The aircraft had reached an altitude of no more than 500 feet when the airspeed suddenly dropped because of thermal currents it encountered during the climb out.

This caused the airplane to stall less than 5 kilometres (3.1 mi; 2.7 nmi) from the airport, crash and catch fire, killing all 156 passengers and 10 crew on board.

At the time of the accident, Alma-Ata was experiencing a heat wave.

The Tupolev stalled, plummeted nose down into a farm near the suburbs of Alma-Ata and slid into a ravine, caught fire and disintegrated, killing everyone on board.

[2] The Soviet aviation board concluded that the crash was caused by windshear which took place while the aircraft was near its maximum takeoff weight for the local conditions which included mountains.