This Thursday, December 11, marks exactly 26 years since the tragedy at Pico da Esperança on the island of São Jorge in the Azores, which became known as the mountain of death.
At 9:20 a.m. local time, one hour behind mainland Portugal, the ATP Graciosa aircraft operated by SATA Air Açores, traveling from Ponta Delgada in São Miguel to the island of Flores, collided with the highest mountain on São Jorge, resulting in the deaths of all 35 passengers and crew on board.
Even 26 years later, not a single Azorean has forgotten that Saturday, so close to Christmas, which shattered the hopes of families, friends, and acquaintances of those on the ill-fated flight 530M.
The day was marked by bad weather, with overcast skies and gusty winds, causing the flight to navigate at low altitude with frequent turbulence. According to the Report of the Inquiry Commission on the accident, disclosed by the National Civil Aviation Institute, this led to the aircraft deviating from its course “without the crew noticing,” ultimately crossing the north coast line of São Jorge, where it met its fate.
Three seconds before the initial impact, the co-pilot issued a warning that the plane was “losing altitude and over São Jorge.” Despite increasing engine power, the maneuver was “insufficient to clear the obstacle,” resulting in a violent explosion that completely destroyed the plane.
The first alert regarding the accident came from a shepherd who, several meters below the ravine where the plane’s remains lay, detected the smell of fuel.
Upon arrival, rescue teams were met with a horrifying scene. “We couldn’t walk. We crawled to the opposite side, where the ravine was,” recounted Vítor Alves, a journalist with RTP Açores and the first to reach the site along with a cameraman, during a 2016 interview.
The journalist recalled that, descending to the site, he first encountered papers, then clothing, metal debris, the airplane’s engine, bodies, and finally the remaining fuselage in what he described as an “indescribable, almost unreal” scene.
Firefighter Rui Bettencourt, who was only 20 years old at the time, was dispatched to the accident site in Velas, where Pico da Esperança is located. “No one could have imagined such a Dantean scene,” he revealed in an interview with RTP Açores.
Due to the extent of the destruction, it was immediately clear that there could be no survivors.
The Azorean Civil Protection faced significant challenges recovering the bodies and the aircraft’s black boxes due to adverse weather conditions and the difficult access to the crash site.
It required several hours of work by responders attempting to distance themselves from what they witnessed, focusing on their mission to allow families and friends of the victims of one of Portugal’s largest air disasters the opportunity to bid their last farewell.
The funerals were held several days after the accident.
