A leaked memo appears to suggest that the placement of the pilot’s handbag led to an incident where a Ural Airline Airbus A320 blew its tires upon landing at Irkutsk Airport (IKT). 

The memo, signed by Igor Bocharov, deputy chief of flight safety at S7 airlines, was published by Aviatorschina’s Telegram channel, which regularly publishes leaks and insider information from the Russian aviation industry.  

The A320, registered RA-73830, was conducting flight U62942 between Dushanbe (DYU) and IKT when the incident occurred on November 2, 2022.  

According to the document, the pilot placed their handbag on a control panel and accidentally switched on a parking brake with the bag’s strap while the aircraft was flying at 40,000 feet (12,000 meters). The crew then turned the brake on and off again several times until the parking brake indication light disappeared.  

Following the event, the crew did not check the parking brake pressure and did not perform the appropriate procedures to control it. The parking brake light turned on again at 1,476 feet (450 meters), and the pilots knew about residual pressure in the braking system, however, they did not choose to abort the landing.  

The aircraft touched down at IKT at 3:30 pm UTC (15:30 IRKT). The brakes were jammed, leading the main landing gear’s four tires to blow out. The landing also damaged the runway, newspaper Argumenty I Fakty added.  

It took the services 12 hours to remove the aircraft and fix the damage, paralyzing the airport and causing at least 14 incoming flights to be redirected. 

Ural Airlines said the incident was caused by a malfunction of the braking system.  

Meanwhile, according to Aviatorschina, the captain whose error reportedly caused the accident left the company soon after the events.