Pakistan International Airlines Flight 705 (PK705) was a Boeing 720B airliner that crashed while descending to land at Cairo International Airport on 20 May 1965. There were 127 people, but only 6 survived. The crash was the deadliest aviation accident to occur in

Egypt Egypt ( , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the Northeast Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to northe ...

at the time. It is also the deadliest air disaster involving the Boeing 720.

Aircraft

The plane was a 3 year old Boeing 720-040B, a shorter version of the

Boeing 707 The Boeing 707 is an early American long-range Narrow-body aircraft, narrow-body airliner, the first jetliner developed and produced by Boeing Commercial Airplanes. Developed from the Boeing 367-80 prototype, the initial first flew on Decembe ...

. Its registration was AP-AMH and the serial number was 18379. This registration was removed from the Pakistan Aircraft Register on 3rd August, 1965, a few months after the crash. The aircraft was first flown on 19th October 1962 and delivered to Pakistan International Airlines on 7 November 1962.Pither 1998, p. 213 At the time of the accident, the aircraft had flown 8378 hours.

Accident

PIA Flight 705 on 20 May 1965 was an inaugural flight between Karachi, Pakistan and London, United Kingdom and was carrying distinguished guests and journalists among the 114 passengers. The aircraft was scheduled to stop at Dhahran in Saudi Arabia, Cairo and then Geneva before completing its journey to London. It was on a routine flight, and it landed in Dhahran International Airport without any problems. The 2nd stopover was

Cairo Cairo ( ; , ) is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Egypt and the Cairo Governorate, being home to more than 10 million people. It is also part of the List of urban agglomerations in Africa, largest urban agglomeration in Africa, L ...

. As the aircraft was on final approach to Cairo International Airport, the pilot reported problems with the flaps; shortly after, the aircraft crashed southeast of the airport and broke up as it exploded into flames. Six of the passengers were thrown clear of the wreckage, but everyone else on board was killed. Among the dead was the Chinese aircraft designer Huang Zhiqian, who was chief designer of the Shenyang J-8. One of the survivors told that he was at the back and his seat was flung outside. He then managed to help the others who were still stuck in their seats.

Investigation

On 26 May, local police reported that a transistor radio had been found in the wreckage of the aircraft with jewellery valued at $120,000 hidden in it. The probable cause of the crash was that "the aircraft did not maintain the adequate height for the circuit and continued to descend until it contacted the ground. The reason for that abnormal continuation of descent is unknown."ICAO Circular 88-AN/74 (113–117) Although this investigation says that the cause it not known, it might have been caused by a problem in the flaps. A few minutes before the disaster, the captain did report that there was an issue in the flaps.

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