Accident | |
---|---|
Date | 16 March 1978 |
Summary | Cause unknown |
Site | Gabare, Bulgaria 43°19′39″N 23°52′23″E / 43.32750°N 23.87306°E |
Aircraft | |
Aircraft type | Tupolev Tu-134 |
Operator | Balkan Bulgarian Airlines |
ICAO flight No. | LZ 107 |
Registration | LZ-TUB |
Flight origin | Sofia Vrazhdebna Airport, Sofia, Bulgaria |
Destination | Warsaw Airport, Warsaw, Poland |
Occupants | 73 |
Passengers | 66 |
Crew | 7 |
Fatalities | 73 |
Survivors | 0 |
Balkan Bulgarian Airlines Flight 107 was an accident that occurred on 16 March 1978, when a Balkan Bulgarian Airlines Tupolev Tu-134 airliner on an international flight from Sofia Airport to Warsaw Airport crashed.[1] All passengers and crew died in the crash. As of 2024, it remains the deadliest accident in Bulgarian aviation history.[1] The exact cause of the crash remains unknown.
A 2024 investigation by "Biograph" journal found witnesses in former communist Committee for State Security (DS) who testified that the aircraft had two unlisted passengers, who were most likely DS-trained agents from Arab countries. The aircraft was most likely hijacked in-flight and crashed as result of onboard fighting, neither of which the communist government was ready to admit.[2][3]