Christmas Day, Azerbaijan Airlines Flight JS-8243 crashed while attempting an emergency landing at Aqtau Airport in Aktau, Kazakhstan. There were 67 passengers and crew aboard; at least 38 died in the crash, and the body count may climb as hospitalized passengers succumb to their injuries. Russian aviation authorities blamed the loss on a massive bird strike, but the intact tail section bore the tell-tale marks of a hit by a missile fired from an SA-22 Greyhound (Russian name: Pantsir) surface-to-air missile system. Read the background in my post: Azerbaijan Airline Crash Was Most Likely Caused by a Russian Missile.
Despite warnings from the Kremlin not to speculate on the cause of the crash, Azerbaijani officials have told the media Flight JS-8243 was brought down by a Russian missile. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry “Pornstache” Peskov said: “It would be wrong to put forward any hypotheses before the investigation’s conclusions. We, of course, will not do this, and no-one should do this. We need to wait until the investigation is completed.”
The new information coming out fills in some major gaps in the narrative as it existed on Wednesday and paints a troubling picture of Russia’s actions in the aftermath of the missile strike.
Initial reporting said the flight was denied landing privileges at Grozny because of fog and diverted to another airport: Makhachkala’s Uytash Airport in Dagestan, Russia; for unknown reasons, the plane did not land at Uytash but was diverted to Aqtau Airport. The plane was reported to have been struck while over the Caspian Sea, but this does not appear to be correct.
As JS-8243 approached Grozny, the airspace was closed due to a Ukrainian drone attack.
According to Russian sources, at the time the Azerbaijan Airlines flight was passing over the territory of Chechnya, Russian air defence forces were actively attempting to shoot down Ukrainian UAVs.
The head of the Security Council of the Chechen Republic, Khamzat Kadyrov, confirmed that a drone attack on Grozny took place on Wednesday morning, noting that there were no casualties or damage.
It was the drone attack, not fog, that prevented JS-8243 from landing.
Near Grozny, the plane was hit by a Russian missile. The plane asked to divert to airports at Makhachkala or Mineralnye Vody, but permission was denied, and it was told to land at Aqtau Airport. Essentially, it was forbidden to land in Russian territory. As the plane left the Grozny area, it was subjected to GPS jamming and other electronic warfare effects. “According to data, the plane’s GPS navigation systems were jammed throughout the flight path above the sea.”
By now, the plane had lost steering, and the pilot and co-pilot were managing direction and altitude by using engine power. This is what the flight looked like with altitude changes.
By any standard, the flight crew on JS-8243 were heroic. By keeping the fatally damaged aircraft in the air and accomplishing a controlled crash near the Aqtau Airport, they saved nearly half the people on board.
Now that the birdstrike and engine explosion stories have gone down in flames, the Russians and their online rentboys are ginning up another campaign.
The fact that the Azerbaijani government isn’t laying down for this is good news. Relations between Baku and the Kremlin have been strained. A finding that Russia recklessly shot down an Azerbaijan Airlines plane and denied responsibility will make that relationship much weaker.
