Bloemfontein - George

On June 1, 2002 at 07:15 AM, Bloemfontein - George experienced a crash involving Avro 748, operated by Airquarius Air Charter, with the event recorded near George Western Cape.

The flight was categorized as postal (mail) and the reported phase was landing (descent or approach) at a mountains crash site.

3 people were known to be on board, 3 fatalities were recorded, 0 survivors were identified or estimated. This corresponds to an estimated fatality rate of 100.0%.

Crew on board: 2, crew fatalities: 2, passengers on board: 1, passenger fatalities: 1, other fatalities: 0.

The listed crash cause is human factor. The aircraft was on a scheduled freight flight from Bloemfontein to George. Poor weather conditions prevailed over the George area and the pilots had to execute an instrument guided approach for the landing. The ground based Instrument Landing System (ILS) on Runway 29 at George Aerodrome was intermittently unreliable during the approach. The pilots decided to execute a missed approach. During the missed approach the pilots did not comply with the published missed approach procedure and with a combination of strong winds and possible erroneous heading indications they lost situational awareness. They flew the aircraft into a valley and crashed into the side of the mountains North-East of the George Aerodrome. The passenger was Hansie Cronje, a former South African cricket captain who had missed a South African Airlines flight.

Aircraft reference details include registration ZS-OJU, MSN 1782, year of manufacture 1980.

Geospatial coordinates for this crash are approximately -34.1392°, 22.0871°.