There's no reason to become alarmed, and we hope you'll enjoy the rest of your flight. By the way, is there anyone on board who knows how to fly a plane?

June 5, 2008 9:28 PM

Russian car magazine "Autoreview" has posted photos of a 1978 Korean Air Lines (KAL) forced landing to accompany an article about the Land Rover Defender pickup that was used to haul equipment at that time. Apparently, Korean Air Lines is not amused (Korean) by this effort to dig up the past. More photos. Via the always awesome Marmot's Hole.

The KAL 707 airliner heading to Seoul from Paris was forced down on a frozen lake 200 miles south of Murmansk after it strayed off course into Soviet airspace on April 21, 1978. During the forced landing, a missile fired from a Soviet fighter killed two and wounded 13.

posted by KokuRyu (13 comments total)

Interesting, but the current conflict is all in Russian or Korean, so pretty much lost on me.
posted by M.C. Lo-Carb! at 9:53 PM on June 5, 2008

That's a hell of a lot more than straying off course. Sheesh. That's like setting out from New York for California and ending up in, well, a frozen lake south of Murmansk.

Yeah, I'm trying, but even the Land Rover connection seems pretty thin. (Also at this time, there was disco.) And the meat of the piece seems best suited for Mefi's Russian and Korean contingent.
posted by Naberius at 10:38 PM on June 5, 2008

Maybe languagehat and stavros will translate for us.
posted by homunculus at 10:38 PM on June 5, 2008

Just so you'll all sleep easy in the arms of thoroughness, here's the wikipedia list of commercial airliners which have been shot down.

An in conclusion, may I refer your attention also to KAL 007.

What is the deal with the creepy "artist's rendering" on all the wikipedia pages?
posted by mwhybark at 12:47 AM on June 6, 2008

They should have named it the Land Rover Aircraft Carrier.
posted by Pendragon at 1:04 AM on June 6, 2008

In Russia, plane shoots.... ahhhh nevermind...


Still, since I have a innate fear of flying, this was heartening to know a plane can take a barrage from a fighter and land semi-safely.
posted by Debaser626 at 6:01 AM on June 6, 2008

Are they upset about the reinforcement of racial stereotypes?

That was "bad driving" of epic proportions. And happened TWICE... (KAL 007) One has to wonder, wtf.
posted by Lectrick at 6:19 AM on June 6, 2008

"Don't you understand? WE ARE LANDING IN RUSSIA!"

*tears up passport, flushes down toilet*
posted by mr_crash_davis at 6:24 AM on June 6, 2008 [1 favorite]

Any Korean journalist worth their salt would track down Capt. Kim Chang Ky and try to draw him out about that incident 30 years ago. I mean it's such a big story... how could Koreans not want to know more about it?
posted by tinkertown at 7:50 AM on June 6, 2008

That is an unbelievable navigational fuckup. Is there a better navigational error out there or does this, as I suspect, qualify as the number one navigational fuckup of the machine age?
posted by alexwoods at 8:09 AM on June 6, 2008

*KGB agent returns with pieces of Misha's passport, having been fished out of toilet by hand, in bowler hat*
posted by alexwoods at 8:10 AM on June 6, 2008

Yeah it's a navigational fuckup, but when you're at the north pole, every direction is south.

That's an amazing aerial view of the plane. Long tracks through snow across ice. That plane must have skidded forever. When the pilot saw those trees coming up fast, he must have panicked, thinking he was going to lose his wing. If it hadn't swung to the right hitting the shore, he would have.
posted by rlk at 9:06 AM on June 6, 2008

I'm with tinkertown, this is one of those stories you'd like to learn more about.
posted by dabitch at 2:01 PM on June 7, 2008