LOT Polish Airlines Flight 5055 Cpt. Pawlaczyk was given the Officers' Cross of Polonia Restituta, other flight crew members received the Knights' Cross of the same order, and the flight attendants received the Golden Cross Of Merit. The state funeral of the crew was conducted on 23 May 1987 at the Northern Communal Cemetery in Warsaw. The graves of the crew of LOT Polish Airlines Flight 007 are located a few hundred meters away. Two days of national mourning were announced after the crash. Many officials from the entire world, including Pope John Paul II, expressed their condolences to the families of the victims. The
LOT Polish Airlines Flight 5055 involving an Ilyushin Il-62, and to date, it remains the deadliest aviation crash in Polish history. It was determined to have been caused by the disintegration of an engine shaft due to faulty bearings. The aircraft was a 186-seat Ilyushin Il-62M built in the third quarter of 1983, registered SP-LBG and named "Tadeusz Kościuszko", after the Polish military leader and national hero. All of the crew members were Polish. The captain, Zygmunt Pawlaczyk, was 59 years old, with 19,745 flight hours' experience (5,542 on Ilyushin Il-62s), and a captain of the type from 11 May 1978. The first officer, Leopold