South African Airways Flight 295, sometimes referenced and known as the Helderberg disaster, was a scheduled international passenger flight from Chiang Kai-shek International Airport, Taipei, Taiwan, to Jan Smuts International Airport, Johannesburg, South Africa, with a stopover in Plaisance Airport, Plaine Magnien, Mauritius. On November 28, 1987, the aircraft serving the flight, a Boeing 747 named Helderberg, experienced a catastrophic in-flight fire in the cargo area, broke up in mid-air, and crashed into the Indian Ocean east of Mauritius, killing all 159 passengers and crew on board. An extensive salvage operation was mounted to try to recover the aircraft's flight recorders, one of which was recovered from a depth of , deeper than the depth to which the Titanic sank.
The official inquiry, headed by Judge Cecil Stanley Margo, was unable to determine the cause of the fire. This lack of a conclusion led to theories, debates, and speculation about the nature of Flight 295's cargo, as well as a subsequent post-apartheid investigation and calls from relatives of those on the flight to re-open the investigation in the years following the accident. Following the accident, South African Airways (SAA) stopped using the Combi version of the Boeing 747 due to safety concerns about the main deck cargo compartment.
Aircraft and crew The aircraft involved was a 7-year-old Boeing 747-244BM Combi registered ZS-SAS and named Helderberg. This was the 488th 747 built, made its first flight on 12 November 1980 and was delivered to SAA on 24 November 1980.
The Boeing 747-200B Combi model permits the mixing of passengers and cargo on the main deck according to load factors on any given route and Class B cargo compartment regulations.
Flight 295 had 140 passengers and six pallets of cargo on the main deck. The master waybills stated that of baggage and cargo were loaded on the aircraft. A Taiwanese customs official performed a surprise inspection of some of the cargo; he did not find anything that could be characterised as suspicious. According to Tinus Jacobs who was SAA's manager in Taiwan at the time of Flight 295, the flight crew appeared relaxed and "happy to fly" before takeoff and did not display any concerns about the cargo.
The captain of Flight 295 was 49-year-old Dawid Jacobus Uys, a former South African Air Force pilot with 13,843 hours' experience of which 3,884 hours was on the Boeing 747 series airplanes. Uys was described by colleagues as having a professional, skilled and friendly personality, and at the time of the accident was considering retiring to take up a role with the South African Pilots' Association. The flight crew also consisted of 36-year-old first officer David Attwell and 37-year-old relief first officer Geoffrey Birchall, with 7,362 and 8,749 hours' experience (including 4,096 and 4,555 hours on the Boeing 747) respectively; and 45-year-old flight engineer, Giuseppe "Joe" Bellagarda and 34-year-old relief flight engineer, Alan Daniel, with 7,804 hours and 1,595 hours (4,254 and 227 of them on the Boeing 747) of experience respectively.
Accident
Flight 295 took off at 14:23 UTC (22:23 local time) on 27 November 1987 from Chiang Kai Shek International Airport near Taipei on a flight to Johannesburg via Mauritius.
Thirty-four minutes after departure, the crew contacted Hong Kong air traffic control to obtain clearance from waypoint ELATO () to ISBAN. A position report was made over ELATO at 15:03:25, followed by waypoints SUNEK at 15:53:52, ADMARK at 16:09:54 and SUKAR () at 16:34:47. The aircraft made a routine report to the SAA base at Johannesburg at 15:55:18.
At some point during the flight, believed to be during the beginning of its landing approach to Mauritius, a fire started in the cargo section on the main deck which was probably not extinguished before impact. The 'smoke evacuation' checklist calls for the aircraft to be depressurized, and for two of the cabin doors to be opened. No direct evidence exists that the checklist was followed or that the doors were opened; however, Air Traffic Control communications and the cockpit voice recording suggest either one or both actions may have taken place. A crew member may have also gone into the cargo hold to try to fight the fire. A charred fire extinguisher was later recovered from the wreckage on which investigators found molten metal and melted cargo netting.
The following communication was recorded with Mauritius air traffic control, located at Plaisance Airport near Port Louis:
Transcript of communication with Mauritius air traffic control Time Speaker Dialog Comment from official inquiry23:48:51295Eh, Mauritius, Mauritius, Springbok Two Niner Five.23:49:00ATCSpringbok Two Nine Five, eh, Mauritius, eh, good morning, eh, go ahead.23:49:07295Eh, good morning, we have, eh, a smoke, eh, eh, problems and we're doing emergency descent to level one five (in error), eh, one four zero. (flight level 140 is 14,000 feet)23:49:18ATCConfirm you wish to descend to flight level one four zero.23:49:20295, we have already commenced, an, due to [a] smoke problem in the aeroplane.Ja means yes in Afrikaans23:49:25ATCEh, roger, you are clear to descend immediately to flight level one four zero.23:49:30295Roger, we will appreciate if you can alert the fire, ehp, ehp eh (inhale) eh23:49:40ATCDo you wish to eh, do you request a full emergency?23:49:48295Okay Joe, [in Afrikaans] can you...for us23:49:51ATCSpringbok Two Nine Five, Plaisance.23:49:54295Sorry, go ahead?23:49:56ATCDo you, eh, request a full emergency please, a full emergency?23:50:00295Affirmative, that's Charlie Charlie.23:50:02ATCRoger, you declare a full emergency, roger.23:50:04295Thank you.23:50:40ATCSpringbok Two Nine Five, Plaisance.23:50:44295Eh, go ahead.23:50:46ATCRequest your actual position please and your DME distance?23:50:51295Eh, we haven't got the DME yet.23:50:55ATCEh, roger and your actual position please.23:51:00295Eh, say again.23:51:02ATCYour actual position.23:51:08295Now we've lost a lot of electrics, we haven't got anything on the, on the aircraft now.23:51:12ATCEh, roger, I declare a full emergency immediately.23:51:15295Affirmative.23:51:18ATCRoger.23:52:19ATCEh, Springbok Two Nine Five, do you have an Echo Tango Alfa Plaisance please?23:52:30ATCSpringbok Two Nine Five, Plaisance.23:52:32295, Plaisance?23:52:33ATCDo you have an Echo Tango Alfa Plaisance please?23:52:36295, eh, zero zero, eh eh eh three zero.23:52:40ATCRoger, zero zero three zero, thank you.23:52:50295Hey Joe, shut down the oxygen left.Inadvertent transmission from the aircraft23:52:52ATCSorry, say again please?00:01:34295Eh, Plaisance, Springbok 295, we've opened the door[s] to see if we (can?)...we should be OK00:01:36295Look there (?)Exclamation by someone else, and is said over the last part of the previous sentence00:01:45295[in Afrikaans] Close the bloody door (More directly translated: Damned door c...)00:01:57295Joe, switch up quickly, then close the hole on your side.00:02:10295Pressure(?) twelve thousand00:02:14295[in Afrikaans] ...Is enough...otherwise our flight could come to grief (More directly translated: ...enough is... otherwise our flight might crash)00:02:25295(Carrier wave only)00:02:38295Eh Plaisance, Springbok Two Nine Five, do [did] you copy?00:02:41ATCEh negative, Two Nine Five, say again please, say again.00:02:43295We're now sixty five miles.00:02:45ATCConfirm sixty five miles.Incorrectly understood by air traffic control to mean that the aircraft was 65 miles from the airport; in fact it was 65 miles from waypoint XAGAL, and 145 miles from the airport.00:02:47295Ja, affirmative Charlie Charlie.00:02:50ATCEh, Roger, Springbok eh Two Nine Five, eh re you're recleared flight level five zero. Recleared flight level five zero.00:02:58295Roger, five zero.00:03:00ATCAnd, Springbok Two Nine Five copy actual weather Plaisance Copy actual weather Plaisance. The wind one one zero degrees zero five knots. The visibility above one zero kilometres. And we have a precipitation in sight to the north. Clouds, five oktas one six zero zero, one okta five thousand feet. Temperature is twenty two, two two. And the QNH one zero one eight hectopascals, one zero one eight over.00:03:28295Roger, one zero one eight.00:03:31ATCAffirmative, eh and both runways available if you wish.00:03:43ATCAnd two nine five, I request pilot's intention.00:03:46295Eh, we'd like to track in eh, on eh one three.00:03:51ATCConfirm runway one four.00:03:54295Charlie Charlie00:03:56ATCAffirmative and you're cleared, eh direct to Foxtrot Foxtrot. You report approaching five zeroClearance granted to the Flic-en-Flac non-directional navigation beacon.00:04:02295KayLast transmission from the aircraft00:08:00ATCTwo Nine Five, Plaisance00:08:11ATCSpringbok Two Nine Five, Plaisance00:08:35ATCSpringbok Two Nine Five Plaisance No answer
The fire began to destroy the aircraft's important electrical systems, resulting in loss of communication and control of the aircraft. At exactly 00:07 UTC (4:07 local time), the aircraft broke apart mid-air, the tail section breaking off first when the fire began to burn the structure of the aircraft, and crashed into the Indian Ocean, about from the airport. Other theories given for the ultimate demise of the aircraft were that the flight crew eventually became incapacitated by the smoke and fire or extensive damage to the 747's control systems rendered the plane uncontrollable before it hit the ocean.
After communication with Flight 295 was lost for thirty-six minutes, at 00:44 (04:44 local time), air traffic control at Plaisance Airport formally declared an emergency. All 140 passengers and 19 crew members aboard died in the crash.
Search and salvage
When Flight 295 last informed Plaisance air traffic control of its position, its report was incorrectly understood to be relative to the airport rather than its next waypoint, which caused the subsequent search to be concentrated too close to Mauritius. The United States Navy sent aircraft from Diego Garcia, which were used to conduct immediate search and rescue operations in conjunction with the French Navy. By the time the first surface debris was located twelve hours after impact, it had drifted considerably from the impact location. Oil slicks and eight bodies showing signs of extreme trauma appeared in the water. There were no survivors.
After recovery of the wreckage from below the surface of the ocean, the aircraft's fuselage and cabin interior were partly reassembled in one of SAA's hangars at Jan Smuts Airport, where it was examined and finally opened for viewing to the airline's staff and selected members of the public. In November 2025, as part of the 38th anniversary commemoration of the disaster, these portions of the wreckage were handed over to the South African Airways Museum at Rand Airport. The material, which had previously been inaccessible to the public, was displayed during a memorial event attended by victims' families, and members of the public.
Investigation
Rennie Van Zyl, South Africa's head crash investigator, examined three wristwatches from baggage recovered from the surface; two of the watches were still running according to Taiwan time. Van Zyl deduced the approximate time of impact at 00:07:00, around three minutes after the last communication with air traffic control.