Double terror strike fear as Russian jets crash
A Russian passenger jet crashed and another apparently broke up in the air almost simultaneously after they took off from the same airport, raising fears of a double terrorist atrocity.
There was little hope today that any of those on board – at least 89 – could have survived.
Authorities said rescuers found wreckage from a Tupolev Tu-154 jet, which was carrying at least 46 people, about nine hours after it issued a distress signal indicating an attack and disappeared from radar screens over the Rostov region, 600 miles south of Moscow.
At about the same time that plane disappeared, a Tu-134 airliner carrying 43 people crashed in the Tula region, about 125 miles south of Moscow. The emergency situations ministry later said that everybody on board the plane was killed.
The planes had left Moscow’s Domodedovo airport within 40 minutes of each other yesterday and disappeared from radar screens about 11pm local time (8pm Irish time), officials said.
President Vladimir Putin ordered an immediate investigation by the nation’s main intelligence agency, the Federal Security Service, and security was tightened at airports across the country.
Authorities have expressed concern that separatists in war-ravaged Chechnya could carry out attacks linked to this Sunday’s election to replace the region’s pro-Moscow president, who was killed by a bombing in May.
Rebels have been blamed for a series of terror strikes that have claimed hundreds of lives in Russia in recent years.
Witnesses reported seeing an explosion before the first plane crashed about 125 miles south of Moscow, and suspicions of terrorist involvement were compounded by the reports that the Tu-154 that went missing in Rostov issued a signal indicating the plane was being hijacked.
Citing an unidentified source in Russia’s “power structures”, Interfax news agency said the signal came at 11.04pm, shortly before the plane disappeared from radar. Emergency and interior ministry sources in southern Russia also said a distress signal had been activated.
Interfax said emergency workers spotted a fire in the Rostov region, 600 miles south of Moscow, where the Tu-154 went missing. But rainy weather hampered the search efforts and it took hours before any wreckage was found.
Regional emergency situations ministry chief Viktor Shkareda said the plane apparently broke up in the air and that wreckage was spread over an area of 25 to 30 miles.
Body parts have also been found along with fragments of the plane near Gluboky, a village north of regional capital Rostov-on-Don.
Shkareda said there were 52 people aboard the plane, while emergency officials in Moscow put the number of passengers and crew at 46.
In the Tula region, rescuers found fragments of the Tu-134 jet’s tail near the village of Buchalki.
Emergency situations ministry spokeswoman Marina Ryklina said later there were no survivors.
At about the same time that the Tu-134 crashed, the Tu-154 lost contact with flight controllers, Ryklina said. Interfax, quoting Russia’s Interstate Aviation Committee, said there were 44 passengers and an unknown number of crew abroad.
The Tu-154 took off from Domodedovo airport at 9.35pm and the other plane left 40 minutes later, state-run Rossiya television reported.
The Tu-154 belonged to the Russian airline Sibir, which said that the plane had been in service since 1982.
ITAR-Tass news agency said that authorities were not ruling out terrorism. Interfax quoted an unnamed Russian aviation security expert as saying the fact that the two planes disappeared around the same time raised suspicions of terrorism.
ITAR-Tass reported that the authorities believe the Tu-134 fell from an altitude of 32,800 feet.
It said the plane belonged to small regional airline Volga-Aviaexpress and was being piloted by the company’s director, and quoted dispatchers as saying there were 34 passengers and seven crew aboard. Ryklina put the numbers at 35 and eight, a total of 43.
A Domodedovo airport spokesman told Interfax there were no foreigners on the passenger lists for either plane.
Authorities said the Tu-134 was heading for the southern city of Volgograd, where Volga-Aviaexpress is based, while the plane that crashed in the Rostov region was flying to the Black Sea resort city of Sochi, where Putin is on holiday.
When Russia’s United Nations ambassador Andrey Denisov was told of the initial report of two near-simultaneous crashes, he said: “Now we have to see if there’s terrorism.”
In Washington, a US official said it was the understanding of American officials that the two Russian planes disappeared within four minutes of each other, which “in and of itself is suspicious”.
