The rocket missed a French Hercules but hit a house killing four civilians.

On Apr. 17, 2020 a rocket accidentally fired by a Chadian Air Force Su-25 Frogfoot parked at Base Aérienne Kossei NDjamena, Chad, struck an empty tanker truck, missed a French Air Force C-130H from the Escadron de transport (Transport Squadron) 2/61 Franche Comté, and landed in the house of Deputy Commander of the Presidential Guard, General Mahamata Salaha Brahima, killing two children and two adults, and wounding two others.

Video from a surveillance camera has leaked online on several platforms (including Lelombrik.net). It shows the moment the rocket fires, passes through the tanker and misses by few meters the French Hercules.

The causes of the incident are being investigated.

Someone suggested it would have been better if the rocket had hit the Hercules: this might be true but we can’t really say based on the video, because we don’t know if people were working inside or around the C-130.

The unusual incident somehow reminds the one that involved a Belgian Air Force F-16 on the ground at Florennes that was destroyed when the M61A1 Vulcan 20mm cannon on board another F-16 was accidentally fired on the ground by maintenance personnel on Oct. 12, 2018.

Back then we wrote that the accident appeared to be quite weird: “it’s not clear why the technician was working on an armed aircraft that close to the flight line. Not even the type of inspection or work has been unveiled. For sure it must have been a check that activated the gun even though the aircraft was on the ground: the use of the onboard weapons (including the gun) is usually blocked by a fail-safe switch when the aircraft has the gear down with the purpose of preventing similar accidents. […] Because strict weapons safety protocols, especially with live ammunition, are in place during ground handling it is extremely rare for maintenance personnel to accidentally discharge an aircraft’s weapon.”

H/T Alex Snow and Arthur Lrn for sending this over to us!





