Polish air disaster: Plane branded 'careless' by Nato after 37 crashes

NATO may have come up with the most appropriate call sign for the Russian-made airliner that crashed yesterday. It was named "Careless" after a series of fatal accidents. The Tupolev Tu-154 has been involved in 37 fatal crashesin its 40-year history, although most have been the result of human error.

The Tu-54 was the workhorse of Soviet aviation. The mid-range, three-engine jet carried half of all the passengers who ever boarded a plane run by the state-owned Aeroflot airline before its break-up after the collapse of communism.

Nearly 1,000 planes were made, starting in 1970. The airliner was regarded as reliable and fast and was widely used around the world.

But some of its accidents were horrific, including a 1982 disaster when a Tu-154 landing at Minsk torpedoed into snowploughs. Its safety record, however, remains average, about the same as Boeings of the same age and class. The plane, nevertheless, has no future. The new Aeroflot operated its last Tu-154 flight last year.