Commission Findings: High-Risk Decisions Led to Bulgaria's Graf Ignatievo Air Crash

Bulgaria's Ministry of Defense's commission investigating the September 13 aviation accident at Graf Ignatievo Airbase, which resulted in the deaths of Lieutenant Colonel Petko Dimitrov and Captain Vencislav Dunkin, concluded that the pilots took an unreasonably high risk. The accident occurred during a training flight involving an L-39 combat training aircraft as part of an air show marking the 20th anniversary of Bulgaria's accession to NATO.

The commission's report detailed that complications arose when the aircraft attempted to maneuver parallel to the runway, reducing its speed below the necessary level for performing a vertical maneuver. At 12:30:01, the crew initiated a climb with a G-force of 3.6 and a slight right bank. At that point, the aircraft was at an altitude of 68 meters and traveling at a speed of 455 km/h. The commission noted that this climb initiated a series of events leading to a complex situation.

By 12:30:13, the aircraft had reached an altitude of 647.61 meters but had decelerated to 213 km/h. The crew then initiated a descent with a steep pitch angle that deepened into an emergency situation. The commission observed that, within a second, the pitch angle worsened, creating conditions for a successful ejection between 12:30:17. However, since the crew did not attempt to eject, the situation escalated to catastrophic proportions. The immediate cause of the crash was the impact of the aircraft with the ground. The main factor was determined to be the decision to take a high-risk maneuver, compounded by a failure to follow safety protocols and an incorrect assessment of altitude during the maneuver.

Colonel Petko Vasilev, an expert from the Military Police's "Investigation of Aviation Accidents and Incidents" department,...