Incident Overview
A scheduled freight flight en route from Bloemfontein to George ended in a collision with terrain northeast of George Aerodrome. The aircraft was conducting an instrument approach to Runway 29 amid poor weather conditions. The ground-based Instrument Landing System (ILS) for that runway was intermittently unreliable during the approach, prompting the flight crew to initiate a missed approach.
Approach and Missed Approach
During the missed approach, the pilots did not follow the published missed approach procedure. Strong winds, combined with possible erroneous heading indications, led to a loss of situational awareness. The aircraft drifted off course and flew into a valley, ultimately crashing into the mountainside approximately 6.7 nautical miles northeast of the aerodrome.
Passenger
The passenger on the flight was Hansie Cronje, a former South African cricket captain who had missed a South African Airlines flight.
Probable Cause
The official probable cause states: "The crew deviated from the prescribed missed approach procedure during an attempted Instrument Landing System landing on Runway 29 at George in Instrument Meteorological Conditions and lost situational awareness aggravated by the presence of strong upper SouthWesterly winds. They allowed the aircraft to drift off course resulting in a controlled impact with terrain 6.7 nm North-East of the aerodrome. Contributing factors to the probable cause were the weather conditions, the intermittent unreliability of the Instrument Landing System, the serviceability of the directional gyro and the uncleared defects."