In what is often referred to as the most fatal mid-air collision in aviation history, two aircrafts crashed above the Indian city of Charkhi Dadri in Haryana, resulting in the deaths of all 349 passengers on board.

The skies witnessed disaster approximately 100 kilometres west of India’s capital, Delhi, on November 12, 1996, when Saudia Flight 763 collided mid-air with Kazakhstan Airlines (KazAir) Flight 1907.

The Saudia plane was a Boeing 747 Jumbo Jet departing from Delhi, India, bound for Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, with a planned stopover in Dhahran, while the Kazakhstan Airlines aircraft was a Soviet-era Ilyushin Il-76TD heading to Delhi from Chimkent in Kazakhstan.

The catastrophic mid-air collision claimed the lives of all 349 individuals aboard both planes – 312 on the Saudia flight and 37 on the Kazakhstan Airlines flight, which was operating a charter service.

The cockpit crew of the Saudia flight included Captain Khalid al-Shubaily, 45, First Officer Nazir Khan, 37, and Flight Engineer Ahmed Edrees, 33. Captain Al-Shubaily was an experienced pilot with 9,837 flying hours to his name, reports the Daily Record.

Equally seasoned was Kazakhstan Airlines’ Captain Alexander Robertovich Cherepanov, 44, who had logged 9,229 flight hours.

He was accompanied by First Officer Ermek Kozhahmetovich Dzhangirov, 37, Flight Engineer Alexander Alexanderovich Chuprov, 50, Navigator Zhahanbek Duisenovich Aripbaev, 51, and Radio Operator Egor Alekseevich Repp, 41.

Pilot’s chilling final words

The Black Box of Kazakhstan Airlines disclosed one final Mayday call by the crew, with the pilot uttering: “Mayday, collision…” followed by an eerie silence.

The Flight Data Recorder from the Saudia plane captured the pilots reciting the Islamic Istighfar (forgiveness prayer) and the Shahada before they collided with the ground.

What transpired on that tragic day

The Saudia flight took off from Delhi at 6:32pm IST – just as the KazAir flight was beginning its descent for landing in the Indian capital.

Both flights were under the control of approach controller VK Dutta, who, immediately after take-off, cleared the Saudia flight to an initial altitude of 10,000 feet.

Two minutes post takeoff, at 6.34pm IST, Dutta then authorised the Kazakhstan Airlines flight to descend to 15,000 feet, when the aircraft was 137 kilometres (or 74 nautical miles) away from the beacon of its destination airport in Delhi.

Then, at 6.36pm IST, Dutta gave the Saudia flight – which was travelling on the same airway G452, but in the opposite direction – permission to ascend to 14,000 feet. The Saudia crew reported reaching the 14,000 feet altitude at 6.38pm IST and subsequently requested a higher level.

At this juncture, approach controller Dutta asked the Saudia crew to maintain their altitude and standby, to which First Officer Khan responded affirmatively: “Saudi 763 will maintain one four zero.”

The Kazakh flight at 6.39pm IST reported that it had reached its assigned altitude of 15,000 feet, but the aircraft was actually at 16,348 feet and descending, higher than the limit assigned to it at the time.

Dutta then advised the flight: “Identified traffic 12 O’Clock, reciprocal, Saudia Boeing 747 at ten miles, likely to cross in another five miles. Report, if in sight,” to which the Kazakhstan Airlines flight’s Radio Operator Repp requested for a clarification.

Dutta responded: “Traffic … is at eight miles, level 140.” The update was acknowledged by the Radio Operator, who signed off with: “Now looking 1907.”

At 6.40pm IST, less than sixty seconds later, the crew from a United States Air Force cargo flight made a radio call informing ATC that they had witnessed “a big explosion” at their two o’clock position.

Approach controller Dutta then attempted to contact both the Saudia and Kazakhstan Airlines flights but was met with radio silence – the two planes had collided in a horrific tragedy that would be remembered throughout history.

The Saudia Boeing 747 immediately lost control and found itself in a rapid descent, crashing into the ground at a nearly supersonic speed of 1,135 km/h, while the KazAir flight went into a flat spin and crashed into a field close to the wreckage of the Saudia aircraft.

Under the supervision of air crash investigators in Moscow for the Kazakhstan Airlines flight and Farnborough, England, for the Saudia flight, the planes’ flight data recorders (FDR) were analysed and the ultimate cause of the crash was determined to be a failure by the pilot of the Kazakhstan Airlines Flight to follow ATC instructions.

Cloud turbulence and communication difficulties were suggested as potential contributing factors.

Furthermore, neither aircraft was fitted with a traffic collision avoidance system, which, had it been present, would have warned the crew on both planes.

This devastating aviation disaster prompted numerous countries to make the Traffic Collision Avoidance System (TCAS) mandatory on commercial aircraft, establishing new international standards for collision prevention.