Emergency specialists work on the crash web site of an Azerbaijan Airways passenger jet close to the western Kazakh metropolis of Aktau.
Issa Tazhenbayev/AFP by way of Getty Pictures
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Issa Tazhenbayev/AFP by way of Getty Pictures
The crash of an Azerbaijan Airways passenger jet over Kazakhstan on Wednesday that killed 38 individuals aboard was doubtless attributable to an antiaircraft missile, some aviation consultants say, though an investigation continues to be ongoing.
The Embraer 190 with 67 passengers and crew was flying from the Azerbaijani capital of Baku to Grozny in Chechnya, Russia, when it was diverted. Russia’s civil aviation authority, Rosaviatsia, steered on Friday that the airplane was rerouted on account of thick fog and Ukrainian drone exercise over Chechnya. In accordance with publicly accessible flight-tracking knowledge, the jet’s GPS monitoring was additionally jammed.
Azerbaijan Airways issued a press release saying the crash was the results of “physical and technical external interference.”
The airplane crashed in a ball of flames a number of miles from an airport within the metropolis of Aktau in western Kazakhstan. Of these aboard, 29 survived the crash.
John Cox, a former pilot and aviation professional, tells NPR’s Morning Version that the erratic flight path taken by the jet earlier than crashing seems to point that crew members had been “fighting for control of the airplane and had limited control.” That, together with photographs of the plane that confirmed puncture holes within the airplane’s tail part, “point to the possibility of an explosion potentially of an antiaircraft missile near the aircraft,” Cox says.
Russia has denied capturing down the airplane and Russian officers initially blamed a fowl strike for the crash. However Cox says “the evidence so far is inconsistent” with that rationalization.
“One … you don’t hear the crew say that. Two, a bird strike doesn’t cause the kind of damage that we’re seeing on this aircraft,” he tells Morning Version.
In a video assertion carried by Russia’s state information company TASS, the top of Rosaviatsia, Dmitry Yadrov, mentioned: “The situation around Grozny airport at the time was very difficult, with Ukrainian combat drones attacking civilian infrastructure in Grozny and Vladikavkaz.”
Azerbaijan Airways has since suspended flights to Russia, The Moscow Instances mentioned, citing native experiences.
In the meantime, Azerbaijan’s minister of digital growth and transportation, Rashad Nabiyev, mentioned that “preliminary conclusions by experts point at external impact,” in accordance with The Related Press. “The type of weapon used in the impact will be determined during the probe,” he mentioned.
At a press briefing on Friday, White Home Nationwide Safety spokesman John Kirby was requested by a reporter whether or not the U.S. had any intelligence indicating the airplane had been shot down. “Short answer to your question is yes. And I’ll leave it at that,” Kirby replied.
Mark Zee of OPSGroup, which does aviation threat evaluation, was quoted by the AP as saying that evaluation of the photographs of the crashed airplane signifies it was “almost certainly” hit by a surface-to-air missile, also called a SAM. “Much more to investigate, but at high level we’d put the probability of it being a SAM attack on the aircraft at being well into the 90-99% bracket,” he advised the AP.
Cox says the crash is paying homage to the 2014 shoot-down of a Malaysian Air Boeing 777 that killed all 298 passengers and crew aboard. The flight, MH17, was en route from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur when it crashed over the Donetsk area of jap Ukraine. The Kremlin blamed Ukraine for capturing down the airplane, however an impartial worldwide investigation named a Buk surface-to-air missile — equipped by Russia to Moscow-backed rebels within the area — because the doubtless trigger. The vast majority of these killed aboard MH17 had been from the Netherlands and in 2022, a Dutch court docket discovered responsible of homicide three males who it mentioned had operated the missile battery.
In 2023, the Joint Investigation Group mentioned there have been “strong indications” that Russian President Vladimir Putin personally authorised the switch of the missiles to Ukrainian separatists who shot down MH17.
