LOT Polish Airlines Flight 016

LOT Polish Airlines Flight 016, was a scheduled LOT Polish Airlines flight between Newark Liberty International Airport and Warsaw Chopin Airport. On 1 November 2011, flight 016 successfully performed a belly landing when its landing gear would not extend. No one was injured in the incident.
Aircraft
The aircraft involved was a Boeing 767-300ER, registered SP-LPC, named ', serial number 28656 LN:659. It was first delivered to LOT on 15 May 1997, and had been leased out twice: first for six months to Air Italy during the end of 2005 and second to Santa Barbara Airlines for three months in early 2007.
Accident
On 1 November 2011 at 13:35 CET, LOT Polish Airlines Flight 016 was scheduled to arrive at Warsaw Chopin Airport from Newark Liberty International Airport when the approach was aborted due to the failure of the landing gear to deploy. The technical difficulties were detected by Captain Tadeusz Wrona within 30 minutes after takeoff from Newark Liberty International Airport. The crew indicated that the central hydraulic system had malfunctioned.
Captain Tadeusz Wrona, a thirty-year veteran pilot with twenty years of experience on the 767, and co-pilot Jerzy Szwartz informed Warsaw air traffic control (ATC) that they were unable to lower the landing gear due to a hydraulic systems failure. Warsaw ATC instructed them to circle the airport for over an hour and consume excess fuel in order to land light and to allow time for emergency services on ground to prepare for the emergency landing. Visual verification by two Polish Air Force F-16 fighter jets showed that none of the landing gear were down; attempts to lower the gear by alternative means (electrically and mechanically) failed.
The airport was kept evacuated for the arrival of the aircraft, roads around the airport were closed to accommodate emergency services. Flights which had been scheduled to land in Warsaw have been diverted to Kraków, Katowice, , and or returned to their point of departure.
On board the LOT Polish Airlines 767-300ER were 231 people, eleven crew and 220 passengers.
At 14:40 CET the cockpit crew successfully performed an emergency landing at Warsaw Chopin Airport on Runway 33 with no loss of life while the aircraft sustained substantial damage in the accident.
A video of the landing is available with Air Traffic Control and Crew communications.
The airport remains closed to traffic until 4:00 CET, 3 November 2011 due to the effort of removing crash debris and inspection of the airport runways and aprons etc. The aircraft has been since lifted on pneumatic pillows, had landing gear deployed and on 20:19, November 2nd, has been towed away from runway.
Poland's President congratulated and thanked the crew for their successful landing.
Post incident investigation
The incident is currently being investigated, preliminary findings point to a failure in the hydraulic system and in the manual release system for the landing gear.

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