Ramstein airshow disaster
|
|
In one of the world's worst airshow disasters on August 28, 1988, three jets from the Italian Air Force display team, Frecce Tricolori, collided in mid-air and one crashed into the crowd during an airshow at Ramstein Air Base near Ramstein, Germany. Sixty seven spectators (as well as all three pilots) were killed and hundreds injured in the resulting explosion.
The disaster resulted in a total ban of public airshows in Germany, which was lifted three years later and replaced with security regulations:
- minimal height and distance from spectators
- no maneuvers in the directions of spectators
- all maneuvers subject to approval by authorities
Ramstein Air Base itself has not held an airshow since the incident.
According to some investigating journalists in Europe, the Ramstein air disaster was in fact a conspiracy, aimed at silencing pilots who participated in a 1980 secret mission to assassinate Libyan president Gadhafi while he was flying home from a state visit to the USSR. The operation went awry and NATO fighter jets over the Mediterranean Sea intercepted and allegedly shot down Itavia Flight 870 by mistake, a passenger jet that crashed with the loss of all hands aboard. NATO has never commented on the incident.
According to some sources (but not the band), the German industrial metal band Rammstein took their name to allude to this disaster. Their first album Herzeleid contained a song, also called Rammstein, which undoubtably does.