Azerbaijani airline plane shot down by Russia | Hacker News Reader

Azerbaijani airline plane shot down by Russia

anewz.tv

58 pointsig0r025 comments

For context: Baku to Grozny is 500 km along the coast. Grozny to Aktau is 450 km over the Caspian Sea.

That the crippled plane was diverted to Aktau in the hope it would vanish into the sea weighs heavy in the article. I wonder what the real story is. Because I can't think that this plan was on the operator's mind. I also know I'm too naive sometimes.

(I'm lacking English vocabulary to explain correctly, please correct me).

It is likely a mix of pilot decision making and lack of 'agility' of the plane (it's movement are coherent with hydraulic control issues). Great pilot btw, will need a medal

Grozny had two fogs when the shooting occurred, a physical one, natural, making it hard to land, and an electronic one (constant above russian infrastructure close enough to Ukraine), making the landing harder to dangerous. I haven't looked into it, but I would bet that the pilot was circling the airport before being shot.

Probably an iff failure on Russian air defence: we know that at least 7 of their own military planes being shot by their own air defense.

Thanks for explaining the situation above Grozny.

That sounds plausible to me that the route over open water appeared least risky. Once the Russian airports declined an emergency landing.

On top of it - russia simply f*cking in a multiple possible ways. Its just a disaster on top of disasters.

they could simply ALLOW to land airplane on they land and hide what happen (similar to what they did with CEO of Total airplane or Polish presedent "accidents").

Plus this might save everyone on the plane, case it might had enough brake fluids and other liquids to make a safe landing.

But no their decided to sink it in the sea to hide any possible proofs.

Hopefully this is the wake-up call for emirates, Qatar, Turkish, and air India to stop flying over Russian airspace permanently.

I wonder if airlines have insurance for this sort of thing.

Yes, airlines apparently regularly have coverage that would apply to this “sort of thing” (war risk), however, insurers fo place limits on it based on geopolitical circumstances (post-9/11, it became very hard to get privately and Congress mandated the FAA offer it for US carriers as part of a wide set of measures designed to prevent the collapse of the American airline industry; relieving them of liability risk of security failures by nationalizing travel security with the TSA was also one of these measures.) Relevant to the current case, international insurers have apparently recently imposed geographical limits as part ofnthe standard terms for such insurance (though special policies can be negotiated) excluding (with some exceptions) losses related to operations in Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine. Not really sure what specific insurance the particular carrier here has or how being shot over Russia but crashing in Kazakhstan has on the application of any geographic limits that may have applied.

It’s my understanding that this insurance all somehow goes back to Lloyd’s of London but maybe there’s a Dubai based entity in there now too. Which means theoretically USA could push its might to stop Russia overflights. I’ve found it really unusual they haven’t - especially considering Air India’s 2 Arctic diversions the past few years on flights to/from USA (questionable to what extent any of their staff were actually trained in arctic ops)

[dupe] more discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42511267

The things Russia did to avoid responsibility and push them out of Russian airspace is insane. After shooting the plane Russia denied the plane from landing in three different Russian airports.

https://caliber.az/en/post/preliminary-investigation-azal-ai...

Is the Russian government even competent enough to pull this off? This theory would require whoever shot them down to realize they shot down the wrong plane, convey this up the chain of command, and then contact air traffic control to tell them to deny landing permissions, all within the span of a few minutes. In an earlier thread other people mentioned it was reason given by ATC for the denial was fog. That seems more plausible to me given the russian state isn't some hivemind with perfect communication.

edit:

sources for the fog claim

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42511939

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42511649

you are assuming it was an accidental shoot-down...on the other hand, if you assume it was on purpose, then all russian unfolding actions make complete sense (fog or not)...this is why itll be interesting to know who was in that plane

This seems plausible, but does anyone have any information on the reliability of this particular news source and/or confirmation from other sources?

Reuters also reporting it via their own sources: https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/azerbaijan-airlin...

Thanks! Likely to be the same original sources but it’s separate reporting which increases my confidence — really appreciate this.

The source is really the Azerbaijani government - it's their investigative body and their claim.

>it's their investigative body and their claim.

Is there a first hand source for this? So far as I can tell, the only thing we know for sure is that "AnewZ.tv" claims the government claims that it was shot down. That's not the same as "The source is really the Azerbaijani government".

I mean, you can look up all the other reporting on this. It's more or less what's interesting about this news - the Azerbaijanis feel confident enough to make this claim semi-officially and the way it's going, will probably make it more formally soon enough.

My point was 'how reliable is this particular news source' isn't going to tell you anything, what you can derive from the item is that Azerbaijan feels fairly confident their plane was shot down.

No. Reuters, EuroNews, this source, and others are all claiming to have sources close to the investigation that have indicated that is what the investigation has found, no one I have seen claims an official statement from the investigation has been released with this conclusion.

There is a difference between leaks from an official investigation and the official outcome of the investigation. Official organs of the Azerbaijan government are not (yet) accusing Russia of shooting the plane with a missile.

It's completely Azerbaijan slow-rolling the accusation. All the 'sources close to the investigation' are from Azerbaijan, you see stuff like https://turan.az/en/politics/the-russian-side-must-apologize...

It's a highly authoritarian state with a complicated relationship with Russia. You're applying generic media literacy 101 to something where it's not readily applicable.

> It’s completely Azerbaijan slow-rolling the accusation

Duh.

> You’re applying generic media literacy 101 to something where it’s not readily applicable.

Yes, it’s readily applicable. The difference between a state making an official accusation and it deliberately keeping the accusation unofficial is just as significant, arguably even moreso, when it is an authoritarian state which controls the message in either case then when it is, say, a bureaucratic liberal democracy which is simply following investigative protocol.

Duh

I'm sorry but this is just aggro dumbassery/pedantry.

It was honestly pretty obvious from the first videos that came out.

You have:

The claim of a bird strike, but not during landing or (shortly after) takeoff, but at cruising altitude. That HAS happened, but is incredibly rare.

The of a bird strike taking out both engines, which is another possible, but very rare thing.

It is unlikely that a double-engine failure would have allowed the jet to cross the Caspian Sea and make two approaches to the airport they ended up crashing near.

The video of the jet on approach showed no movement of any control surfaces, which supports the notion of a total hydraulic failure.

The video of the jet on approach showed it engaged in phugoid oscillation, which is consistent along with the above video with the pilots having only minimal control over some surfaces, or more likely, being forced to use thrust vectoring alone to control the craft.

Videos taken by passengers showing shrapnel damage, including some very striking video and stills of the pattern before the crash.

Videos taken on the ground of the tail-section, which show a pattern of shrapnel that is consistent with the annular shrapnel pattern you'd expect from a continuous-rod warhead, which is what you'd expect from the Pantsir system.

So all of that circumstantial evidence is striking, and all points in one direction. Now the people who have access to the black boxes are claiming that it was a shoot-down, and frankly I'd be inclined to believe them.

don't understand the downvotes on your post. What do an average hackernews reader know about this particular news site?

I had a similar response to the linked source - how am I sure it's real news and not some fake website.

People gonna people. I don’t ever recommend taking downvotes or upvotes too seriously. Asking for verification is often seen as criticism of the original source, and in some cases it is. Personally I’m at the point where I doublecheck most things, especially those which confirm my opinions… but nobody here knows me so hey!

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