Three killed in Libyan cargo aircraft crash

A C-130 crashed with 4 on board. One survived. They were headed to the oil fields with food and supplies.

Air Cargo Week

Three crew members, including the pilot, were killed and another wounded when a cargo plane exploded minutes after taking off from Sharara oil field in southwestern Libya on Sunday. The C-130 aircraft was delivering 18 tonnes of catering and maintenance supplies to Sharara oil field.

The fact it was a C-130 kind of gave me pause because I immediately thought it could be the US Air Force. It was the Libyan Air Force actually.

Speculate away. I'll see if I can figure out more about the oil company (National Oil Corporation (NOC) of Libya).

I posted this while at work so couldn't do much with it until now.

First of all, the reason they're flying in 18 tons of "stuff" is because the roads to the oil field are closed due to security issues. Apparently, there's some kind of roadblock going on.

The other strange thing about the story is that the C-130 had just unloaded its cargo and left empty. Two clicks away and it crashed.

From news24.com comes a bit more information.

Akakus Oil, which runs the Al-Sharara field, had chartered the plane because local access roads have been closed due to security issues in the area.

Another source called it an explosion...

Initial reports said the plane was exploded due to a mechanical failure.

Question for Zaphod, what kind of mechanical failure does it take for a C-130 to explode? What are the chances this was intentional to stop the flow of goods much like the road blockade?

a reply to: LogicalGraphitti

The aircraft itself didn't explode. The load master survived and is in the hospital. That means if there was an explosion it was either engine, or fuel tank. Since the aircraft appears to have come down mostly intact, and in a big enough piece there was a survivor, I'd say engine.

It was a C-130H-30. I'll dig into how old they are and where they got them.

They had a total of 16 aircraft delivered. Nine were embargoed, one was involved in a mishap, and one was destroyed. The aircraft that was destroyed was hit by an RPG while at Entebbe and burned. The aircraft involved in the mishap suffered minor damage last year during an airstrike by Libyan MiG-21s.

As of 2009, the embargoed aircraft were rotting and damaged beyond repair at the Lockheed plant in Georgia.

a reply to: Zaphod58
Thanks for the explanation. Sad there are aircraft abandoned at the Lockheed plant. I work near there and it isn't unusual to see them doing touch and go's.

Falling from the sky in a giant aluminum can is never a good thing.
One survived. That's good.