The UAE’s General Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) has released the following timeline for the chain of events that led up to the crash of the ill-fated UPS plane on Friday.
6.53pm - The GCAA confirmed that flight UPS6 B744 departed from Dubai International Airport at 6.53pm local time, headed for Koln-Bonn (Cologne), Germany.
7.15pm - Information was received from Bahrain that the aircraft was returning to Dubai airport reporting smoke in the cockpit and struggling to maintain altitude.
The pilot had requested the airport to land the aircraft immediately.
The UAE Air Traffic Control (ATC) centre issued a clearance when the aircraft was approximately 40km from touchdown.
However, because the UPS plane was high on approach – at 8,500ft and 24km from touchdown – it overshot the airfield and was forced to make a sharp right turn.
New position reports were passed to the tower, as well as advice that all runways were available for the aircraft to land on.
The aircraft tracked southwest and rapidly lost altitude.
7.42pm - Radar contact was lost.
The B744 finally crashed in an unpopulated area between the Emirates Road and Al Ain highway, 50 minutes after departure and after returning back from Bahrain Flight Information Region.