Azerbaijan’s air authority said preliminary results of an investigation into the plane crash in Kazakhstan show the crash was caused by “foreign objects and technical interference”, while Russia said that It was important to wait for the conclusion of the official investigation to understand what happened to the plane. .
A passenger plane belonging to Azeri Airlines crashed last Wednesday near the town of Aktau in western Kazakhstan after diverting from an area in southern Russia where systems are deployed air defense systems used to shoot down Ukrainian drones.
Incident details
Azerbaijan Airlines flight J2-8243, departing from Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, deviated several hundred kilometers from its planned route to Grozny, Chechnya, southern Russia, and crashed on the opposite shore of the Caspian Sea, approximately 3 kilometers from Aktau in Kazakhstan.
Azerbaijan’s national airline said the Embraer SA190 plane changed course to make an emergency landing in Kazakhstan, but crashed about 3 kilometers from the town of Aktau.
There were 67 people on board the plane, including 5 crew members, and at least 38 people died in the incident, while 29 people survived.
Accidentally dropped
Four sources familiar with the preliminary results of Azerbaijan’s investigation said Russian air defenses shot down the plane by mistake, and photos of the plane’s wreckage showed what appeared to be damage caused by shrapnel in the tail of the plane.
Two surviving passengers on the plane reported that there was at least one explosion as the plane approached its original destination, Grozny.
He declined to comment
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said yesterday Friday that he had no additional information and did not want to provide any assessment before the results of official investigations are published, in response to several accusations indicating the possibility that a missile from Russian air defenses had brought it down.
Russia’s Aviation Control Authority (Rosaviatsia) said last Wednesday that an emergency could result from a collision with a flock of birds.
Rosaviatsia said in another statement Friday that the plane decided to change its trajectory from its original destination in Chechnya, amid heavy fog and a local warning about Ukrainian drones.
Commissions of inquiry
Kazakhstan is leading the investigation, which will be conducted under the UN International Civil Aviation Authority convention. In accordance with the guidelines of Annex 13 of the Convention, an initial report will be published within 30 days of the incident and a final report within 12 months.
Brazil sent 3 Air Force investigators to Kazakhstan to assist in the investigation, as it is the headquarters of the aircraft manufacturer Embraer, and local media reported from the President of Kazakhstan that representatives of Embraer were also present.
The governments of the passengers and crew who were on board the plane – Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Russia and Kyrgyzstan – are also expected to participate, in addition to the United States, where the plane’s engine also been manufactured.
The Interfax news agency reported last Wednesday that the plane’s black box, which contained flight data, had been found to help determine the cause of the crash.
Azerbaijan’s Civil Aviation Authority said flights from Baku to Russia would be halted for security reasons until the final report was published. Flydubai has also suspended flights to two southern Russian airports since the incident.
Previous incidents in armed conflict
If the results of the investigation confirm that the plane was shot down accidentally, it would be the third major fatal accident of an airliner linked to armed conflict since 2014, according to the Aviation Safety Network, affiliated with the Aviation Safety Foundation, a global database. accidents and incidents.
Previous disasters include the 2020 crash of Ukraine International Airlines Flight PS-752 by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, resulting in the deaths of all 176 people on board.
It took more than a year for the Iranian Civil Aviation Authority to release the final report on the plane’s accidental crash in Iran.
In 2014, Malaysia Airlines Flight MH-17 was shot down over eastern Ukraine by a Russian BUK missile system, killing 298 passengers and crew.