Russia’s head of aviation mentioned on Friday that there was a Ukrainian drone attack happening in Chechnya when an Azerbaijani airliner tried to land but then redirected to Kazakhstan where it eventually crashed earlier this week.
Dmitry Yadrov, who leads Russia’s civil aviation authority Rosaviatsia, did not address the claims made by an Azerbaijani politician and several aviation experts who suggested that the crash on Wednesday was caused by Russian air defense fire.
The Embraer 190 belonging to Azerbaijan Airlines was en route from Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, to Grozny, the capital of the Russian republic of Chechnya. However, the plane altered its course to Aktau in Kazakhstan, located across the Caspian Sea, and tragically crashed while trying to land there. The accident resulted in the loss of 38 lives and left all 29 survivors injured.
Authorities in Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Russia were tight-lipped about a possible cause of the crash pending an official probe, but a member of Azerbaijan’s parliament, Rasim Musabekov told the Azerbaijani news agency Turan on Thursday that the plane was fired on while in the skies over Grozny and urged Russia to offer an official apology.
Asked about Musabekov’s statement, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov declined to comment, saying that it will be up to investigators to determine the cause of the crash.
“The air incident is being investigated and we don’t believe we have the right to make any assessments until the conclusions are made as a result of the investigation,” Peskov said in a conference call with reporters.
Yadrov, the Russian aviation chief, said that as the plane was preparing to land in Grozny in deep fog, Ukrainian drones were targeting Grozny, prompting authorities to close the area for air traffic.
Yadrov said that after the captain made two unsuccessful attempts to land in Grozny, he was offered other airports as an alternative but decided to fly to Aktau across the Caspian Sea.
“The situation in the area of Grozny airport was quite difficult,” he said in a statement. “There are many circumstances that it’s necessary to investigate jointly.”
Investigators from Azerbaijan are working in Grozny as part of the crash probe, Azerbaijani Prosecutor General’s office said in a statement.
As the official crash probe started, some aviation experts pointed out that holes seen in the plane’s tail section suggested that it could have come under fire from Russian air defense systems fending off a Ukrainian drone attack.
Ukrainian drones had previously attacked Grozny, the capital of the Russian republic of Chechnya, and other regions in the country’s North Caucasus.
FlightRadar24 said in an online post that the aircraft had faced “strong GPS jamming” that interfered with flight tracking data. Russia has extensively used sophisticated jamming equipment to fend off drone attacks.
Following Wednesday’s suspension of flights from Baku to Grozy and Makhachkala, Azerbaiajan Airlines announced Friday that it would also halt service to more Russian cities, cutting air links to Mineralnye Vody, Sochi, Volgograd, Ufa, Samara.
It said in a statement that the flights will be suspended “following the preliminary results of the investigation into the crash of the Embraer 190 aircraft operating flight J2-8243 from Baku to Grozny, caused by physical and technical interference, and considering potential risks to flight safety.”
The company will continue to operate flights to six other Russian cities including Moscow, St. Petersburg and Kazan. Those cities also have been repeatedly targeted by Ukrainian drone strikes in the past.
Kazakhstan’s Qazaq Air also announced Friday that it was suspending flights from Astana to the Russian city of Yekaterinburg in the Ural Mountains for a month.
The day before, Israeli El Al suspended flights from Tel Aviv to Moscow citing “developments in Russia’s airspace.” The airline said it would reassess the situation next week to decide whether to resume the flights.
Copyright © 2024 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
