany and approached Switzerland. Captain Grigoriev received the last instructions from the German controllers. After that, the German center gave the Tu-154 under the care of Switzerland, and personally to Peter Nielsen. At this time, a Boeing 757 also entered Swiss airspace. Boeing 757 captain Paul Philipps asked for permission to increase flight altitude. Boeing 757 climbed to a height of 11 kilometers. A Russian plane was flying at the same altitude. But there was a great distance between them. There was no danger yet.

Nilson's assistant gave him a new assignment. It was necessary to help the Airbus land at one of the airports in Switzerland. Since Nilsen was watching two screens at once, he wanted to pass this task on to controllers from the Airbus destination. However, telephone lines were not working. A large plane requested a landing, and the controller had to look away from one screen, leaving the Tu-154 unattended. At the same time, several planes called Nielsen, and he was occupied by them. Dispatchers are accustomed to a restless and tense robot, however, that night, some warning devices did not work. For the third time Nilsen tried to call the airport control post, but the phones still did not work.

At that time Boeing 757 and Tu-154 flew towards each other at great speed. The team of none of the aircraft did not suspect that they had 2.5 minutes left before the collision. Boeing 757 was approaching the Swiss-German border. The Russian Tupolev flew to the same point, at the same height. Finally, one of the German mission control centers noticed the danger. The dispatcher grabbed the phone to alert Nielsen of the situation, but he couldn't get through to him. International aviation regulations did not allow him to address pilots directly.

Unexpectedly, the TCAS system went off on board the Tu-154. A few minutes later, the system aboard the Boeing 757 detected the Russian plane. The Russian pilots were puzzled. They didn't know how high the Boeing was flying. At the same time, the pilot of the cargo aircraft began to descend on the command of the TCAS system. Finally, Peter Nielsen noticed the danger himself. He ordered the Tu-154 to descend. Captain Gross turned off the autopilot and began to descend. But the TCAS system told the Russian pilots to climb. The dispatcher repeated that the Tu-154 should descend immediately. At that time, he believed that he had prevented plane crash and collision in the sky. But he did not know that the Boeing 757 pilots received instructions from the onboard TCAS system, and she also ordered them to descend. They tried to tell Nielsen about their descent, but he was busy with other planes and did not hear them. If both planes had followed the instructions of the onboard security system, nothing would have happened. But the Tu-154 chose to obey the operator, and the aircraft again flew at the same height. Alarms sounded in the cockpits of both aircraft. Tu-154 pilots realized their mistake too late, and the planes collided in the sky. The tail of the Boeing 757 seemed to rip open the Russian aircraft and cut it into two parts. The pilots almost immediately lost consciousness. The Boeing 757 crew fought for their lives for another 2 minutes. They fell 7 kilometers from the Tu-154 crash site.

Peter Nielsen did not yet know what had happened. But soon neither the passenger nor the cargo plane got in touch. At the mission control center, they realized that the planes had collided. This is a nightmare for any dispatcher.

The wreckage of two planes fell near the small town of Überlingen. It was the worst plane crash in post-war German history.

Eyewitness: The sky was orange. We saw bright sparks that fell down. And also explosions. All over again. Surprisingly, nothing fell on the houses. But next to our school, we found the bodies of dead children. We soon realized that there was nothing we could do to help.

Policeman: The problem was that the bodies and debris were scattered over a vast area of ​​40 square kilometers. It was a corridor 12 kilometers long and 2 wide. We have conducted the largest search operation in our history.

The search operation continued for a week. 6000 people took part in it. Everything was literally littered with rubble. Many trees were burned down due to the fire. As a result, many Ufa children were buried in Überlingen. 28 children's bodies were found in that area.

Vitaliy Kaloev was waiting for his family in Barcelona. He was one of the first to arrive at the crash site. Although the police did not want him to take part in the search for the bodies, Vitaly insisted. In the grass, he found a torn pearl necklace. It belonged to his 4 year old daughter. Also, nearby, he found her body.

Policeman: Two days after the crash, relatives of the victims began to arrive. But they were not shown the bodies of the children, because they were all badly disfigured. There was a lot of crying.

Ufa has become a city of sorrow. People of different religions were shocked by what had happened. Over time, a separate cemetery was established there for the victims of the tragedy. Also, a monument was opened in the form of a chain of paper airplanes, which froze in their flight. Vitaliy Kaloev lost his entire family in a plane crash. In their memory, he erected a huge monument.

Work continued at the Skyguide control center in Zurich. However, everyone was shocked. Over the next three weeks, the schedule of the dispatch center was relaxed. Peter Nielsen has never worked at operator stations for longer.

Dispatcher: If you've been through this, you'll never go back to your old job. This is too deep a shock.

As always, after the tragedy, the search for the perpetrators began. First of all, suspicion fell on the Russian crew.

Expert: The pilot of the Russian aircraft did not comply with repeated orders. SystemTCASmany times asked him to change the height.

Over time, Peter Nilson became the prime suspect. It was he who controlled the movement of aircraft. The media added fuel to the fire. They made history more and more. Journalists took excerpts from the words of professionals and compiled the text they needed. The dispatcher was simply driven out by the press. They called him a killer.

The official investigation was carried out by German air crash detectives. On the fifth day, they found the "black boxes" with the aircraft's flight recorders. Also, all the wreckage was taken to a special hangar. They had hard work ahead of them.

A year later, many relatives of the victims again came to Überlingen for the first anniversary of the tragedy. The Germans built a monument at the crash site. They were huge silver pearls on a torn necklace. The anniversary was attended by Peter Nilson, as well as Vitaly Kaloev.

As a result of their work, the investigators learned incredible facts about the TCAS system. When it was just put into operation, a gross mistake was made. No one has ever said what to do if the TCAS and operator center instructions are opposite of each other. There was no specific order to the pilots what to do. Pilots in the west are taught to obey TCAS first. In the rest of the world, one has only to guess whose order is correct.

Expert: In Russian civil aviation, there were cases when pilots did not follow the orders of the dispatcher, and this led to tragedy.

The prerequisites for this tragedy appeared in a year and a half. A similar disaster nearly occurred when two airliners nearly collided mid-air over Japan. They were so close that they could see each other's faces through the windows. Then a bold maneuver saved the planes from disaster. The reason for the danger was that the pilots listened to the operator, and not the onboard TCAS system. There were also 4 dangerous situations in Europe. In all of them, the pilots listened to the controller, not the TCAS system. Unfortunately, these incidents did not serve as a warning. Bureaucratic standards were played, and the relevant services did not respond properly.

Expert: If I have to put together the conclusions and give advice to the pilots - it is obvious. If a warning comes from the systemTCAS,pilots must immediately follow the instructions received.

Unfortunately, condolences could no longer console the parents of Ufa children. Vitaliy Kaloev was seized by the idea that he must find the culprit in the disaster. To do this, he went to Zurich. On February 24, 2004, he came to the house of Peter Nielsen and killed him.

Expert: The murder of the flight operator was very sad news. The worst thing is that he was not to blame for the disaster.. The reason was the quality of the call center systems. The leaders were guiltySkyguide", which did not provide the controllers with the necessary equipment.

What made the tragedy inevitable?

1. First, Peter's colleagues went to rest, leaving him alone.
2. Secondly, the engineers, by order of the management, began repair work.

Unbeknownst to the controller, many hazard warning systems were disabled. The need to land a passenger Airbus also played a role. Peter couldn't pass the plane's landing on to someone else because the phones didn't work. In fact, he was deprived of all technical support. Finally, when the Boeing 757 pilots began their descent, they could not tell the operator about the situation due to the fact that all frequencies were busy.

The investigation of this catastrophe took 22 months. Skyguide apologized to the families of the victims. However, many will never be able to forget the tragedy of Überlingen.

Collision of two planes

Pilot and air traffic controller error

Near the city of Überlingen,

47.778333 , 9.173889

Computer modulation of disaster

Collision over Lake Constance- an aviation accident that occurred on July 1, 2002, when the Tu-154M aircraft, performing Flight 2937 of Bashkir Airlines, collided in the air with a Boeing-757, DHL flight 611. The collision took place near the city of Überlingen, near Lake Constance (). The crash claimed the lives of everyone on board both aircraft (71 people, including 52 children).

Previous events

Tu-154M "Bashkir Airlines", tail number RA-85816, followed the route Moscow - Barcelona. On board were 12 crew members and 57 passengers, including 52 children who flew on vacation to Spain. This trip was organized by the Committee for UNESCO of Bashkiria as an encouragement for good studies.

The group had missed their flight the day before. Bashkir Airlines, at the request of the travel companies involved in the trip, urgently organized an additional flight. Other late passengers were also offered to board it, in total 8 tickets were sold for the flight.

Skyguide's management tolerated for several years only one controller in control of air traffic at night when his partner was resting, and did not provide enough personnel to change this practice. In addition, on the night of the collision, the equipment that alerts the controller to the danger of a collision between aircraft was turned off for maintenance. Phones were also turned off. Because of this, Nielsen, at a critical moment, was unable to agree with Friedrichshafen Airport, so that they would take care of the plane arriving with a delay, which he followed from another terminal. For the same reason, the dispatchers in Karlsruhe, who saw the dangerous approach of the aircraft, could not warn Nielsen about this.

The Commission also noted that the ICAO documents governing the use of TCAS and, as a result, the documents that guided the Tu-154 crew were incomplete and partially contradictory. Although, on the one hand, they contained a direct prohibition of performing maneuvers that contradicted TCAS prompts, on the other hand, this system was called auxiliary, which could give the impression that the controller's instructions take precedence.

Prior to this disaster, there were several dangerous close encounters due to the fact that the crew of one aircraft followed the TCAS prompts, while the crew of the other made maneuvers contrary to them. However, the necessary clarifications were not published until after the disaster.

Dispatcher murder

Monument to the victims of the plane crash and Peter Nielsen at the Skyguide office

The air traffic controller who controlled the colliding planes was killed on the threshold of his house on February 24, 2004. Vitaly Kaloev was arrested on suspicion of murder, having lost his wife and two children in the crash. Kaloev stated that he showed Nielsen photographs of the children and wanted Nielsen to apologize to him for what had happened. Nielsen hit Kaloev's hand, knocking out the photos. According to Vitaly Kaloev, he does not remember what happened after that. On October 26, 2005, he was found guilty of murder and sentenced to eight years in prison.

Skyguide Trial

In May 2006, a lawsuit began on charges against eight employees of the company. The final decision was made in September 2007. Four of Skyguide's managers were found guilty of manslaughter. Three of them were sentenced to probation, one to a fine. Four other defendants are acquitted .

The memory of the dead

Monument "Die zerrissene Perlenkette"

At the site of a plane crash near the city of Überlingen, a monument "Die zerrissene Perlenkette" ("Broken string of pearls") was erected.

Ten years ago, a plane crash occurred in the skies over Germany, which killed 52 children and 19 adults - passengers and crew of a Tu-154 and a cargo Boeing-757, which collided as a result of a mistake by Swiss air traffic controllers.

On the night of July 1-2, 2002 in Germany in the area of ​​Lake Constance, a Russian passenger airliner Tu-154 of the Bashkir Airlines company, operating a charter flight from Moscow to Barcelona (Spain), and a Boeing-757 cargo plane of the international air transportation company DHL, flying from Bergamo (Italy) to Brussels (Belgium). On board the Tu-154 were 12 crew members and 57 passengers - 52 children and five adults. Most of the children were sent on vacation to Spain as a reward for excellent studies by the UNESCO Committee of Bashkiria. By a tragic accident, on the plane - Svetlana Kaloeva with 10-year-old Kostya and 4-year-old Diana, who flew to her husband, Vitaly Kaloev, in Spain, where he worked under a contract. The cargo Boeing was flown by two pilots.

From the collision, the Tu-154 fell apart in the air into several parts that fell in the vicinity of the German city of Überlingen.

The crash resulted in 52 children and 19 adults.

The tragedy occurred a few minutes after German air traffic controllers handed over escort of the Russian aircraft to Swiss colleagues from the SkyGuide air control center operating at one of the largest European airports, Zurich-Kloten (Switzerland).

That night, at the Skyguide air traffic control center, there was one controller on duty instead of the usual two - Peter Nielsen. He gave the Tu-154 crew a command to descend when the approaching aircraft could no longer occupy safe echelons.

The main equipment for telephone communication and automatic notification of the personnel of the center about the dangerous approach of aircraft was turned off. The main and backup telephone lines were not working. The dispatcher from the German city of Karlsruhe, who noticed the dangerous approach of the planes, tried 11 times to get through - and to no avail.

After the plane crash, Nielsen was suspended from work, and the Swiss investigating authorities launched a criminal investigation against Skyguide and its management.

February 24, 2004 Peter Nielsen in the Zurich suburb of Kloten by a Russian citizen Vitaly Kaloev, who lost his entire family in a plane crash over Lake Constance - his wife, daughter and son. On this day, Kaloev came to the dispatcher's house to show him photographs of his dead wife and children, but Nielsen pushed him away, and the photographs fell to the ground, which led to the loss of control over the grief-stricken man.

In October 2005, Kaloev was convicted of the murder and. In November 2007, he was released early and returned to his homeland, North Ossetia. In 2008, Vitaliy Kaloev in construction and architecture of the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania.

Immediately after the disaster, the Swiss company Skyguide put all the blame on the Russian pilots, who, in their opinion, did not understand the instructions of the controller in English well.

In May 2004, the German Federal Aviation Accident Investigation Office issued a report on the results of the crash investigation.

Experts acknowledged that in the collision of a Tu-154 passenger airliner of Bashkir Airlines with a cargo Boeing from Skyguide.

The control center in Zurich did not notice in time the danger of two planes colliding at the same echelon. The crew of the Russian Tu-154 carried out the dispatcher's command to descend, despite the fact that the on-board flight safety system TIKAS required an urgent climb.

Only after the publication of the report, Skyguide admitted its mistakes and, two years after the disaster, its director Alain Rossier apologized to the families of the victims. On May 19, 2004, Swiss President Joseph Deiss sent an official letter of apology to Russian President Vladimir Putin for the plane crash over Lake Constance.

In December 2006, Skyguide director Alain Rossier.

In September 2007, the district court in Bülach, Switzerland, found four employees of the Skyguide air traffic control service guilty of criminal negligence that led to a plane crash over Lake Constance. In total, eight employees of the Swiss company appeared before the court. Defendants, shifting it to the murdered dispatcher Peter Nielsen.

Four Skyguide managers in manslaughter. Three of them were sentenced to probation, one to a fine. Four other defendants are acquitted.

The Skyguide company offered the families of the victims of the disaster certain compensation, provided that their claim was not considered in one of the US courts. Some of the families did not agree with this proposal, and at a meeting of the committee of parents of dead children in June 2004 in Ufa, in which 29 people took part, there was, including the payment of compensation, in court.

On July 1, 2004, it became known that lawsuits were filed in the US and Spanish courts against the Swiss air traffic control service Skyguide, who lost their relatives in a plane crash over Lake Constance.

In February 2010, the Federal Administrative Court of Switzerland opened a memorial complex dedicated to the victims of the crash.

In 2004, at the scene of a tragedy in the German city of Überlingen in a plane crash, which is a torn necklace, the pearls of which scattered along the trajectory of the wreckage of two aircraft.

In 2006, in Zurich, opposite the Skyguide building, there was a spiral, on which 72 candles were installed in memory of 71 victims of a plane crash and a killed air traffic controller.

The material was prepared on the basis of information from RIA Novosti and open sources

Fifteen years have passed since the tragedy occurred in the skies over Germany. The 2002 plane crash over Lake Constance claimed the lives of 71 single people, most of whom were children.

plane crash

The plane crash occurred in 2002 on the night of the first to the second of July in the area of ​​Lake Constance in the sky over Germany. The collision of two aircraft claimed the lives of 19 adults and 52 children. Almost all the victims are passengers of the Russian Tu-154m airliner, on which the children flew on vacation to Spain. The plane belonged to the Bashkir Airlines, it was on a charter flight from Moscow to Spain (Barcelona).

The second aircraft involved in the collision, a Boeing-757 of the international air transportation company HDL, was traveling from Italy (Bergamo) to Belgium (Brussels). On board the Tu-154M were 57 passengers, of which only five were adults, and 52 were children, as well as 12 crew members.

Airplane passengers

Many children were among those killed in the 2002 plane crash over Lake Constance. This is due to the fact that they flew to rest in Spain. Talented students were rewarded with a trip for high academic achievements. The UNESCO Committee provided vouchers for Bashkir children.

random events

Already after the collision over Lake Constance, it was found out that the event was preceded by a whole series of fatal accidents, which could have been ignored if there had been no trouble. Bashkir children were not supposed to fly at all that night. By chance, the accompanying adults brought them to the wrong airport. Instead of Domodedovo, from where their plane flew to Barcelona, ​​they ended up in Sheremetyevo. Naturally, they missed their flight.

Many schoolchildren who went on vacation were children of high-ranking officials. So, for example, the fifteen-year-old daughter of the head of the administration under the President of Bashkiria, Leysan Gimaeva, was on board.

If there were children from ordinary families in the group, then for sure they would just go home, missing the plane. Schoolchildren, of course, would be disappointed, but they would still be alive.

However, events developed in a completely different scenario. Influential parents decided to send a Bashkir Airlines plane to Moscow, which could take the children to Spain on a charter flight. The head of the crew of the airliner was Alexander Gross, who had previously flown to Barcelona and knew the route perfectly.

After the schoolchildren boarded the plane, it turned out that there were several more empty seats available. It was decided at lightning speed to sell these seven tickets. So gradually the number of future victims increased.

Four tickets were purchased by the Shislovsky family from Belarus, who missed their flight, and therefore were forced to fly another one. Three more tickets went to a resident of North Ossetia, Svetlana Kaloeva with two children, who flew to her husband Vitaly, who worked under a contract in Spain. After the collision over Lake Constance, the names of random passengers were not immediately clarified.

How it was...

On the fateful night before the plane crash over Lake Constance, both subsequently colliding airliners were in the sky above Germany itself, but for some reason the leadership of their movement was transferred to the Swiss company Skynide, located in Zurich. In this flight center, as a rule, only three people worked at night: an assistant and two dispatchers. However, it was on this terrible night that only one person was on duty. It was Peter Nielsen, who had to track two terminals at once.

When the controller noticed something was wrong, the liners were already in line at a distance of 36,000 feet, which meant that only seconds remained before the collision. Why the duty officer discovered the problem so late is unknown, but a plane crash over Lake Constance was already almost inevitable. However, in this situation, one could try to do something to save the situation. But, unfortunately, Peter Nelson got it completely wrong. Either he was not ready for such emergency situations, or he was simply confused ... But his erroneous commands led to the death of many people.

Incorrect dispatcher commands

When Peter Nelson realized that the courses of the liners intersect, and they are inexorably approaching each other, he tried to correct the situation. That is why he gave the command to the Russian plane to go down. It is worth noting that at this moment the crew itself noticed the approach of the other side from the left side. The pilots were ready to perform a maneuver in order to disperse safely.

However, after a command from the ground controller on board the Russian aircraft, the automatic TCAS system worked, which warns of the danger of approach. So, she informed about the need to climb.

At the same time, an identical system worked on the Boeing, prompting the pilots to climb. Perhaps the catastrophe could have been avoided if these commands had been carried out on both aircraft. The co-pilot of the Russian airliner immediately noticed a discrepancy between the commands of the dispatcher and TCAS, which he immediately informed the rest of the team. But I received an answer that ground commands would be carried out. Moreover, the order to decline was received again.

Whose mistake caused the tragedy?

It is difficult to blame the pilots in the plane crash over Lake Constance, because they followed the commands from the ground, as the instructions prescribe. Later, the investigation will establish the cause of the disaster - the untimely command of the dispatcher Peter Nielsen. He gave erroneous information to the Russian pilots that there was a board to their right. Deciphering the black boxes showed that the team was simply misled. The pilots, relying on the dispatcher, considered that there was another aircraft to their right, which the TCAS system did not detect, because it is no secret that ground-based installations provide more accurate data, and on-board instruments can fail for some reason.

Considering that pilots have only fractions of a second to make important decisions, and confusion in such situations is tantamount to death, the team followed the instructions of the ground officer. It remains a mystery why none of the pilots informed Peter Nielsen that his command contradicted the messages of the automatic safety system. Perhaps there just wasn't enough time for it.

Aircraft collision

After the dispatcher's command, an air crash over Lake Constance was inevitable. Both liners went down. The Russian board at the same time carried out the command of Peter Nielsen, and the Boeing worked according to the instructions of the TCAS system. Both teams reported their actions to the ground controller, but Peter Nielsen did not hear one of the teams, since they both communicated at the same time on different frequencies. And if at that time there were several people on duty in the control room, as it should be, the information would be heard in time.

In the last seconds before the plane crash over Lake Constance, the pilots of the two planes, as best they could, tried to avoid the collision by deflecting the controls. However, their attempts were in vain. The collision of the liners occurred almost at a right angle. An HDL cargo plane crashed into a Russian one, causing the Tu-154M to split in half at a ten-kilometer altitude. The wreckage of the liner fell apart into four parts, scattered in the vicinity of the town of Iberlingen. And the remains of the Boeing were found seven kilometers from the Russian airliner.

Air crash investigation

The tragedy over Lake Constance was the cause of long investigations. Since the disaster occurred over Germany, the German Federal Office was involved in the investigation. The commission's first conclusions were given only two years later.

The report presented the following reasons for the plane crash over Lake Constance involving Tu-154 and Boeing:

1. The air traffic controller failed to properly ensure the separation of the liners in time.
2. The instruction for the descent was given too late.

Subsequently, all charges were dropped from the pilots.

In the course of the investigation, a number of other circumstances were clarified. As it turned out, the telephone communication equipment and the automatic notification of the approach of the liners of the mission control center were turned off for unknown reasons. The backup telephone lines also did not work. A more responsible dispatcher from the city of Karlsruhe in Germany noticed the approach of the planes and repeatedly tried to get through to the point where Nielsen was on duty, but all attempts were unsuccessful.

Immediately after the disaster, Peter Nielsen was suspended from work until the causes and circumstances of the tragedy were clarified. As for the Skyguide company, the investigating authorities organized a criminal investigation against it.

The results of the disaster

Immediately after the crash, the Skyguide company blamed the pilots of the Russian airliner for the events. According to them, the crew carried out the commands incorrectly, because they did not understand the instructions of the dispatcher in English. Only in 2004 did the German Federal Office publish the official conclusion of the results of the investigation. According to the conclusion, the dispatcher from Skyguide was responsible for the collision. Only after the publication of the results of the investigation, the company admitted its guilt. Only two years later, the director of the company bothered to apologize to the families of those who died that terrible night. And on May 19, 2004, Joseph Deiss (President of Sweden) sent an official document to Vladimir Putin apologizing for what had happened.

And only in December 2006, Alain Rossier resigned from his position as director of Skyguide.

And in September 2007, the court in the Swiss town of Bülach convicted four Skyguide employees of negligence in their duties, which led to the tragedy. In total, eight people who worked for the Swiss company appeared before the court. The defendants refused to admit their guilt, shifting all responsibility to Peter Nielsen, who had already died at that time. And yet, four managers were found guilty of manslaughter by the court.

All of them were given different punishments. Three workers were given only suspended sentences, and one was given only a fine.

Consequences of the 2002 disaster

After the crash of the planes, the series of troubles did not end. Heartbroken relatives could not stand the tests that fell on them, some families broke up after the tragedy. The tragedy took a lot of lives. The list of those killed in the disaster over Lake Constance initially consisted of the names of 52 children and 19 adults. However, on February 24, 2004, the lists were supplemented by another surname - Nielsen.

The same dispatcher, through whose fault the cancerous error occurred, was killed by Vitaly Kaloev, whose children and wife accidentally became passengers on the ill-fated flight. The court considered the case for a year. And in October 2005, he pleaded guilty to Kaloev, sentencing him to eight years in prison. However, given the severe mental state of the man, as well as all the circumstances of the case, the term was subsequently reduced to five years. Three years later, Kaloev was released for good behavior, after which he returned to North Ossetia.

Memorial to the dead

At the site of the tragedy in 2004, a memorial was erected to those who died in a plane crash over Lake Constance - a broken string of pearls symbolizes the scattered wreckage of the aircraft. The idea for creating such a monument was the pearl necklace of the girl Diana (daughter of that same Kaloev), found at the site of the tragedy.

Almost all the victims of the disaster were buried at the Southern Cemetery in Ufa. Their graves were arranged according to how people sat on the plane.

Silent reminder

Another memorial reminds of that tragedy. In Zurich in 2006, next to the building of the Skyguide company, a stone and glass monument was erected in the form of a spiral, along which 72 candles are located, symbolizing 71 victims of the disaster and one dispatcher.

Disaster movie

The terrible tragedy and its further consequences, as well as the act of Vitaliy Kaloev formed the basis of the film "Consequences", filmed in the USA. Of course, much of it was changed and the action was moved to America, but it was the 2002 plane crash that served as the basis for filming. The main character of the film was played by Arnold Schwarzenegger. His name is Roman Melnik, he has been living and working in the USA for a long time. And now his pregnant wife and daughter are finally flying to him. That is why a monument to three will be erected on the grave ... As in a real story, Melnik himself finds his daughter's beads and her body. And also goes crazy in search of those responsible for the tragedy. The company whose dispatcher caused the disaster offers him compensation, but he does not understand why the culprit of the accident is still at large. The miller goes to the dispatcher's house with a knife and everything happens according to the same scenario as in real life. Only some details are changed by the director, who managed to convey on the screen the incredible experiences of the protagonist.

In April, the film "Consequences" will be released with Arnold Schwarzenegger about the Russian Vitaly Kaloev, whose family died in a plane crash over Lake Constance in 2002. 478 days after the tragedy, Vitaliy Kaloev killed an air traffic controller, due to whose mistake his wife and two children died.

In July 2002, Russian architect Vitaly Kaloev was working in Spain. He completed the construction of a cottage near Barcelona, ​​handed over the object to the customer and was waiting for his family, whom he had not seen for nine months. Svetlana with her children, 11-year-old son Konstantin and 4-year-old daughter Diana, could not buy a plane ticket in any way. And only three hours before departure at the airport, she was offered last-minute tickets on board that same plane.

The Tu-154 pilots had not yet seen the Boeing approaching from the left, but they were ready for the fact that they would have to perform a maneuver to diverge from it. Therefore, they began their descent immediately after receiving the controller's command (in fact, even before it was completed). However, immediately after that, a command from the automatic proximity warning system (TCAS) sounded in the cockpit, informing about the need to climb. Simultaneously, the pilots of Flight 611 received instructions from the same system to descend.

One of the crew members drew the attention of the others to the TCAS command, he was told that the controller had given the command to descend. Because of this, no one confirmed the receipt of the command (although the plane was already descending). A few seconds later, Nilsen repeated the command, this time its receipt was immediately acknowledged. At the same time, he mistakenly reported incorrect information about another aircraft, saying that it was to the right of the Tu-154. As the transcript of the flight recorders later showed, some of the pilots of Flight 2937 were misled by this message and may have thought that there was another aircraft not visible on the TCAS screen. Tu-154 continued to descend, following the instructions of the controller, not TCAS. None of the pilots informed the controller about the contradiction in the received commands.

At the same time, Flight 611 was descending following a TCAS instruction. As soon as possible, the pilots reported this to Nielsen. The controller did not hear this message due to the fact that at the same time another aircraft got in touch with him on a different frequency.

In the last seconds, the pilots of both aircraft saw each other and tried to prevent a collision by fully deflecting the controls, but this did not help.

The police did not want to let Vitaly to the crash site, but when he explained that his wife and children were there, they let him through. According to Vitaly, his daughter Diana was found three kilometers from the crash site. Kaloev himself participated in the search work and first found Diana's torn beads, and then her body.

At ten in the morning I was at the scene of the tragedy. I saw all these bodies - I froze in tetanus, could not move. A village near Überlingen, there was a headquarters at the school. And nearby at the crossroads, as it turned out later, my son fell. I still can’t forgive myself that I drove by and didn’t feel anything, didn’t recognize him.

On February 22, 2004, his attempt to talk to air traffic controller Peter Nielsen ended in the murder of the controller on the threshold of his own house in the Swiss town of Kloten: twelve stabs with a penknife.

I knocked. Nielsen left. I first gestured to him to invite me into the house. But he slammed the door. I called again and said to him: Ich bin Russland. I remember these words from school. He said nothing. I took out photographs of the bodies of my children. I wanted him to look at them. But he pushed my hand away and sharply gestured for me to get out ... Like a dog: get out. Well, I kept silent, the insult took me. Even my eyes filled with tears. I extended my hand to him with the photographs for the second time and said in Spanish: “Look!” He slapped me on the arm - the pictures flew. And there it started.

Kaloev was released ahead of schedule - in November 2008. When leaving prison, the first thing Vitaly Kaloev said was: “Why do I need this freedom now?”

Vitaliy Kaloev recently celebrated his sixtieth birthday and retired. For eight years he worked as Deputy Minister of Construction of North Ossetia. He was appointed to this post shortly after his early release from a Swiss prison. Thirteen years after the tragedy, Vitaly Kaloev got married.

I think that I lived my life in vain: I could not save my family. What depended on me is the second question, - Vitaly Kaloev admitted. - You can’t learn to live after that ... I still haven’t recovered. But you don't have to go down. If you need to cry, cry, but it’s better to be alone: ​​no one saw me with tears, I didn’t show them anywhere. Maybe on the very first day. We must live with the fate that is intended. Live and help people.

Trailer of the movie "Consequences"

• Immediately after the disaster, the Swiss company Skyguide put all the blame on the Russian pilots, who, in its opinion, did not understand the instructions of the controller in English well. In May 2004, the German Federal Aviation Accident Investigation Office issued a report on the results of the crash investigation. Experts admitted that dispatchers were to blame for the collision. Only after the publication of the report, Skyguide admitted its mistakes, and two years after the disaster, its director Alain Rossier apologized to the families of the victims.

In 2016, Vitaly Kaloev was detained at the Munich airport. He flew to participate in mourning events on the occasion of the death on July 2, 2002 of the Tu-154 aircraft over Lake Constance. It turned out that the Swiss side protested against allowing Kaloev to the ceremony.

• According to Kaloev, the creators of the film "Consequences" did not consult with him, he himself did not see the picture, but he is going to watch it. “Cut and filmed. What is there to react? The main thing is that nothing is distorted. And then there will be action with the chase. I didn't hide from anyone. Openly came, openly left,” said Kaloev.