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See my previous comments in fp story by Migeru National mourning in Poland
and Arthur Gilroy’s diary Putin Heads Investigation Into Polish Crash?
Looking at ILS compatibility and communication in Russian between pilots and ATC
(Aviation Herald) – The air traffic controller at the Air Base said, the airplane attempted only one approach before radio contact was lost.
Russia’s Prime Minister Putin was briefed by local officials, that the required horizontal visibility for the approach to the North Airport would have been 1000 meters with an actual visibility of 400 meters. The airplane impacted trees of a height of about 8 meters (26 feet) about 1200 meters (3950 feet) short of the airfield when the airplane should have been at a height of at least 60 meters (200 feet). The airplane continued to impact multiple single trees and was destroyed before the airplane impacted ground. Emergency responders reached the crash site within 3 minutes. An investigation team of 60 people is on scene.
The air traffic controller at Smolensk Air Base (Northern Airport) said, that the communication between him and the crew was done in Russian, the crew understanding Russian but not being fluent in the language and having trouble to do their readbacks. The airplane was on its first approach, when he advised of the deteriorating visibility and recommended to divert, the crew however responded, that they would give it one try and divert thereafter if they were not able to land. During the approach the crew stopped reading back, the aircraft subsequently impacted ground.
Polish officials confirmed, that the airplane was on its first approach to the Air Base, when it impacted the trees. Three flights were to land at the Air Base in that period of time: the first was a Yakovlev YAK-40 carrying journalists accompanying Poland’s president, which made a safe landing. The second was a Russian Ilyushin IL-76, which diverted after two unsuccessful approaches. The third was the presidential Tupolev TU-154M.
In one of my first comments I linked to these two possibilities:
Perhaps if the ILS equipment had a malfunction … or pilot received erroneous data from ATC.
(RT News) – Speaking to RT, defense analyst and former Polish military pilot Mikhal Fisher noted a previously unmentioned factor that possibly was one of the reasons for the crash.
- “In the Soviet Union/Russia they use a unique instrumental landing system called PRMG. It works almost exactly the same way as the international Western system ILS. However, the two are not compatible. The Polish airplane was modified to use the ILS, as the [Soviet] airplane was mainly flying to various airports that use it.”
Former test pilot Magomed Tolboev told RT that of all the crashes in which the TU-154 aircraft has been involved, only 10 per cent were caused by technical problems.
(Flighglobal) – The investigation found that aircraft 019 – one of the air force’s two newest EADS Casa C-295s and assigned to its 13th Air Transport Squadron- was fully serviceable at the time of the accident, and that a mix of bad weather, air crew inexperience and air traffic control failings led to its loss near Miroslawiec air base.
The C-295 crew reported in to Miroslawiec control and descended to 8,000ft (2,440m), but received inaccurate information about weather conditions, which included a cloud base of 60-90m and visibility worsening to 3km (1.6nm), with haze and a crosswind. Air traffic controllers also reported altitude in metres rather than feet, as displayed on the C-295’s instruments.
My earlier comment: Tupolev TU-154M Crash
Pilot was advised to divert due to heavy fog, it’s the captain’s call and responsibility. Runway length 2,500 mtr (8,200 ft) isn’t very long, came in too low trying to land not being aware of tall tree tops. Poor pilot judgement, safety record of the Tupolev TU-154M is poor and problems were pre-existent in recent past.
(Aviation Herald) – A Polish Air Force Tupolev TU-154M was on approach to Smolensk North Airport‘s (Air Base) unmarked runway (runway heading approximately 270 degrees) in developing dense fog, when the airplane impacted trees about 1500-2000 meters short of the runway and crashed onto the ground coming to rest about 700 meters short of the runway threshold.
The crew was advised by air traffic control in Belarus not to continue to Smolensk due to fog, but to divert to Minsk and later, after hand off to Russian ATC, Russian Air Traffic Controllers recommended to divert to Moscow, the crew however continued to Smolensk. [Notable passengers list]
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I suppose the aircraft in a holding pattern circling a few times could be mistaken for an earlier attempt to land. The locals do not refer to any earlier landing attempts.
Smolensk Crash: Locals eyewitness Kaczynski plane coming down (Video)
Polish Journalists Escape Death
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(RT.com) – Polish journalists arrived in Smolensk an hour before the air catastrophe and were among the first to get to the site of the crash. They would have flown on the president’s plane had the delegation not been so large.
See extended report by the Polish journalists who arrived at the crash site within 20 minutes.
[Their smaller aircraft did make a landing at Smolensk airport. I’m nor sure if this was the civilian or military (north) airport. – Oui]
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."l think any fault that one would want to ascribe to the lLS system can be discounted based on this report:
bad luck all round, eh.
Russia cites pilot error for Polish jet crash
And here’s something I haven’t seen elsewhere:
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Fourth attempt was the presumption in the first hours after the crash, see Polish paper Krakow Post. Later this has been debunked. The site I linked to seems to be more knowledgeable on aviation matters. Btw, Polish journalists were at the scene shortly after the crash. All video material were confiscated, an overreaction? A single video of the crash site was relayed to Poland, the reporter was arrested and later released after intervention by Polish officials.
Further confusion probably due to earlier two landing attempts by Russian military plane IL-76. According to History : Weather Underground between 7:00 AM and 10:00 AM that morning the visibility at Smolensk airport changed from 4 kilometers to 0.5 kilometers, the conditions from mist to heavy fog!
Putting blame on VIP syndrome and Katyń massacre controversy between Putin and Kaczynski. The so called ‘four attempts’ is used as argument for external pressure applied to plane captain. Information received, the captain was present as first officer in plane incident of Kaczynski’s Tupolev refusing to land in Georgia.
Another forum with expert input into discussion:
If you zoom in a bit and choose “hybrid” view the crash location is fairly clear. ASN Accident location map 10 APR 2010 Tupolev 154M 101. In approach between dirt road and paved street is an elevation with tall trees, this is approx. 1.2 km from runway. The plane crashed and ended in mostly open field at approx. 300 meters from runway. For explanation of coming in too low, I did found this reasoning due to language barrier with Russian numbers in translation of QNH and QFE altimeter setting. Diagrams which may help those unfamiliar with overseas QFE altimetry. Was there a communication break down between ATC and the pilot?
– Transcript by Google translation
Later video report from RT.com has been ‘sanitized’:
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence.".
Russian link
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence.".
(David Buchanan) – “The pilot told Mr Plyusnin (the Russian air controller at Smolensk) that he would make one approach to land before switching to an alternate destination if he did not succeed.” Another news source has eyewitnesses describing the crash. None of them mention the plane making multiple attempts to land. Another article reports “The air traffic controller at the Air Base said, the airplane attempted only one approach before radio contact was lost.”
Who would want to eliminate the Polish government? An article in Jewish Currents entitled “The Return of the Radical Right in Poland” reports “Something has gone very, very wrong in Poland. After elections last September, a group called `Law and Justice,’ led by a longtime Solidarity activist and right-wing politician named Jaroslaw Kaczynski, emerged as the largest party in parliament.
All it would have taken to cause the accident at Smolensk would have been the sabotage of the plane’s altimeter so that the pilot would have thought he was higher up than he was. Thousands of planes land in bad weather in Europe and the US and only a tiny number crash. The arch-criminal Franklin Delano Roosevelt (?) once said “In politics, nothing happens by accident. If it happens, you can bet it was planned that way.”
Polish pilot Arkadiusz Protasiuk spoke Russian fluenty
[Some links added are minde – Oui]
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."