What happened
On the afternoon of the accident, a Deutsche Lufthansa flight, designated LH 005, was performing a scheduled multi-leg service from Frankfurt to Hamburg via Bremen. The aircraft departed Frankfurt at 16:41 GMT. During the final approach to Bremen, the aircraft descended from flight level 600 and was cleared for an ILS approach to runway 27.
As the aircraft progressed along the approach, it passed the outbound Bremen radio beacon at 17:44 GMT and returned inbound at 17:48 GMT. Witnesses observed the plane approximately 1,000 meters before the runway threshold with its landing lights active and gear extended. At 17:50:15 GMT, while positioned roughly 1,200 meters past the threshold near the intersection of runways 27/09 and 32/14, the aircraft initiated a go-around at an altitude of approximately 30 feet.
Shortly after the decision to go around, the aircraft entered a steep pitch and banked with the left wing forward. The aircraft type impacted the ground about 385 meters west of the end of runway 27 and 380 meters south of the centerline. The impact resulted in the total destruction of the airframe and 46 fatalities, with no survivors among the occupants.
Findings
The investigation determined that the aircraft overshot the glide path and subsequently stalled while attempting to execute the missed approach. It is believed that a potential malfunction in a flight director instrument prevented the pilot from maintaining the correct glide path, leading to an incorrect assessment of altitude during the transition to visual flight.
Following the stall, the crew was unable to recover due to several critical factors:
- An improper activation of controls, potentially triggered by a sudden medical emergency involving a crew member.
- The inherent difficulty in managing a stall under instrument flight conditions.
- The poor stall recovery performance characteristic of this aircraft type.
- Insufficient altitude and engine power to regain a stable attitude before ground impact.