THE HUNYANI DISASTERA compilation of newspaper reports.....
http://www.rhodesia.nl/viscount.htmhttp://www.rhodesian.com.au/memoriam%20viscounts.phpOn the evening of 3 September 1978 Rhodesians were shocked by the news that terrorists of Joshua Nkomo’s ZIPRA had shot down a Rhodesian Viscount airliner, the "Hunyani", using a Soviet-made Sam-7 missile. The airliner, carrying 52 passengers and 4 crew members vanished from radar screens five minutes after its 5.05 p.m. takeoff from Kariba airport. Almost immediately a distress signal was received to the effect that the engines had failed. The aircraft crashed near the northern border with Zambia in the Urungwe Tribal Trust Land, 40 km south-east of Kariba Dam. Eighteen people survived the crash.
The crash itself was shocking news, but the fate that awaited some of the survivors was to cause a wave of revulsion throughout Rhodesia. The following are newspaper reports of the event and aftermath.
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SHOT AT POINT BLANK RANGE5 September 1978, Herald Reporters
Ten "shocked and numbed" survivors of the Air Rhodesia Viscount disaster were ordered to their feet by terrorists in the vicinity of the crash and shot dead at point blank range, Combined Operations Headquarters said in a statement last night.
Eyewitness reports proved that 18 of the 52 passengers had survived the crash and were alive and well at 5.45 p.m. on Sunday, the report said.
Of these, five left through thick bush to seek help from local tribespeople and 13 remained close to the aircraft. Terrorists later approached the scene and ordered the shocked and numbed survivors to their feet.
The terrorists then opened fire with Communist-made Kalashnikov assault rifles and 10 of the passengers - as yet unnamed, but six known to be women - died in a hail of fire.
The three who survived the massacre were named as Mr. and Mrs. H. Hansen and Mr. A. Hill. They are in Kariba hospital suffering from nothing more serious than numbed feet, following the impact (of the plane as it hit the ground).
Combined Operations Headquarters were unable last night to name the terror victims.
The five who made their way to nearby kraals were named as Mr. and Mrs. Hargreaves, Mrs. Sharon Coles, four-year-old Tracey Coles and Dr. C. MacLaren. They were at the Andrew Fleming Hospital in Salisbury by nightfall yesterday. Dr. MacLaren was discharged soon after arrival. A spokesman for the hospital said it remained to be seen whether the others would spend the night at the hospital.
The Combined Operations statement went on: "Security force members on arriving at the scene of the crash this (yesterday) morning said a starboard engine appeared to have exploded and the starboard external side of the plane was heavily scorched. The terrorists looted the plane."
The wreckage of what appeared to be the missing plane was spotted by the pilot of an Air Force Dakota, who said there was no sign of survivors.
At Kariba airport 26-year-old Mr. Andrew Mace anxiously awaited news of the fate of his sister Alison (28), her husband Mr. Ronald Vermeulen, Mr. Vermeulen’s parents, Mr. and Mrs. P.K. Vermeulen of Gatooma, and the elder Mrs. Vermeulen’s sister and husband who were visiting Rhodesia from Scotland.
After a short discussion with military personnel who had come off one of the Dakotas in search of the wreck Mr. Mace indicated to a reporter he had been told there was little likelihood of any survivors. His relatives were not among the survivors.
Also keeping vigil at the airport was Mr. Howard Coles, manager of a Kariba hotel, whose wife Sharon and four-year-old daughter Tracey were on the flight. Tracey was discharged from the Andrew Fleming Hospital in Salisbury last night while her mother was detained there. Her condition was said to be satisfactory.
At 12.10 Air Rhodesia announced officially that the wreck had been found and that a helicopter had been sent for a closer look after the plane had been spotted from a fixed-wing aircraft...
The Viscount had been missing since it took off from Kariba for Salisbury at about 5 p.m. on Sunday, carrying 52 passengers and four crew. First eyewitness accounts of the wreck were that it appeared to be completely burnt out. Paratroops and para-medics were dropped on the crash site, which is in an area heavily infested with terrorists.
An Air Force pilot who flew over the wreck said that the only identifiable part of the plane was its tail. His impression was that the pilot had tried to land in a 400 m. patch of comparatively open bush and that, while attempting to put the plane down, hit a gulley. The Viscount apparently broke up on impact.
The man in charge of operations was Karoi Police Superintendent Paul Bedingham, working from an airfield about 12 km. south of Karoi. Before noon six small Police Reserve planes, two Air Force planes and four helicopters operated from this base.
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THREE DESCRIBE A NIGHT OF TERRORHerald Reporter, Gavin Lindsell-Stewart, Kariba
Survivors of the Air Rhodesia Viscount crash told journalists in Kariba yesterday of their night of terror in the remote Urungwe Tribal Trust Land. Mr. Anthony Hill (39), Mr. H. Hansen (35) and his wife, Diana (31), three of the survivors who are recovering from lacerations and bruises in Kariba hospital, described their escape from the aircraft wreckage and how they and 15 others who survived were faced by about nine terrorists.
Mr. Hill said the first signs of anything wrong was a big explosion in the plane. "The whole plane shook" he said. Flames from the starboard engine were pouring past the windows immediately the aircraft started a deep dive.
Last Words
He said passengers were instructed to fasten their seat belts and put their heads between their knees.
The last words from Captain Hood were to tell the passengers to brace themselves for impact.
"Then we hit the deck. The plane broke up." The survivors said that only the tail section of the aircraft remained relatively intact but that the front section "virtually disintegrated."
Mr. Hill said he saw a bit of daylight through a hole in the tail section in which he and a few other passengers were trapped.
"I enlarged the hole. This is where I got most of my cuts We started getting everyone out. We moved everyone about 100 metres away. The section we were in was alight."
Later three of them went back to the plane to collect clothing and blankets for the more seriously injured.
Then they heard the voices of Africans talking. They turned round to find themselves face to face with a group of terrorists.
The terrorists told the survivors that they would bring them help and water. They then instructed the survivors to assemble at a point a few metres away from the wreckage.
The terrorists were told that some of the injured were unable to walk whereupon the terrorists told the able-bodied men to carry those who could not move.
A few moments later one of the terrorists said: "You have taken our land." They then opened fire from about 15 metres. The terrorists were speaking to the survivors and among themselves in English.
"We ran," said Mr. Hill. "They kept firing at us until we ducked behind a ridge." The survivors stayed in hiding for about two hours. Then the terrorists came back. They raided the aircraft wreckage, looting suitcases that were strewn around while the survivors, hidden in the nearby bush, watched in horror as the terrorists made off "with their hands full", said Mrs. Hansen.
Mr. Hansen is sure he heard a terrorist’s bayonet as he drove it several times into the body of a seriously injured survivor who was killed in the first sustained burst of automatic gunfire two hours previously.
Mrs. Hansen said: "They were terribly brutal. They took everything." She added that the survivors had spent an extremely cold night in the bush.
Among the survivors was Dr. C. MacLaren who led a group of survivors in the direction of a nearby village to get water. Most of them were not seriously injured.
A security force spokesman who was a member of an aircraft crew first on the scene said that it seemed that the group of survivors that were shot were in an area of about 10 metres square.
He said that one of the survivors had torn off her dress to make bandages for the more seriously injured. Among the survivors shot dead were two young girls aged 11 and 4. The shooting took place at 5.45 p.m. The spokesman described the terrorist action as "completely nonsensical."
Neither the Department of Civil Aviation nor the Air Force have ruled out the possibility that the airliner was hit by a heat-seeking missile. The bush fire started by the crash travelled for about 9 kilometres before burning itself out.
Survivors estimate it was about five minutes between the explosion and impact with the ground. "It felt as if the plane would break up before we hit. It was going at a hell of a speed." Mr. Hill said.