What happened
On November 30, 1999, an Austrian airline flight from Vienna to Timisoara, Romania, landed on runway 29 at Timisoara Airport (LRTR) at approximately 14:03 UTC. The flight duration was roughly 70 minutes. Following touchdown, while the aircraft was still in the landing roll, the right main landing gear failed. This structural failure caused the right wing to drop and the wingtip to strike the runway surface. The aircraft eventually came to rest approximately 8 and 800 meters from the touchdown point near the outer edge of the runway.
The captain declared an emergency and requested assistance from airport fire and rescue services. While emergency teams arrived promptly, no direct intervention was required to manage the situation. All 46 occupants (5 crew and 41 passengers) were uninjured and evacuated the aircraft normally through the cabin doors.
The investigation
The investigation was conducted by the Romanian Civil Aviation Inspectorate with support from the Austrian Federal Safety Investigation Office (SUB). Investigators examined the wreckage and the flight data recorder (FDR) and cockpit voice recorder (CVR).
Analysis of the flight recorders verified that the landing was performed according to standard procedures and manufacturer specifications. The recorded load factors during the landing were well within the aircraft's design limits, ruling out an overweight or hard landing as the cause. Physical examination of the landing gear revealed that the housing of the right main landing gear shock strut had fractured at the radius, specifically where the component transitions from a vertical to a horizontal orientation. The fracture surfaces showed clear evidence of fatigue failure.
Findings
- The primary cause of the landing gear failure was a fatigue crack in the shock strut housing at the transition radius.
- A similar crack had been identified on another aircraft of the same type operated by the same airline in June 1998, which had prompted an Alert Service Bulletin from the manufacturer.
- During a fleet-wide inspection ordered following this accident, a crack was discovered in the shock strut housing of another aircraft in the airline's fleet, necessitating a component replacement.
Safety action
Following the investigation, the aircraft manufacturer issued a new Alert Service Bulletin. This directive mandates regular inspections of the critical fracture area during every A-check, which occurs approximately every 400 flight hours, to prevent future occurrences of structural fatigue.