Experts doubt Russia’s claims of bird strike in Kazakhstan plane crash

Speculation was growing on Friday that the Russian military may have played a role in the incident. Azerbaijan Airlines plane crash According to the experts’ report, the incident in Kazakhstan on Christmas Day caused the death of 38 people and injured 29 people. Casting doubt on Moscow’s proposal He said the crime was bird strike.

Azerbaijan Airlines’ Embraer 190 flight 8243 was flying from Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, to the city of Grozny in Russia’s North Caucasus region on Wednesday, when its route was disrupted two days later for reasons that are still unclear. It was reported that at some point during the flight, the aircraft’s GPS tracking was disrupted, causing significant deviations in the flight path.

The plane crashed while trying to reach another airport in Aktau in western Kazakhstan after flying east over the Caspian Sea. It crashed and exploded into a ball of fire just two miles from Aktau airport.

Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and Russia launched an investigation into the cause of the accident, but two days later, Russia faced the most frequently asked questions. The Kremlin urged people not to jump to hasty conclusions, and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, who has forged closer ties between his country and Russia during his two decades in power, also said it was too early to speculate.

“The information given to me is that the plane changed course between Baku and Grozny due to deteriorating weather conditions and was heading towards Aktau airport, where it crashed during landing,” he said, while Russia’s civil aviation authority Rosaviatsia suggested a bird strike. theory.

But a U.S. official told CBS News there were early signs that a Russian anti-aircraft system may have hit the plane, in an area where Ukrainian and Russian forces have been exchanging drone and rocket fire for months. If true, it would further highlight Russia’s recklessness in its ongoing occupation of Ukraine, the official, who spoke to CBS News on condition of anonymity, said.

Independent aviation experts also cast doubt on the bird strike theory, citing damage to the plane’s fuselage as evidence of a more sinister possible explanation.

“It certainly doesn’t look like a flock of birds,” said CBS News aviation safety analyst Robert Sumwalt, former chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board.

“Birds are not flying at the altitude where the initial damage occurred to this aircraft,” Sumwalt added.

Instead the damage bears traces of shrapnel from an air-launched weapon, and senior British military and security analyst Justin Crump told CBS News partner network BBC News: “The most likely hypothesis is that it was hit by an air defense missile – almost certainly.” Russian.”

In a statement quoted by international news agencies on Friday, Azerbaijan Airlines said there was “external physical and technical intervention” during the flight of the plane, but did not provide further information.

Some survivors said they heard an explosion before they crashed.

“The Ukrainian drones were active at the time and that’s commensurate with everything we saw in the pilots’ communication with air traffic control,” Crump told the BBC.

There is Ukraine relied heavily on explosive drones Last year, Russia frequently used air defense systems to hit Russian military and infrastructure targets in the neighboring country’s western territory, which was much larger last year.

For many observers, the circumstances of the Azerbaijan Airlines crash and the damage to the plane’s wreckage Shooting down of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 In 2014, this passenger plane was hit by a missile launched by Russian-backed forces into Eastern Ukraine, killing all 298 people on board.

Among those desperately seeking answers in the latest disaster in Kazakhstan are survivors; These include a man who said he was sitting next to his wife in a hospital bed on the plane at the time of the crash.

“I haven’t seen my wife since then,” he said.

Investigators recovered so-called “black boxes” of flight data and cockpit voice recorders at the crash site. Experts from Brazil, where the plane was built, were expected to arrive in Kazakhstan on Friday to help receive and analyze information from them.

The Ukrainian government called on Friday for Russia to be held responsible for the crash, as Azerbaijan Airlines reportedly suspended scheduled flights to seven cities in Russia while official investigations intensified.

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