Azerbaijan on Thursday noticed a nationwide day of mourning for the victims of the airplane crash that killed 38 individuals and left all 29 survivors injured as hypothesis mounted a few attainable explanation for the catastrophe, with some consultants saying that the airliner was broken by Russian air protection fireplace.
Azerbaijan Airways’ Embraer 190 was en route from Azerbaijan’s capital of Baku to the Russian metropolis of Grozny within the North Caucasus on Wednesday when it was diverted for causes but unclear and crashed whereas attempting to land in Aktau in Kazakhstan after flying east throughout the Caspian Sea.
The airplane went down about 3 kilometers (round 2 miles) from Aktau. Cellphone footage circulating on-line appeared to indicate the plane making a steep descent earlier than smashing into the bottom in a fireball. Different footage confirmed a part of its fuselage ripped away from the wings and the remainder of the plane mendacity the wrong way up within the grass.
Because the official crash investigation began, theories abounded a few attainable trigger, with some consultants alleging that holes seen within the airplane’s tail part presumably point out that it may have come beneath fireplace from Russian air protection techniques keeping off a Ukrainian drone assault.
Ukrainian drones had beforehand attacked Grozny, the provincial capital of the Russian republic of Chechnya, and different areas within the nation’s North Caucasus. An official in Chechnya stated one other drone assault on the area was fended off on Wednesday, though federal authorities didn’t report it.
On Thursday, nationwide flags have been lowered throughout Azerbaijan, visitors throughout the nation stopped at midday, and alerts sounded from ships and trains because the nation noticed a nationwide second of silence.
Talking at a information convention Wednesday, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev stated that it was too quickly to invest on the explanations behind the crash, however stated that the climate had compelled the airplane to alter from its deliberate course.
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“The knowledge offered to me is that the airplane modified its course between Baku and Grozny attributable to worsening climate circumstances and headed to Aktau airport, the place it crashed upon touchdown,” he stated.
Russia’s civil aviation authority, Rosaviatsia, stated that preliminary data indicated that the pilots diverted to Aktau after a fowl strike led to an emergency on board.
In line with Kazakh officers, these aboard the airplane included 42 Azerbaijani residents, 16 Russian nationals, six Kazakhs and three Kyrgyzstan nationals. Russia’s Emergencies Ministry on Thursday flew 9 Russian survivors to Moscow for therapy.
Mark Zee of OPSGroup, which screens the world’s airspace and airports for dangers, stated that the evaluation of the pictures of fragments of the crashed airplane point out that it was virtually actually hit by a surface-to-air missile, or SAM.
“Way more to analyze, however at excessive stage we’d put the chance of it being a SAM assault on the plane at being nicely into the 90-99% bracket,” he stated.
Osprey Flight Options, an aviation safety agency primarily based in the UK, warned its purchasers that the “Azerbaijan Airways flight was possible shot down by a Russian army air-defense system.” Osprey offers evaluation for carriers nonetheless flying into Russia after Western airways halted their flights throughout the warfare.
Osprey CEO Andrew Nicholson stated that the corporate had issued greater than 200 alerts relating to drone assaults and air protection techniques in Russia throughout the warfare.
“This incident is a stark reminder of why we do what we do,” Nicholson wrote on-line. “It’s painful to know that regardless of our efforts, lives have been misplaced in a approach that would have been prevented.”
Caliber, an Azerbaijani information web site, claimed that the airliner was fired upon by a Russian Pantsyr-S air protection system because it was approaching Grozny. It questioned why Russian authorities failed to shut the airport regardless of the obvious drone raid within the space. Khamzat Kadyrov, head of Chechnya’s Safety Council, stated that air defenses downed drones attacking the area on Wednesday.
Caliber additionally requested why Russian authorities didn’t permit the airplane to make an emergency touchdown in Grozny or different Russian airports close by after it was hit.
Requested concerning the claims that the airplane had been fired upon by air protection belongings, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov advised reporters that “it will be unsuitable to make hypotheses earlier than investigators make their verdict.”
Kazakhstan’s parliamentary Speaker Maulen Ashimbayev additionally warned in opposition to dashing to conclusions primarily based on photos of the airplane’s fragments, describing the allegations of air protection fireplace as unfounded and “unethical.”
Different officers in Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan have equally prevented touch upon a attainable explanation for the crash, saying it will likely be as much as investigators to find out it.
© 2024 The Canadian Press
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