B9/1997L Aircraft Incident at Turku Airport, Finland, on 30 December 1997

On Tuesday 30 December, 1997 at 00.12 local time (Finnish local time is used in this report) an aircraft incident took place at Turku airport where a Douglas DC-9-41 aircraft, registered LN-RLT, owned by Det Norske Luftfartselskap A/S and operated by Scandinavian Airlines System ran off the side of runway. The flight number was SK 720. There were 27 passengers and four crewmembers on board. Nobody was injured but the aircraft was slightly damaged.

On 30 December, 1997 the Accident Investigation Board (AIB), Finland appointed an investigation commission by letter B 9/1997 L. Airline pilot (ret.) Mr Jussi Haila was appointed investigator-in-charge and Aircraft accident investigator Mr Esko Lähteenmäki from the AIB was appointed member of the commission. The investigation was conducted in Finnish legislation, International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) Annex 13 and Council of European Union Directive 94/56/EC.

The commission consulted airline pilot, psychologist Mr Matti Sorsa as an expert on the human factors contribution to the incident.

Havarikommisjonen for Sivil Luftfart (HSL), Aircraft Accident Investigation Board, Norway, was notified of this incident and the investigation on 30 December, 1997. The HSL did not appoint an accredited representative for the investigation.

The commission sent the final draft of this aircraft incident report to the HSL for comments according to ICAO Annex 13 on 10 February, 1999. The draft has also been sent for comments to the Finnish Flight Safety Authority, SHK (Board of Accident Investigation, Sweden) and the airline SAS. The received comments have been taken into account in the report and are enclosed as appendices 2-7.

B9/1997L Report (pdf, 0.63 Mt)