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Sibir Tu-154 Explodes Over Black Sea
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Sibir Tu-154 Explodes Over Black Sea
A Russian chartered airliner heading from Tel Aviv to Siberia exploded in flight Thursday and crashed off the Black Sea coast with at least 76 people on board, and a senior U.S. military official said that it may have been downed accidentally by a missile fired during a military exercise in Ukraine.
However, Ukraine categorically denied that theory, and President Vladimir Putin said he had no reason to doubt the denial.
``The weapons that were being used during this exercise could not reach the area where our Tu-154 was flying,`` Putin said. ``What I told you as of this moment is based on what our Ukrainian partners have told us and we don't have any reason not to trust them.``
Russian officials were investigating the possibility that the plane had been targeted by terrorists. ``A civilian aircraft crashed today and it is possible that it is the result of a terrorist act,`` Putin told a meeting of visiting European justice ministers.
A U.S. Defense Department official in Washington, speaking on condition of anonymity, said a land-based surface-to-air missile had been fired from the Crimean region of Ukraine.
The missile was believed to be an S-200, a surface-to-air missile of Russian design that is guided by radar to its target. NATO calls the missile the SA-5 ``Gammon.`` It flies faster than three times the speed of sound, has a range of up to nearly 250 kilometers and can hit targets above 30,000 meters altitude, according to several military publications.
Another American defense official said the missile may have been fired from a naval vessel. The exercises were conducted on Cape Onuk, in Crimea, about 250 kilometers from the site of the crash, on territory controlled by the Russian Black Sea Fleet.
Ukrainian anti-aircraft, navy, rocket forces, aviation and artillery took part, as well as Russian forces including shore-based forces and a guard ship. Part of the exercise involved firing on an unmanned aircraft.
According to military officials, the exercise included anti-aircraft S-125, S-200 and S-300 rockets, which are similar to U.S. Patriot missiles, and R-300 tactical rockets.
``The direction of the firing and the distance do not correspond to the plane's explosion site either in theory or in practice. All the hits by the rockets used during the exercise were recorded by corresponding devices and reached their targets,`` said Konstantyn Khivrenko, the Ukrainian defense spokesman. ``Moreover, the monitoring means of Ukraine`s air defense forces as well as those of the Ukrainian air traffic control did not record the presence of any civilian aircraft in the exercise area during the maneuvers.``
He said that the targets were at a distance of 35 to 39 kilometers. ``All the rockets used during the training exercise had guaranteed service lives and self-destruction mechanisms in case they deviated from their course,`` said Defense Minister Oleksandr Kuzmuk, according to a statement released by Khivrenko.
Garik Ovanesyan, the pilot of an Armenian An-24 flying from the Crimean city of Simferopol to the Armenian capital, Yerevan, said his plane was at 6,300 meters above the Black Sea when the plane above his exploded.
``I saw the explosion on the plane, which was above me at an altitude of 11,000 meters,`` Ovanesyan said. ``The plane fell into the sea, and there was another explosion in the sea. After that I saw a big white spot on the sea and I had the impression that oil was burning.``
The plane, a Tu-154, went down in pieces 180 kilometers off the Russian coastal city of Adler, located on the Georgian border, said Vasily Yurchuk, a spokesman for the Emergency Situations Ministry.
The plane was on its way from Tel Aviv to Novosibirsk, Yurchuk said. It belonged to Sibir, which is based in Novosibirsk, and had been chartered, Sibir officials said.
A spokesman for the airline, Yevgeny Filenin, said that there were 64 passengers and 12 crew members aboard.
Most if not all passengers were Israeli citizens.
The deputy director for security for Sibir, Viktor Alexeyev, was aboard the plane, ORT television reported, citing the airline`s deputy director, Natalya Filyova.
Filyova also said that the passengers` manifest and the list of passengers who had bought tickets were not identical.
An Emergency Situations Ministry officer in the Black Sea port of Novorossiisk, Konstantin Ludchenko, told ORT that 10 bodies have been recovered so far. He said that the Black Sea was 2,100 meters deep at the site of the crash.
Officials from President George W. Bush`s administration quickly contacted their counterparts in Moscow in an attempt to determine whether there was a connection between the explosion and the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks or U.S. plans to retaliate.
Putin, who has taken a high-profile position in the international anti-terrorist coalition that has formed following the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, was immediately informed of the crash, the chief presidential press spokesman said.
In a telephone conversation, he and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon expressed condolences to the families and friends of the crash victims. The two leaders pledged to cooperate in the investigation.
Israeli Transport Minister Ephraim Sneh said there was no clear evidence yet that the plane crashed as the result of a terror attack. But Russian officials said it was the first possibility being considered.
``Naturally, a terrorist attack is one of the versions under consideration,`` said Alexander Zdanovich, spokesman for the Federal Security Service. ``Against the background of the fight against international terrorism, naturally this version must be considered.``
He said other potential causes of the crash would be investigated, including a possible explosion in an engine that was not sparked by an explosive device.
The crash was the 21st involving a Tu-154 since it entered service in the early 1970s. With some 1,000 planes built, it is the most widely used jetliner in Russia and is used in many other countries.
By Deborah Seward & Alexander Zemlianichenko /AP/
AVIA.RU - Информационное агентство "Российская авиация и космонавтика"
Passengers Were Russian Emigres
A young bride flying to Siberia for her wedding. A grandmother anxious to see her Russian hometown again after 10 years in Israel. The daughter of an Israeli immigration official. They were among the 66 passengers aboard the Russian airliner that crashed into the Black Sea.
Sobbing relatives huddled in a lounge at Israel`s main airport Thursday to comfort each other after being told their loved ones were on the fatal Sibir flight from Tel Aviv to Novosibirsk.
Some wailed or covered their faces with their hands. Others passed on the news in phone conversations punctuated by sobs.
Officials said most if not all the passengers were Israelis — immigrants from the former Soviet Union who were en route to Novosibirsk for family visits during the Jewish holiday of Sukkot.
Vadim Kupov, a recent immigrant to Israel, lost his 28-year-old wife Laila and his 18-month-old son Michael. The three had initially planned to fly to Novosibirsk for a family visit on Sept. 11, but that flight was canceled when Israel closed its airspace after the terror attacks on New York and Washington that day.
Kupov, a tall man with short blond hair, said he had considered joining his family on Thursday`s flight, but decided to stay behind in Israel because of financial problems. Kupov`s son was one of two infants aboard, aviation officials said.
A Tel Aviv music student, 24-year-old Elena Starikovsky, had planned to get married in Novosibirsk, said a friend, Dina Kulbatzka. Several days ago, Starikovsky`s friends in Israel threw her a party in Tel Aviv.
Kulbatzka said the bride, who immigrated to Israel two years ago, had hoped to persuade her husband to make a life in the Jewish state, rather than in Russia.
Olga Kuznitsov lost her 76-year-old mother, Sarah Kamcha, who was anxious about returning to her hometown of Novosibirsk for the first time in 10 years.
``She was nervous to go back to visit home,`` Kuznitsov said of her mother. Kutznitsov said she heard about the crash on television, and then rushed to Ben Gurion International Airport near Tel Aviv.
She said she hasn`t told her 5-year-old son yet about his grandmother`s death. The two were especially close, she said.
Also aboard were the daughter of an Israeli immigration official and an elderly woman from Gilo, a Jewish neighborhood built on disputed land on the outskirts of Jerusalem. Gilo has frequently come under Palestinian fire in the past year of Israeli-Palestinian fighting, and the woman hoped to find some respite from the fighting in Novosibirsk, said Housing Minister Natan Sharansky.
Social workers offered to escort grieving relatives home for emergency counseling. ``We are trying, with a network of volunteers, to help the families in their difficult times, and to get to their homes,`` said social worker Ruth Bar-On.
All outgoing flights at Ben Gurion, Israel`s main airport, were grounded for about four hours. Airport officials said planes and luggage of passengers were being given an extra check. Thousands of passengers were temporarily stranded, with at least 20 flights forced to delay their departure.
In a sign of the apprehension of airport officials, even passengers who had already checked in were called back for another security check. Security procedures, already stringent at Ben Gurion, were further tightened, Israel TV`s Channel Two said.
There were conflicting reports on how many of the passengers were Israelis. The Jewish Agency, which helps bring immigrants to Israel, said all 66 had Israeli passports, while the Israeli Airports Authority said the vast majority were Israelis. Several of the passengers were members of the 15,000-member Jewish community in Novosibirsk, said a rabbi in the city, Rabbi Zalman Zaklas.
By Laurie Copans /AP/
AVIA.RU - Информационное агентство "Российская авиация и космонавтика"
Probe into Russian Plane Crash Continues
Russian Deputy Transport Minister Alexander Neradko said he hopes that the probe into the Russian Tu-154 plane crash ``will succeed in discovering the causes of the accident.``
Neradko told reporters on Saturday that over twenty ships are currently working in the disaster area. ``We are drawing many rescue vessels. Fishing vessels, and also research vessels with deep-water equipment, have joined them,`` Neradko said.
Presidential Aide Yevgeny Shaposhnikov said specialists will be assessing the damage done to the plane. In the future it is planned to use this information to determine how the plane was destroyed, Shaposhnikov said.
/Interfax/
AVIA.RU - Информационное агентство "Российская авиация и космонавтика"
Attempts Begin to Find Crashed Plane`s Flight Recorders in Black Sea
Attempts are being made to retrieve the flight recorders of the Russian Tu-154 plane, which crashed into the Black Sea on Thursday, with the help of deep-water devices.
The research vessel Akademik Golitsyn arrived in the disaster area on Saturday, the Russian Emergency Situations Ministry told Interfax. The Triton deep-water device, which the vessel is carrying and which belongs to a foreign company, can work at a depth of up to three kilometers.
Two seiners also came to the disaster area. They started sweeping the crash site to retrieve debris from the plane, passengers` belongings, and other objects.
/Interfax/
AVIA.RU - Информационное агентство "Российская авиация и космонавтика"
A Russian chartered airliner heading from Tel Aviv to Siberia exploded in flight Thursday and crashed off the Black Sea coast with at least 76 people on board, and a senior U.S. military official said that it may have been downed accidentally by a missile fired during a military exercise in Ukraine.
However, Ukraine categorically denied that theory, and President Vladimir Putin said he had no reason to doubt the denial.
``The weapons that were being used during this exercise could not reach the area where our Tu-154 was flying,`` Putin said. ``What I told you as of this moment is based on what our Ukrainian partners have told us and we don't have any reason not to trust them.``
Russian officials were investigating the possibility that the plane had been targeted by terrorists. ``A civilian aircraft crashed today and it is possible that it is the result of a terrorist act,`` Putin told a meeting of visiting European justice ministers.
A U.S. Defense Department official in Washington, speaking on condition of anonymity, said a land-based surface-to-air missile had been fired from the Crimean region of Ukraine.
The missile was believed to be an S-200, a surface-to-air missile of Russian design that is guided by radar to its target. NATO calls the missile the SA-5 ``Gammon.`` It flies faster than three times the speed of sound, has a range of up to nearly 250 kilometers and can hit targets above 30,000 meters altitude, according to several military publications.
Another American defense official said the missile may have been fired from a naval vessel. The exercises were conducted on Cape Onuk, in Crimea, about 250 kilometers from the site of the crash, on territory controlled by the Russian Black Sea Fleet.
Ukrainian anti-aircraft, navy, rocket forces, aviation and artillery took part, as well as Russian forces including shore-based forces and a guard ship. Part of the exercise involved firing on an unmanned aircraft.
According to military officials, the exercise included anti-aircraft S-125, S-200 and S-300 rockets, which are similar to U.S. Patriot missiles, and R-300 tactical rockets.
``The direction of the firing and the distance do not correspond to the plane's explosion site either in theory or in practice. All the hits by the rockets used during the exercise were recorded by corresponding devices and reached their targets,`` said Konstantyn Khivrenko, the Ukrainian defense spokesman. ``Moreover, the monitoring means of Ukraine`s air defense forces as well as those of the Ukrainian air traffic control did not record the presence of any civilian aircraft in the exercise area during the maneuvers.``
He said that the targets were at a distance of 35 to 39 kilometers. ``All the rockets used during the training exercise had guaranteed service lives and self-destruction mechanisms in case they deviated from their course,`` said Defense Minister Oleksandr Kuzmuk, according to a statement released by Khivrenko.
Garik Ovanesyan, the pilot of an Armenian An-24 flying from the Crimean city of Simferopol to the Armenian capital, Yerevan, said his plane was at 6,300 meters above the Black Sea when the plane above his exploded.
``I saw the explosion on the plane, which was above me at an altitude of 11,000 meters,`` Ovanesyan said. ``The plane fell into the sea, and there was another explosion in the sea. After that I saw a big white spot on the sea and I had the impression that oil was burning.``
The plane, a Tu-154, went down in pieces 180 kilometers off the Russian coastal city of Adler, located on the Georgian border, said Vasily Yurchuk, a spokesman for the Emergency Situations Ministry.
The plane was on its way from Tel Aviv to Novosibirsk, Yurchuk said. It belonged to Sibir, which is based in Novosibirsk, and had been chartered, Sibir officials said.
A spokesman for the airline, Yevgeny Filenin, said that there were 64 passengers and 12 crew members aboard.
Most if not all passengers were Israeli citizens.
The deputy director for security for Sibir, Viktor Alexeyev, was aboard the plane, ORT television reported, citing the airline`s deputy director, Natalya Filyova.
Filyova also said that the passengers` manifest and the list of passengers who had bought tickets were not identical.
An Emergency Situations Ministry officer in the Black Sea port of Novorossiisk, Konstantin Ludchenko, told ORT that 10 bodies have been recovered so far. He said that the Black Sea was 2,100 meters deep at the site of the crash.
Officials from President George W. Bush`s administration quickly contacted their counterparts in Moscow in an attempt to determine whether there was a connection between the explosion and the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks or U.S. plans to retaliate.
Putin, who has taken a high-profile position in the international anti-terrorist coalition that has formed following the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, was immediately informed of the crash, the chief presidential press spokesman said.
In a telephone conversation, he and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon expressed condolences to the families and friends of the crash victims. The two leaders pledged to cooperate in the investigation.
Israeli Transport Minister Ephraim Sneh said there was no clear evidence yet that the plane crashed as the result of a terror attack. But Russian officials said it was the first possibility being considered.
``Naturally, a terrorist attack is one of the versions under consideration,`` said Alexander Zdanovich, spokesman for the Federal Security Service. ``Against the background of the fight against international terrorism, naturally this version must be considered.``
He said other potential causes of the crash would be investigated, including a possible explosion in an engine that was not sparked by an explosive device.
The crash was the 21st involving a Tu-154 since it entered service in the early 1970s. With some 1,000 planes built, it is the most widely used jetliner in Russia and is used in many other countries.
By Deborah Seward & Alexander Zemlianichenko /AP/
AVIA.RU - Информационное агентство "Российская авиация и космонавтика"
Passengers Were Russian Emigres
A young bride flying to Siberia for her wedding. A grandmother anxious to see her Russian hometown again after 10 years in Israel. The daughter of an Israeli immigration official. They were among the 66 passengers aboard the Russian airliner that crashed into the Black Sea.
Sobbing relatives huddled in a lounge at Israel`s main airport Thursday to comfort each other after being told their loved ones were on the fatal Sibir flight from Tel Aviv to Novosibirsk.
Some wailed or covered their faces with their hands. Others passed on the news in phone conversations punctuated by sobs.
Officials said most if not all the passengers were Israelis — immigrants from the former Soviet Union who were en route to Novosibirsk for family visits during the Jewish holiday of Sukkot.
Vadim Kupov, a recent immigrant to Israel, lost his 28-year-old wife Laila and his 18-month-old son Michael. The three had initially planned to fly to Novosibirsk for a family visit on Sept. 11, but that flight was canceled when Israel closed its airspace after the terror attacks on New York and Washington that day.
Kupov, a tall man with short blond hair, said he had considered joining his family on Thursday`s flight, but decided to stay behind in Israel because of financial problems. Kupov`s son was one of two infants aboard, aviation officials said.
A Tel Aviv music student, 24-year-old Elena Starikovsky, had planned to get married in Novosibirsk, said a friend, Dina Kulbatzka. Several days ago, Starikovsky`s friends in Israel threw her a party in Tel Aviv.
Kulbatzka said the bride, who immigrated to Israel two years ago, had hoped to persuade her husband to make a life in the Jewish state, rather than in Russia.
Olga Kuznitsov lost her 76-year-old mother, Sarah Kamcha, who was anxious about returning to her hometown of Novosibirsk for the first time in 10 years.
``She was nervous to go back to visit home,`` Kuznitsov said of her mother. Kutznitsov said she heard about the crash on television, and then rushed to Ben Gurion International Airport near Tel Aviv.
She said she hasn`t told her 5-year-old son yet about his grandmother`s death. The two were especially close, she said.
Also aboard were the daughter of an Israeli immigration official and an elderly woman from Gilo, a Jewish neighborhood built on disputed land on the outskirts of Jerusalem. Gilo has frequently come under Palestinian fire in the past year of Israeli-Palestinian fighting, and the woman hoped to find some respite from the fighting in Novosibirsk, said Housing Minister Natan Sharansky.
Social workers offered to escort grieving relatives home for emergency counseling. ``We are trying, with a network of volunteers, to help the families in their difficult times, and to get to their homes,`` said social worker Ruth Bar-On.
All outgoing flights at Ben Gurion, Israel`s main airport, were grounded for about four hours. Airport officials said planes and luggage of passengers were being given an extra check. Thousands of passengers were temporarily stranded, with at least 20 flights forced to delay their departure.
In a sign of the apprehension of airport officials, even passengers who had already checked in were called back for another security check. Security procedures, already stringent at Ben Gurion, were further tightened, Israel TV`s Channel Two said.
There were conflicting reports on how many of the passengers were Israelis. The Jewish Agency, which helps bring immigrants to Israel, said all 66 had Israeli passports, while the Israeli Airports Authority said the vast majority were Israelis. Several of the passengers were members of the 15,000-member Jewish community in Novosibirsk, said a rabbi in the city, Rabbi Zalman Zaklas.
By Laurie Copans /AP/
AVIA.RU - Информационное агентство "Российская авиация и космонавтика"
Probe into Russian Plane Crash Continues
Russian Deputy Transport Minister Alexander Neradko said he hopes that the probe into the Russian Tu-154 plane crash ``will succeed in discovering the causes of the accident.``
Neradko told reporters on Saturday that over twenty ships are currently working in the disaster area. ``We are drawing many rescue vessels. Fishing vessels, and also research vessels with deep-water equipment, have joined them,`` Neradko said.
Presidential Aide Yevgeny Shaposhnikov said specialists will be assessing the damage done to the plane. In the future it is planned to use this information to determine how the plane was destroyed, Shaposhnikov said.
/Interfax/
AVIA.RU - Информационное агентство "Российская авиация и космонавтика"
Attempts Begin to Find Crashed Plane`s Flight Recorders in Black Sea
Attempts are being made to retrieve the flight recorders of the Russian Tu-154 plane, which crashed into the Black Sea on Thursday, with the help of deep-water devices.
The research vessel Akademik Golitsyn arrived in the disaster area on Saturday, the Russian Emergency Situations Ministry told Interfax. The Triton deep-water device, which the vessel is carrying and which belongs to a foreign company, can work at a depth of up to three kilometers.
Two seiners also came to the disaster area. They started sweeping the crash site to retrieve debris from the plane, passengers` belongings, and other objects.
/Interfax/
AVIA.RU - Информационное агентство "Российская авиация и космонавтика"
In knowledge we trust!
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инструменты
Specialists Hear Pilot`s Cry During Deciphering of Conversations aboard Tu-154
When experts were deciphering the tapes of conversations aboard the Tu-154 that crashed near Sochi, they heard a pilot cry out.
Russia`s Deputy Transportation Minister Alexander Neradko reported this at a press conference on Sunday. He said a ground-based tape recorder fixed this cry at 1:45 p.m.
At present, this recording is being studied by specialists in greater detail. Neradko said the pilot`s cry might have coincided with the moment of the explosion aboard the plane.
Deputy Minister for Emergency Situations Alexander Moskalets and Chairman of the Interstate Aviation Committee Tatiana Anodina told the press conference that specialists from the Russian and Ukrainian Defense Ministries will be joining the investigation as of Monday.
/Interfax/
AVIA.RU - Информационное агентство "Российская авиация и космонавтика"
When experts were deciphering the tapes of conversations aboard the Tu-154 that crashed near Sochi, they heard a pilot cry out.
Russia`s Deputy Transportation Minister Alexander Neradko reported this at a press conference on Sunday. He said a ground-based tape recorder fixed this cry at 1:45 p.m.
At present, this recording is being studied by specialists in greater detail. Neradko said the pilot`s cry might have coincided with the moment of the explosion aboard the plane.
Deputy Minister for Emergency Situations Alexander Moskalets and Chairman of the Interstate Aviation Committee Tatiana Anodina told the press conference that specialists from the Russian and Ukrainian Defense Ministries will be joining the investigation as of Monday.
/Interfax/
AVIA.RU - Информационное агентство "Российская авиация и космонавтика"
In knowledge we trust!
Kremlin Looks to Kiev for Crash Clues
With the Kremlin now ready to consider the possibility that a Russian passenger plane was shot down by a stray Ukrainian anti-aircraft missile, investigators on Sunday looked through the piles of debris that have been brought ashore and a vessel searched the bottom of the Black Sea for evidence.
A Sibir Tu-154 airliner flying Thursday afternoon from Tel Aviv to Novosibirsk exploded over the Black Sea, some 180 kilometers off the coast of Sochi, killing all 78 people aboard. Most of the passengers were Israeli citizens with Russian roots who were on their way to visit relatives.
A 21-member Israeli delegation arrived Sunday in Sochi to help identify the 14 bodies that were recovered by a Russian freighter. Eight have been identified, officials said.
Ukraine`s military has denied that a missile fired during an air-defense exercise on the Black Sea coast downed the plane, saying it did not have sufficient range.
But President Vladimir Putin was not satisfied with the documentation on the exercises that Ukraine has provided so far, Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov said Saturday. Putin had demanded more information about the firing of an S-200 missile at 1:41 p.m. Moscow time, three minutes before the Sibir plane disappeared from radar screens, Ivanov said on RTR television.
``All versions of what happened are being examined, including the possible link between the plane crash and the air defense exercises held by the Ukrainian armed forces,`` Ivanov said.
Just hours after the crash, unnamed U.S. defense officials in Washington said that data from an early-warning missile tracking system showed the plane was hit by a surface-to-air missile.
Putin initially said he had no reason to doubt Ukraine`s denial. Ivanov said the ``so-called version`` of a stray rocket was ``launched by the media.`` A terrorist attack or malfunction of the aircraft were given as more likely possibilities Thursday.
But at a press conference Saturday in Sochi, Security Council head Vladimir Rushailo confirmed the plane was ``hit by an explosion,`` although he would not elaborate on what kind of explosion. He said investigators have found ``foreign objects`` among the airplane debris, but said these might be anything, including the passengers` personal belongings.
The Associated Press said officials involved in the salvage effort described finding a large floating cylindrical object that they could not identify.
Fragments of the plane that were found floating in the sea — broken seats, soaked cushions, a wheel, unrecognizable pieces of metal, even some personal belongings — were piled in a small hangar at Sochi`s airport. Many had small, round holes in them.
The largest fragment — a piece of bent metal just more than a meter high — had a big jagged hole in the middle, much like a shrapnel hole.
The New York Times quoted an unidentified official at the Severny Zavod missile factory saying that S-200s shoot down aircraft by blasting them with shrapnel. It is not unusual for the body of the missile to survive the attack, the official said.
The bodies that were retrieved had numerous wounds caused by objects that had gone right through them, said Rushailo, who is heading the commission investigating the tragedy.
The last sound Russian air traffic controllers heard from the cockpit of the Tu-154 was of a pilot`s scream, said Alexander Neradko, first deputy transportation minister. ``It was not a word, but a scream. It was very short. It only lasted half a second,`` he said at a news conference Sunday.
The plane`s black boxes remain on the bottom of the Black Sea at a depth of more than 2,000 meters. Tatyana Anodina, a member of the special commission, said they were not emitting any radio signals that would make them easier to find.
The search for the black boxes was further hampered by the fact that the silt at the bottom of the Black Sea is six meters deep, Interfax reported, citing Deputy Emergency Situations Minister Alexander Moskalets.
The bottom of the sea was being searched by an unmanned deep-sea vessel, Triton, which belongs to the scientific research ship Alexander Galitsyn, currently deployed at the place of the crash. But the results were hardly encouraging: Triton managed to search only 30 square kilometers Sunday, less than 10 percent of the area where the debris may lie and which is estimated at some 300 square kilometers.
The Ukrainian Defense Ministry was sending a delegation to Sochi on Monday to help with the investigation.
On April 20, 2000, a Ukrainian surface-to-surface Tochka-U missile fired during a training exercise veered off course and hit an apartment building in the town of Bovary. Three people were killed and five were injured. The military took several days to admit that the explosion at the apartment building was caused by its missile.
Meanwhile, relatives of passengers on the Sibir flight were arriving in Sochi. The first plane carrying family members from Israel arrived Sunday evening.
``They really don`t know what to do, how to behave,`` said Rabbi Berl Lazar, one of Russia`s chief rabbis, who also came to Sochi. ``They don`t want anything, they just ask what should they do.``
The Sochi city administration is offering to take relatives by boat on Monday morning to the place where the plane crashed.
By Ana Uzelac & Ivan Sekretarev / AP
AVIA.RU - Информационное агентство "Российская авиация и космонавтика"
With the Kremlin now ready to consider the possibility that a Russian passenger plane was shot down by a stray Ukrainian anti-aircraft missile, investigators on Sunday looked through the piles of debris that have been brought ashore and a vessel searched the bottom of the Black Sea for evidence.
A Sibir Tu-154 airliner flying Thursday afternoon from Tel Aviv to Novosibirsk exploded over the Black Sea, some 180 kilometers off the coast of Sochi, killing all 78 people aboard. Most of the passengers were Israeli citizens with Russian roots who were on their way to visit relatives.
A 21-member Israeli delegation arrived Sunday in Sochi to help identify the 14 bodies that were recovered by a Russian freighter. Eight have been identified, officials said.
Ukraine`s military has denied that a missile fired during an air-defense exercise on the Black Sea coast downed the plane, saying it did not have sufficient range.
But President Vladimir Putin was not satisfied with the documentation on the exercises that Ukraine has provided so far, Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov said Saturday. Putin had demanded more information about the firing of an S-200 missile at 1:41 p.m. Moscow time, three minutes before the Sibir plane disappeared from radar screens, Ivanov said on RTR television.
``All versions of what happened are being examined, including the possible link between the plane crash and the air defense exercises held by the Ukrainian armed forces,`` Ivanov said.
Just hours after the crash, unnamed U.S. defense officials in Washington said that data from an early-warning missile tracking system showed the plane was hit by a surface-to-air missile.
Putin initially said he had no reason to doubt Ukraine`s denial. Ivanov said the ``so-called version`` of a stray rocket was ``launched by the media.`` A terrorist attack or malfunction of the aircraft were given as more likely possibilities Thursday.
But at a press conference Saturday in Sochi, Security Council head Vladimir Rushailo confirmed the plane was ``hit by an explosion,`` although he would not elaborate on what kind of explosion. He said investigators have found ``foreign objects`` among the airplane debris, but said these might be anything, including the passengers` personal belongings.
The Associated Press said officials involved in the salvage effort described finding a large floating cylindrical object that they could not identify.
Fragments of the plane that were found floating in the sea — broken seats, soaked cushions, a wheel, unrecognizable pieces of metal, even some personal belongings — were piled in a small hangar at Sochi`s airport. Many had small, round holes in them.
The largest fragment — a piece of bent metal just more than a meter high — had a big jagged hole in the middle, much like a shrapnel hole.
The New York Times quoted an unidentified official at the Severny Zavod missile factory saying that S-200s shoot down aircraft by blasting them with shrapnel. It is not unusual for the body of the missile to survive the attack, the official said.
The bodies that were retrieved had numerous wounds caused by objects that had gone right through them, said Rushailo, who is heading the commission investigating the tragedy.
The last sound Russian air traffic controllers heard from the cockpit of the Tu-154 was of a pilot`s scream, said Alexander Neradko, first deputy transportation minister. ``It was not a word, but a scream. It was very short. It only lasted half a second,`` he said at a news conference Sunday.
The plane`s black boxes remain on the bottom of the Black Sea at a depth of more than 2,000 meters. Tatyana Anodina, a member of the special commission, said they were not emitting any radio signals that would make them easier to find.
The search for the black boxes was further hampered by the fact that the silt at the bottom of the Black Sea is six meters deep, Interfax reported, citing Deputy Emergency Situations Minister Alexander Moskalets.
The bottom of the sea was being searched by an unmanned deep-sea vessel, Triton, which belongs to the scientific research ship Alexander Galitsyn, currently deployed at the place of the crash. But the results were hardly encouraging: Triton managed to search only 30 square kilometers Sunday, less than 10 percent of the area where the debris may lie and which is estimated at some 300 square kilometers.
The Ukrainian Defense Ministry was sending a delegation to Sochi on Monday to help with the investigation.
On April 20, 2000, a Ukrainian surface-to-surface Tochka-U missile fired during a training exercise veered off course and hit an apartment building in the town of Bovary. Three people were killed and five were injured. The military took several days to admit that the explosion at the apartment building was caused by its missile.
Meanwhile, relatives of passengers on the Sibir flight were arriving in Sochi. The first plane carrying family members from Israel arrived Sunday evening.
``They really don`t know what to do, how to behave,`` said Rabbi Berl Lazar, one of Russia`s chief rabbis, who also came to Sochi. ``They don`t want anything, they just ask what should they do.``
The Sochi city administration is offering to take relatives by boat on Monday morning to the place where the plane crashed.
By Ana Uzelac & Ivan Sekretarev / AP
AVIA.RU - Информационное агентство "Российская авиация и космонавтика"
In knowledge we trust!
Israeli Team Arrives in Russia to Investigate Air Crash
A 21-member Israeli delegation arrived in the Black Sea city of Sochi yesterday to aid the investigation into what caused an airliner carrying mostly Russian-born Israeli immigrants to explode in flight, killing 77 people.
The Tupolev 154, en route from Tel Aviv to Novosibirsk, exploded and crashed into the sea Thursday 180 kilometers off the Russian coastal city of Adler, near Sochi. Fifty-one of its passengers were Israelis.
The Israeli delegation included forensic experts, technicians and three Jewish military chaplains, one of whom carried a large box containing a Torah scroll. Most of the forensic experts were to help identify the victims, while the rabbis were to observe the Jewish rites surrounding death.
The investigation into Thursday`s disaster has centered on suspicions that a Ukrainian rocket was misfired during a military exercise, after debris was found at the crash site that could not have come from the plane.
The head of Russia`s civil aviation authority, Alexander Neradko, said a short scream was heard in the cockpit at 1:45 p.m., the time the plane flying from Israel to Siberia fell off radar screens.
``It was not a word, but a scream. It was very short. It only lasted half a second,`` he told a news conference in Sochi, adding that the scream sounded like a reaction to an explosion.
Throughout the day specialist salvage ships and fishing trawlers battled stormy weather in the Black Sea in the search for bodies and debris for examination by experts.
A small group of distraught relatives was taken to the morgue in a thunderstorm yesterday for the grim task of trying to identify bodies - some burnt beyond recognition.
Military rabbis accompanied the Israeli delegation to ensure that bodies were treated according to correct Jewish procedure.
Yitzhak Kornia, a police superintendent in the delegation, said there were five identification experts in the group.
``Our main goal is to identify the Israeli citizens among the victims of the air crash,`` he said.
Igor Maslakov, Sochi`s chief forensic expert, said the Israelis brought dental and fingerprint records of Israeli passengers. In some cases, he said, the records were the only way disfigured bodies could be identified.
A total of 14 bodies and the fragments of one other body have been recovered and brought to Sochi. Eight have been identified, five of them Israeli citizens, according to Leonid Baklitsky, the regional deputy governor in charge of the recovery operation.
Jewish Agency Treasurer Chaim Chesler, who spent four years as the Jewish Agency`s key representative in the former Soviet Union, told The Jerusalem Post that he had dealt with people under the most trying of circumstances, but what he had experienced yesterday morning when meeting the bereaved, ``was one of the most difficult moments of my life.``
Chesler called on the Israeli public to be especially sensitive to the emotional needs of Russian immigrants , who in four months had suffered two major catastrophes, the first of which was the bombing in June of the Dolphinarium disco in which the majority of the victims were Russian immigrant teenagers.
The Jewish Agency, the Ministry of Immigrant Absorption and the Flying Carpet Travel agency are jointly picking up the tab for the expense of transporting relatives of the victims to and from Sochi, and for transporting bodies back to Israel for burial.
By Greer Fay Cashman /Jerusalem Post/
AVIA.RU - Информационное агентство "Российская авиация и космонавтика"
A 21-member Israeli delegation arrived in the Black Sea city of Sochi yesterday to aid the investigation into what caused an airliner carrying mostly Russian-born Israeli immigrants to explode in flight, killing 77 people.
The Tupolev 154, en route from Tel Aviv to Novosibirsk, exploded and crashed into the sea Thursday 180 kilometers off the Russian coastal city of Adler, near Sochi. Fifty-one of its passengers were Israelis.
The Israeli delegation included forensic experts, technicians and three Jewish military chaplains, one of whom carried a large box containing a Torah scroll. Most of the forensic experts were to help identify the victims, while the rabbis were to observe the Jewish rites surrounding death.
The investigation into Thursday`s disaster has centered on suspicions that a Ukrainian rocket was misfired during a military exercise, after debris was found at the crash site that could not have come from the plane.
The head of Russia`s civil aviation authority, Alexander Neradko, said a short scream was heard in the cockpit at 1:45 p.m., the time the plane flying from Israel to Siberia fell off radar screens.
``It was not a word, but a scream. It was very short. It only lasted half a second,`` he told a news conference in Sochi, adding that the scream sounded like a reaction to an explosion.
Throughout the day specialist salvage ships and fishing trawlers battled stormy weather in the Black Sea in the search for bodies and debris for examination by experts.
A small group of distraught relatives was taken to the morgue in a thunderstorm yesterday for the grim task of trying to identify bodies - some burnt beyond recognition.
Military rabbis accompanied the Israeli delegation to ensure that bodies were treated according to correct Jewish procedure.
Yitzhak Kornia, a police superintendent in the delegation, said there were five identification experts in the group.
``Our main goal is to identify the Israeli citizens among the victims of the air crash,`` he said.
Igor Maslakov, Sochi`s chief forensic expert, said the Israelis brought dental and fingerprint records of Israeli passengers. In some cases, he said, the records were the only way disfigured bodies could be identified.
A total of 14 bodies and the fragments of one other body have been recovered and brought to Sochi. Eight have been identified, five of them Israeli citizens, according to Leonid Baklitsky, the regional deputy governor in charge of the recovery operation.
Jewish Agency Treasurer Chaim Chesler, who spent four years as the Jewish Agency`s key representative in the former Soviet Union, told The Jerusalem Post that he had dealt with people under the most trying of circumstances, but what he had experienced yesterday morning when meeting the bereaved, ``was one of the most difficult moments of my life.``
Chesler called on the Israeli public to be especially sensitive to the emotional needs of Russian immigrants , who in four months had suffered two major catastrophes, the first of which was the bombing in June of the Dolphinarium disco in which the majority of the victims were Russian immigrant teenagers.
The Jewish Agency, the Ministry of Immigrant Absorption and the Flying Carpet Travel agency are jointly picking up the tab for the expense of transporting relatives of the victims to and from Sochi, and for transporting bodies back to Israel for burial.
By Greer Fay Cashman /Jerusalem Post/
AVIA.RU - Информационное агентство "Российская авиация и космонавтика"
In knowledge we trust!
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Создано 06.10.2001
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Создано 06.10.2001
Связь с владельцами и администрацией сайта: anonisimov@gmail.com, rwasp1957@yandex.ru и admin@balancer.ru.
