Thursday, January 9, 2020

Opuscula

World has
To wonder
About UI jet


UPDATE: Iran admits shooting down the Ukrainian plane; claims to have arrested shooters.

THE WORLD HAS TO WONDER: Did an Iranian missile down the Ukrainian jet murdering 178 people on board?

Boeing 737-800 in Ukraine International livery

THE QUESTION IS RAISED BECAUSE, as numerous internet sources claim

    1: Iran won’t release the aircraft’s black boxes to internationally respected experts, 2: Iran won’t allow, as this is keyed, Ukrainians to get close to the plane, and 3: There allegedly are missile fragments from one of the Russian Tor-M1s1 delivered to Iran in 2007.

The Iranians deny the Ukrainian plane was downed by a missile. (That is true. The plane was downed by TWO Iranian missiles.)

So far, no one has blamed either the U.S. or Israel of causing the plane crash.

The downed aircraft was a relatively new Boeing 737-800. Given decent routine maintenance, the Boeing 737-800 has a generally good safety record. Most of the accidents involving the 737-800 were due to “pilot error.”2

The 737-800 is not a 737 MAX and has different avionics, according to Boeing.

The Question

According to the Iranians, The crew of a Ukrainian jetliner that crashed in Iran never made a radio call for help and were trying to turn back for the airport when the plane went down.3

I’m not an experienced pilot, but it is hard to comprehend IF the aircraft crew was “trying to turn back to the airport” there was no Mayday call; no request to clear a runway or have a crash crew standing by. Standard procedure when an aircraft deviates from a flight plan is to alert the nearest airport.

According to Ukraine International Airlines (UIA), there were three people on the flight deck: pilot, co-pilot/first officer, and a pilot/instructor.4 The least experienced pilot was the first officer who had “only” 7,600 hours on Boeing 737 type aircraft.

Why three pilots? The airline contends that “Tehran airport is anything but a simple one. Therefore, for several years UIA has been using this airport to conduct training on Boeing 737 aircraft aimed at evaluating pilots’ proficiency and ability to act in emergency cases.”

Given that, so far, the Iranians are not blaming the U.S. or Israel, and that they, so far, are denying the plane was brought down by a missile — ANYONE’S missile — what reason would anyone have for bringing down the airplane?

Accident?

The crash came immediately after Iran launched a ballistic missile attack against Iraqi military bases housing U.S. troops.

The passenger list included 82 Iranians, at least 63 Canadians and 11 Ukrainians, according to officials. No U.S. citizens.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said 138 of the passengers were bound for Canada. The flight also included a family of four and newlyweds, too. The manifest listed several teenagers and children, some as young as 1 or 2.3

Trudeau blames Iran's shooting down of Ukrainian passenger plane. (https://tinyurl.com/tu3s3kt) The U.S. should have informed him before taking action (so he could warn the general of impending doom which, according to Trudeau escalated tensions that led to Iran's murder of 176 people?)

People NOT “in the know”

Meanwhile, the internet is alive with “authorities” who claim that the Ukrainian flight was downed by an Iranian missile.

As this is keyed, there is no evidence pointing to any specific cause for the crash. Iran’s bellicose leadership and its apparent reluctance to allow foreign investigators, including from the Ukraine, to approach the crash site DOES raise suspicion about a missile — fired at the plane or strayed off a U.S. target — does raise suspicions.

Was the deaths of 176 passengers and crew an accident? Did a missile go astray? Did the Iranians shoot down the plane for reasons known only to the ayatollahs?



Sources

1. Tor M1: https://tinyurl.com/tg6p32t

2. Pilot error: https://tinyurl.com/t636knn

3. Turning back: https://tinyurl.com/v9rsyvf

4. Three pilots: https://tinyurl.com/rpg9hd3

PLAGIARISM is the act of appropriating the literary composition of another, or parts or passages of his writings, or the ideas or language of the same, and passing them off as the product of one’s own mind.

Truth is an absolute defense to defamation. Defamation is a false statement of fact. If the statement was accurate, then by definition it wasn’t defamatory.

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