Japan Air Lines Flight 715

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Japan Air Lines Flight 715
日本航空クアラルンプール墜落事故

JA8051, the aircraft involved in the accident
Occurrence
Date	27 September 1977
Summary	Controlled flight into terrain due to pilot error
Site	Elmina Estate, near Sultan Abdul Aziz Shah Airport, Subang, Malaysia
Aircraft
Aircraft type	McDonnell Douglas DC-8-62H
Operator	Japan Air Lines
Registration	JA8051
Flight origin	Tokyo International Airport, Tokyo, Japan
1st stopover	Kai Tak Airport, Hong Kong
Last stopover	Sultan Abdul Aziz Shah Airport, Subang, Malaysia
Destination	Singapore International Airport, Singapore
Passengers	69
Crew	10
Fatalities	34
Injuries	45
Survivors	45

Japan Air Lines Flight 715 (日本航空 715便, Nihonkōkū 715 Bin) was an airplane that crashed in Malaysia on 27 September 1977.^[1][2] It was a McDonnell Douglas DC-8, registration JA8051, on a flight from Haneda Airport in Tokyo, Japan, to Singapore International Airport in Singapore, with stopovers at Kai Tak Airport in Kowloon Bay, Hong Kong, and Sultan Abdul Aziz Shah Airport in Subang, Malaysia. Ten crew and 69 passengers were on board.^[1] It was the second-deadliest aviation disaster to occur in Malaysia at the time.^[1]

The aircraft involved was a McDonnell Douglas DC-8-62H (serial number 46152 and factory 550), manufactured in 1971, and delivered to Japan Air Lines on 23 August. It was registered as JA8051. The aircraft was powered by four Pratt & Whitney JT3D-3B turbofan engines.^[3]

Two hours into the flight, air traffic control at Sultan Abdul Aziz Shah Airport told flight 715 to start its approach and land on runway 15. The flight crew started their approach, putting the landing gear down and extending the flaps. The aircraft descended below minimum descent altitude of 750 feet (230 m), then at 300 feet (91 m), it crashed into the side of a hill 4 miles (3.5 nmi; 6.4 km) from the airport, near an estate called Elmina Estate.^[4] The aircraft broke on impact, and a fire erupted, which was extinguished by airport rescue and firefighting.^[5]

The accident killed 34 people: eight of the 10 crew and 26 of the 69 passengers. Forty-five survivors, among the passengers and crew, were taken to a hospital.^[6] The remains from the crash could be found in the soil surrounding the estate until 2011. Most of the land now is being converted to developments.^[7]

A memorial was built in the Japanese cemetery in Kuala Lumpur.^[8]

The crash was the second-deadliest aviation disaster to occur in Malaysia until the crash of Malaysian Airline System Flight 653, two months later, with 100 fatalities.^[1]

The Malaysian Department of Civil Aviation investigated the accident. At the time of the crash, the weather around the airport was poor and the aircraft was on a VOR approach. The investigation determined that the cause of the accident was the captain descending below the minimum descent altitude without having the runway in sight, and continuing the descent, causing the aircraft to crash before reaching the airport. The flight crew loss of sight of the airport due to bad weather, which also contributed to the accident. In addition, the first officer did not challenge the captain for violating the regulations.^[7][9]

• Elmina plane crash, happened in the same area 46 years later
• Malaysian Airline System Flight 653, another plane crash in Malaysia that happened three months later

• Entry at Aviation-Safety.net
• [1]^[usurped]
• Memorial of the crash site (in Japanese)