Tupolev Tu-104


The Tupolev Tu-104 was a twinjet medium-range narrow-body turbojet-powered Soviet airliner. It was the second to enter regular service, behind the British de Havilland Comet, and was the only jetliner operating in the world from 1956 to 1958, when the British jetliner was grounded due to safety concerns.
In 1957, Czechoslovak Airlines – ČSA, became the first airline in the world to fly a route exclusively with jet airliners, using the Tu-104A variant between Prague and Moscow. In civil service, the Tu-104 carried over 90 million passengers with Aeroflot, and a lesser number with ČSA, while it also saw operation with the Soviet Air Force. Its successors included the Tu-124, the Tu-134 and the Tu-154.

Design and development

At the beginning of the 1950s, the Soviet Union's Aeroflot airline needed a modern airliner with better capacity and performance than the piston-engined aircraft then in operation. The design request was filled by the Tupolev OKB, which based their new airliner on its Tu-16 'Badger' strategic bomber. The wings, engines, and tail surfaces of the Tu-16 were retained with the airliner, but the new design adopted a wider, pressurised fuselage designed to accommodate 50 passengers. The prototype build in MMZ 'Opit' first flew on June 17, 1955 with Yu.L. Alasheyev at the controls. It was fitted with a drag parachute to shorten the landing distance by up to, since at the time not many airports had sufficiently long runways. The first serial TU-104 took off on 5 November 1955.
The Tu-104 was powered by two Mikulin AM-3 turbojets placed in the wing roots. The crew consisted of five people: two pilots, a navigator, a flight engineer and a radio operator. The airplane raised great curiosity by its lavish "Victorian" interior – so-called by some Western-hemisphere observers – due to the materials used: mahogany, copper and lace.
Tu-104 pilots were trained on the Il-28 bomber, followed by mail flights on an unarmed Tu-16 bomber painted in Aeroflot colors, between Moscow and Sverdlovsk. Pilots with previous Tu-16 experience transitioned into the Tu-104 with relative ease. The Tu-104 was considered difficult to fly, as it was heavy on controls and quite fast on final approach, and at low speeds it would display a tendency to stall, a feature common with highly-swept wings.
Experience with the Tu-104 led the Tupolev Design Bureau to develop the world's first turbofan series-built airliner, the Tupolev Tu-124, designed for local markets, and subsequently the more commercially successful Tu-134.

Operational history

On 15 September 1956, the Tu-104 began revenue service on Aeroflot's Moscow-Omsk-Irkutsk route, replacing the Ilyushin Il-14. The flight time was reduced from 13 hours and 50 minutes to 7 hours and 40 minutes, and the new jet dramatically increased the level of passenger comfort. By 1957, Aeroflot had placed the Tu-104 in service on routes from Vnukovo Airport in Moscow to London, Budapest, Copenhagen, Beijing, Brussels, Ottawa, Delhi, and Prague.
In 1957, ČSA Czechoslovak Airlines became the only export customer for the Tu-104, placing the aircraft on routes to Moscow, Paris, and Brussels. ČSA bought six Tu-104As configured for 81 passengers. Three of these aircraft were subsequently written off.
In 1959 a Tu-104 was leased to Sir Henry Lunn Ltd. of London which used the aircraft to transport holiday-makers to Russia with a 4.5 hour flight time.
Whilst the Tu-104 continued to be used by Aeroflot throughout the 1960s and 1970s, the safety record of the aircraft was poor in comparison to subsequent jet airliners. The Tu-104 was unreliable, heavy, very unstable with poor control response, with an inclination to Dutch roll. Poor design aerodynamics of the wings resulted in a propensity to stall with little or no warning and a dangerous tendency to pitch-up violently before stalling and entering an irrecoverable dive. Due to the fear of inadvertent stalls aircrew would fly approaches above the recommended approach speed, landing at, nearly faster. At least two accidents were attributed to the pitch-up phenomenon, prompting changes to the design of the aircraft and operating procedures, but the problem remained. Aeroflot retired the Tu-104 from civil service in March 1979 following a fatal accident at Moscow, but several aircraft were transferred to the Soviet military, which used them as staff transports and to train cosmonauts in zero gravity. After a military Tu-104 crash in February 1981 killed 52 people, the type was permanently removed from service. The last flight of the Tu-104 was a ferry flight to Ulyanovsk Aircraft Museum in 1986.

Variants

Data from:
According to the American Flight Safety Foundation, between 1958 and 1981, 16 Tu-104s were lost in crashes out of 37 aircraft written off with a total of 1140 fatalities.
DateTail numberAircraft typeLocationCasualtiesDescriptionRefs
19 02 1958CCCP-Л5414Tu-104Savasleyka0/3Force-landed short of the runway after running out of fuel following a diversion.
15 08 1958CCCP-Л5442Tu-104AChita64/64Aeroflot Flight 4 stalled, spun down and crashed after entering an updraft at.
17 10 1958CCCP-42362Tu-104AKanash80/80A flight carrying high-level delegations crashed when it entered a dive and crashed after entering an updraft at. The Tu-104 was limited to and the tail modified in the wake of this accident.
20 10 1960CCCP-42452Tu-104AUst-Orda3/68Aeroflot Flight 5 struck sloping terrain and crashed while the pilot was checking the landing lights.
01 02 1961CCCP-42357Tu-104AVladivostok0Overran runway after landing too late.
16 03 1961CCCP-42438Tu-104Bnear Koltsovo7/51Aeroflot Flight 68 force-landed on a frozen pond following double engine failure. Two people on the ground died when a house was struck by the aircraft.
10 07 1961CCCP-42447Tu-104BOdessa1/94Aeroflot Flight 381 crashed after entering downdrafts while landing in bad weather.
17 09 1961CCCP-42388Tu-104ATashkent0Heavy landing; written off.
02 11 1961CCCP-42504Tu-104BVladivostok0Struck a radio antenna while on approach and force-landed in a field following engine failure.
04 06 1962CCCP-42491Tu-104BSofia5/5Struck a mountain following engine failure.
30 06 1962CCCP-42370Tu-104AKrasnoyarsk Krai84/84Aeroflot Flight 902 crashed after it was accidentally shot down by a missile.
03 09 1962CCCP-42366Tu-104A Khabarovsk86/86Aeroflot Flight 3 lost control at while climbing. Although the cause was not determined, issues with the autopilot were blamed. An accidental shoot-down by a missile was also theorized.
25 10 1962CCCP-42495Tu-104BSheremetyevo11/11Crashed on takeoff during a test flight due to cross-connected rudder controls.
16 03 1963OK-LDBTu-104ASanta Cruz AirportCaught fire while being refueled.
18 05 1963CCCP-42483Tu-104BLeningrad0Stalled on approach and crashed.
13 07 1963CCCP-42492Tu-104Bnear Irkutsk Airport33/35Aeroflot Flight 12 crashed short of the runway due to incorrect instrument readings. Water entered the instrument wiring, causing a short circuit.
09 06 1964CCCP-42476Tu-104BNovosibirskOvershot runway in heavy rain during second landing attempt.
28 04 1969CCCP-42436Tu-104BIrkutskLanded short of runway; written off.
01 06 1970OK-NDDTu-104ATripoli13/13Crashed short of the runway after the pilot attempted an approach to runway 36.
25 07 1971CCCP-42405Tu-104BIrkutsk97/126Aeroflot Flight 1912 landed short of the runway; breaking off the left wing. The aircraft rolled to the left and caught fire.
10 10 1971CCCP-42490Tu-104BVnukovo25/25Aeroflot Flight 773 crashed shortly after takeoff after an explosion occurred while climbing through. The explosion damaged the fuselage and destroyed flight controls. Control was lost and the aircraft rolled right and entered a descent until it struck the ground. The explosion was caused by a bomb placed between the cabin wall and a passenger seat in the rear of the cabin near frame 45.
19 03 1972CCCP-42408Tu-104BOmsk0Struck a snow wall short of the runway during the fifth landing attempt.
24 04 1973CCCP-42505Tu-104BLeningrad2/57Hijacked by a passenger who demanded to be taken to Sweden. The crew returned to Leningrad. While the landing gear was lowered, the hijacker set off a bomb, killing himself and the flight engineer. The bomb blew a hole in the fuselage, but the aircraft was able to land safely.
18 05 1973СССР-42379Tu-104BBuryat ASSR82/82Aeroflot Flight 109 was hijacked by a passenger who demanded to be taken to China. A bomb that the hijacker had put on board the aircraft detonated at and the aircraft lost control and crashed east of Lake Baikal.
29 08 1973OK-MDETu-104ANicosia0/70CSA Flight 531 veered off the runway after landing after the pilot failed to stop the aircraft in time. The wreckage remains at the airport site to this day.
30 09 1973CCCP-42506Tu-104BSverdlovsk108/108Aeroflot Flight 3932 crashed shortly after takeoff due to a power failure of the artificial horizons.
13 10 1973CCCP-42486Tu-104BDomodedovo122/122Aeroflot Flight 964 crashed while on approach following a power failure to the compass system and main gyros and resulting loss of control. The crash is the worst involving the Tu-104.
7 12 1973CCCP-42503Tu-104Bnear Moscow16/75Aeroflot Flight 964 crashed after a wing struck the ground after coming in too fast.
05 11 1974CCCP-42501Tu-104BChita0Overran the runway on landing and came to rest against a railway embankment.
30 08 1975CCCP-42472Tu-104BTolmachevo Airport0Right landing gear collapsed following a heavy landing.
09 02 1976CCCP-42327Tu-104AIrkutsk24/115Aeroflot Flight 3739 crashed after banking to the right while climbing for takeoff and entering a descent. Debris from the aircraft struck a North Korean Tu-154 that had just landed. Although the official cause of the accident was loss of control caused by crosswinds, improper fueling and pilot error were also theorized.
17 07 1976CCCP-42335Tu-104AChita Airport0Failed to take off and crashed due to overloading.
28 11 1976CCCP-42471Tu-104Bnear Sheremetyevo72/72Aeroflot Flight 2415 lost control and crashed following artificial horizon failure and resulting crew disorientation.
CCCP-42371Tu-104ABorispol AirportCrashed short of the runway after the engines were shut down in flight.
13 1 1977CCCP-42369Tu-104AAlma-Ata96/96Aeroflot Flight 3843 exploded in mid-air due to an engine fire.
17 3 1979CCCP-42444Tu-104Bnear Moscow58/119While operating as Aeroflot Flight 1691, the crew encountered a false fire alarm from engine during takeoff and turned back to Vnukovo. The plane crashed while attempting to return to the airport. Aeroflot removed the Tu-104 from service following this accident.
7 2 1981CCCP-42332Tu-104APushkin50/50Soviet Navy flight; 1981 Pushkin Tu-104 crash, failed to take off due to shifting cargo. All military Tu-104's were grounded following this accident.

Specifications (Tu-104B)

In film

A Tu-104 is the supposed aircraft making a flight from London to New York which forms the subject of the 1959 film Jet Storm. Footage of an actual Tu-104 taxiing and taking off is shown near the beginning of the film.

In philately

Tu-104 is depicted on Soviet postage stamps of 1958 and 1969.