Azerbaijan Airline crash a Russian hit–sources
BAKU—Russian air defenses downed an Azerbaijan Airlines plane that crashed in Kazakhstan, killing 38 people, four sources with knowledge of the preliminary findings of Azerbaijan’s investigation into the disaster told Reuters on Thursday.
Flight J2-8243 crashed on Wednesday morning in a ball of fire near the city of Aktau in Kazakhstan after diverting from an area of southern Russia where Moscow has repeatedly used air defense systems against Ukrainian drone strikes.
The Embraer passenger jet had taken off 7:55 a.m. here at Baku, Azerbaijan’s capital, and flown to Grozny, in Russia’s southern Chechnya region, before veering off hundreds of miles across the Caspian Sea.
It crashed on the opposite shore of the Caspian after what Russia’s aviation watchdog said was an emergency that may have been caused by a bird strike.
Officials did not explain why it had crossed the sea. The nearest Russian airport on the plane’s flight path, Makhachkala, was closed on Wednesday morning.
Same preliminary conclusion
One of the Azerbaijani sources familiar with the investigation told Reuters that preliminary results showed the plane was struck by a Russian Pantsir-S air defense system and its communications were paralyzed by electronic warfare systems on the approach into Grozny.
“No one claims that it was done on purpose. However, taking into account the established facts, Baku expects the Russian side to confess to the shooting down of the Azerbaijani aircraft,” the source said.
Three other sources confirmed that the investigation had come to the same preliminary conclusion.
A US official told Reuters on Thursday there were early indications a Russian anti-aircraft system may have struck the plane.
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization called for a full investigation into the crash. “Our thoughts and prayers are with the families and victims of Azerbaijan Airlines flight J28243,” the bloc’s spokesperson Farah Dakhlallah said on Thursday in a post on X.
Canada’s foreign ministry also said on X: “We call on Russia to allow for an open and transparent investigation into the incident and to accept its findings.”
But Kazakh Deputy Prime Minister Qanat Bozymbaev said he could neither confirm nor deny the thesis that Russian air defenses downed the plane.
Asked about that possibility, the Kazakh transport prosecutor for the region where the plane came down said the investigation had yet to reach a firm conclusion.
Russia’s Defense Ministry did not respond to a request for comment, while the Kremlin said it would be improper to comment until the inquiry was concluded.
“It is wrong to build hypotheses before the conclusions of the investigation,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said.
On Friday Russia’s TASS news agency reported that an Azerbaijan Airlines flight to the southern Russian town of Mineralnie Vody had turned back to Baku after being told a chunk of airspace in southern Russia had been closed.
Electronic jamming
Footage shot by passengers on the plane before it crashed showed oxygen masks down and people wearing life vests. Later footage showed bloodied and bruised passengers climbing out of the plane, which had a total of 67 people on board. There were 29 survivors.
Pictures of the plane wreckage showed what appeared to be shrapnel damage to its tail section.
In an alert to airlines on Wednesday, aviation security firm Osprey Flight Solutions said footage of the wreckage and the circumstances around the air space in southwest Russia indicated the possibility that the airliner was hit by some form of anti-aircraft fire.
In addition, publicly available ADS-B flight tracking data showed that the Azerbaijani aircraft experienced GPS jamming throughout its flight over southwest Russia, the alert said.
Russia uses advanced electronic jamming equipment to confuse Ukrainian drone location and communication systems, and a large number of air defense systems have been deployed to shoot down the drones.
Ukrainian military drones have repeatedly targeted Russia’s southern regions in recent months, triggering Russian air defenses. Russia and Ukraine have been at war since Moscow’s invasion of its neighbor in February 2022.
Earlier on Wednesday, the Russian Defense Ministry had reported the downing of 59 Ukrainian drones over several regions.
Some were reportedly shot down in closed air space over regions bordering Ukraine, including the Sea of Azov. Flight operations were reportedly temporarily suspended at Russia’s Kazan Airport due to the activity.
