During January, the Indonesian airline Metro Batavia makes its first flights, operating between Jakarta and Pontianak, Indonesia. The airline later will be renamed Batavia Air.
1 January – Norway's Accident Investigation Board for Civil Aviation – the future Accident Investigation Board Norway – takes on the responsibility for the investigation of railway accidents in Norway and is renamed the Accident Investigation Board for Civil Aviation and Railways.
The Indonesian airline Awair suspends operations. It will not resume flights until December 2004, when it begins flying as an associate of AirAsia.
4 March – Ansett Australia permanently ceases flight operations for the second and final time due to financial collapse. Its final flight lands the following morning.
31 March – Bankrupt Swissair goes out of business. On the same day, the Swiss airline Crossair ceases operations as such and reconstitutes itself as Swiss International Air Lines, which immediately takes over many of Swissair's routes.
April
1 April – Swissair's last flight, Flight 145, arrives in Zürich, Switzerland, from São Paulo, Brazil. The 71-year history of Swissair, during which it has carried more than 260 million passengers, comes to an end.
18 April – A Rockwell Commander 112 crashes into the upper floors of the Pirelli Tower in Milan, Italy, killing its pilot and four people in the building. Sixty more people in the building and on the ground sustain injuries.
May
3 May – After the pilot of an Indian Air ForceMiG-21bis (NATO reporting name "Fishbed") fighter hears an explosion in the aircraft's engine and ejects, the MiG-21 crashes into a bank in Jalandhar, Punjab, India, setting the bank and an adjacent lumber store on fire, showering nearby homes with debris, killing eight people on the ground, and injuring 17 others. The pilot survives.
20 May – The Republic of China removes the Aviation Safety Council – the government agency responsible for aviation accident investigation, with the purpose of analyzing causal factors and proposing flight safety recommendations in Taiwan – from the control of the Executive Yuan and makes it an independent government agency, as it had been from May 1998 to May 2001.
12 June – Returning to the frigateHMS Richmond after an exercise, the British Royal NavyWestland Lynx helicopter XZ256 suffers a double engine failure and crashes into the Atlantic Ocean, killing two of the three people on board. The helicopter's observer, Jenny Lewis, is believed to be the first female Royal Navy aviator to die in service.
16 July – The Sikorsky S-76AhelicopterG-BJVX, operated by Bristow Helicopters, crashes in the southern North Sea during a flight between the gas production platform Clipper and the drilling rig Global Santa Fe Monarch, killing all 11 people on board.
26 July – The Africa OneAntonov An-26 (NATO reporting name "Curl") 9Q-CMC, declared to be carrying three tons of cargo but actually badly overloaded with dozens of tons, aborts its takeoff at Kinshasa-N'Djili Airport in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo. Its landing gear collapses and it is damaged beyond repair, although no one is killed or injured in the accident.
19 August – Chechnen separatists shoot down an overloaded Russian Federation Air ForceMil Mi-26 (NATO reporting name "Halo") helicopter carrying at least 140 Russian military personnel with a 9K38 Igla (USDoD designation "SA-18", NATO reporting name "Grouse") shoulder-fired surface-to-air missile at Khankala, Chechnya. The helicopter crashes in a minefield, killing 127 of those on board. It is the largest loss of life in a single incident in the history of helicopter aviation. For the Russian armed forces, it is the greatest loss of life in a single military aviation incident, and the greatest loss of life in any single incident since 1999.
26 August – An unmanned National Aeronautics and Space Administration scientific balloon sets a world altitude record for balloons, reaching 161,000 feet (49,000 meters).[8] At 60,000,000 cubic feet (169,9011 cubic meters), it also is the largest balloon ever launched successfully.[8]
2 October – During their squadron'sSilver Jubilee celebrations at Dabolim Naval Air Base in Goa, India, two Indian NavyIlyushin Il-38 (NATO reporting name "May") maritime patrol aircraft (serial numbers IN302 and IN304) carrying six crew members each collide while flying in close formation in front of many high-ranking naval officials and their families and crash, killing all twelve occupants of the two aircraft.
31 October – French baker and entrepreneur Lionel Poilâne, his wife, and their dog are killed when the Agusta AW109 helicopter he is piloting crashes in the Bay of Cancale off the coast of Brittany, France, while flying in fog.[1]
13 November – Satellite television broadcasting pioneer Henry Howard Taylor dies when a Beechcraft A36TC Bonanza suffers engine failure just after takeoff from San Andreas, California, and crashes in a bed of rocks in an otherwise grassy field, killing two of the three people on board.[1]
18 November – American Airlines and British Airways announce plans to codeshare some transatlantic flights, but the partnership is heavily restricted by U.S. regulators.
27 November - A British Airways Cornado from LHR to JFK loses part of its rudder but it is able to make a safe landing at JFK.[12]
An unmanned aircraft is involved in air-to-air combat for the first time when two Iraqi MiG-23s (NATO reporting name "Flogger") attack a U.S. Air Force RQ-1 Predatorunmanned aerial vehicle experimentally armed with AIM-92 Stingerair-to-air missiles and patrolling the no-fly zone over southern Iraq in an attempt to bait Iraqi Air Force fighters into combat during Operation Southern Watch. After neither MiG-23 achieves a lock-on,[16] an Iraqi MiG-25 (NATO reporting name "Foxbat") of the 1st Fighter-Interceptor Squadron scrambles[16] to assist. The MiG-25 and Predator fire missiles at one other; the MiG-25 is out of range of the Predator's Stingers, but it shoots down the Predator.[17]
