Seems this happened many times recently.
The Times of India Online
Printed from timesofindia.indiatimes.com > India
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MiG goes down, again
TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 02, 2004 10:39:39 PM ]
NEW DELHI: The aging MiG fighters of the IAF, which constitute almost 75% of the combat fleet, continue to crash despite all precautions. In the latest such incident, a MiG-21 crashed near the Nal airbase in western Rajasthan after it developed engine trouble on Monday night.
"Flying Officer S Mitra, on a routine night-flying sortie, managed to eject safely after what seems to be an engine failure. The jet crashed in the sand dunes. The court of inquiry will ascertain the reason behind the crash," said an IAF officer.
Mitra, after having ejected, informed the police and IAF authorities about the crash over his mobile phone after which rescue personnel rushed to the accident site about 25 km from Nal airbase. "No loss of life or damage on the ground was reported," said the officer.
The MiG-21 which crashed on Monday was a "Type-75" variant and was the 10th IAF fighter to go down this year. There have been over 320 Category-I (where the aircraft is totally destroyed) crashes of MiG-21s alone since 1971-72.
In the recent past, three French-built Mirage-2000 multi-role jets and four Jaguar deep-penetration fighters have also been involved in accidents. "Technical defects" and "human errors" cause 40% each of the crashes witnessed by IAF, with the rest being attributed to bird hits and other factors.
The MiG-21s, which are of the 1960s vintage with several design limitations, in particular form a deadly mix when they are coupled with inadequate flying skills, lack of situational awareness and errors of judgment by pilots.
