Korean Air Lines Flight 902

On April 20, 1978, Soviet air defense shot down Korean Air Lines Flight 902 (KAL 902) near Murmansk, Soviet Union, after the civilian aircraft violated Soviet airspace and allegedly failed to respond to Soviet interceptors. Soviet air defense initially assumed the plane was part of Soviet naval aviation, but then mistakenly identified it as part of the United States Air Force. When Captain Alexander Bosov, pilot of the Sukhoi Su-15 that brought down Flight 902, saw Chinese characters on the tail of the Korean aircraft, he attempted to convince his superiors on the ground that the plane was not a military threat. Despite this, Vladmir Tsarkov, commander of the 21st Soviet Air Defense Corps, ordered Bosov to take down the plane. The Su-15 opened fire, killing two of the 109 total passengers and crew members aboard Flight 902. The plane then made an emergency landing on the frozen Korpijärvi lake near the Finnish border.

Flight 902


Flight 902 departed from Paris, France on a course to Seoul, South Korea. The plane’s only scheduled stop was in Anchorage, Alaska, where it would refuel and proceed to Seoul. As the plane passed over Alert on Ellesmere Island &mdash; located about 800 km (500 miles) from the North Pole &mdash; flight captain Kim Chang Ky (alternatively spelled Kyi or Kyu) suddenly changed his course and headed southeast toward Murmansk.

The aircraft was not fitted with an inertial navigation system, and GPS navigation was not available at the time. Due to an error in calculating magnetic declination, the plane flew in an enormous, right-turning arc. It flew southeast over the Svalbard archipelago and the Barents Sea, past northern Scandinavia and into Soviet airspace.

Soviet air defense
Soviet air defense radar spotted the plane approximately 400 km away from Soviet territorial waters. At first, the Soviets assumed the plane was a naval aircraft that was returning from a mission, having forgotten to change its IFF transponder code. When the Korean aircraft passed over the Kola Peninsula at 21:19 (Moscow time), Soviet air defense dispatched Alexander Bosov to intercept.



Bosov incorrectly identified the plane as a United States Air Force reconnaissance RC-135. When reporting back to Tsarkov, Bosov said he could see a maple leaf on the plane's tail, implying that it belonged to North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO). After a few moments, he corrected himself, stating that he could see Chinese characters and the "maple leaf" was actually a red stork with wings spread.

According to Kim's account of the attack, the interceptor approached his aircraft from the right side rather than the left as required by International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) regulation. Kim decreased his speed and turned on the navigation lights, indicating that he was ready to follow the Soviet fighter for landing.

According to Soviet reports, the intruder repeatedly ignored commands to follow the interceptor, and Flight 902 began drifting toward Finland. However, tapes released by Rovaniemi Area Control Centre show that Kim transmitted a call signal three times immediately prior to being shot down and attempted to communicate with the intercepting pilot.

Bosov tried to convince his superiors that the plane was not a military threat, but after receiving orders to shoot it down he fired a pair of R-60 missiles. The first missile flew past the target. The second one hit the left wing, knocking off approximately four meters of its length. The missile also punctured the fuselage, causing rapid decompression and jamming one of the plane's four turbines.

After being hit, the airliner quickly descended from a height of 9 km. It fell into a cloud, disappearing from Soviet air defense radars. Soviets mistook the part of the wing that had fallen off Flight 902 for a winged missile and dispatched another Su-15 interceptor to fire at it. Anatoly Kerefov, another Soviet pilot, replaced Bosov because his aircraft was running low on fuel.

Emergency landing
For the next 40 minutes, Flight 902 flew across the whole Kola Peninsula at a low altitude, searching for a place to land. After several unsuccessful attempts at landing, Kim brought the plane down on the ice of the frozen Korpijarvi Lake in Karelian ASSR, located approximately 140 kilometers from the Finnish border.

Finnish sources state that Soviet air defense did not have any information on the plane's whereabouts after it disappeared from the radar. However, Tsarkov stated that Kerefov located Flight 902 and led it to the Afrikanda air base. Tsarkov went on to say that Kim fell behind and landed on the lake. Kerefov said he practically forced the plane to land on the ice of Korpijärvi.

Rescue of survivors
Soviet helicopters rescued the 107 survivors and transported them to the city of Kem in Karelia. The passengers were quartered in the garrison's Officers' Lodge. After two days at the Murmansk Airport, the passengers were released to the U.S. Consulate in Leningrad. The crew was held for investigation and released after making a formal apology. The Korean pilots acknowledged that they deliberately failed to obey the commands of Soviet interceptors. They petitioned the Presidium of the Supreme Council of the USSR for pardon.

Eventually, the passengers were deported out of the Soviet Union back to Seoul. The Soviet Union invoiced South Korea $100,000 for caretaking expenses.

Aftermath
TASS, the official news agency of the Soviet Union, released a statement to the public on April 30, 1978. The Soviet Union refused to cooperate with international experts while they investigated the incident and did not provide any data mined out of the plane's "black box". The airplane was taken apart and all equipment transferred by helicopter on a barge in Kandalakshi Sound. The deputy chief commanding officer of Soviet air defense, Yevgeniy Savitsky, personally inspected the pilot's cockpit.

The incident was a major embarrassment to Soviet air defense because Flight 902 had already entered Soviet territory before it was intercepted. This led to a shift in command and contributed to the shooting down of another Korean Airlines flight, KAL 007, in 1983, which killed everyone on board.

Korean Air continues to use the flight number 902 on its Paris-Seoul route, but it is now a nonstop eastbound route. The flight from Paris now departs from Charles de Gaulle Airport instead of Orly and arrives at the Incheon Airport in Seoul instead of Gimpo. Korean Air uses mostly Boeing 747 aircraft on this route.