Suspicions that the Azerbaijan Airlines Embraer E190 was hit by Russian air defenses in Chechnya emerged shortly after images of the plane’s wreckage showed shrapnel holes in its tail.
On Thursday, Azerbaijani government officials monitoring the investigation confirmed to Reuters that the aircraft, registered 4K-AZ65, was indeed shot down by the Pantsir-S missile system.
Flight J2-8243 had taken off from Baku bound for Grozny, Chechnya, during Christmas, but after attempting to land at the local airport it was prevented from landing due to a drone attack in the region.
Azerbaijani officials say AZAL Embraer 190 was hit by Russian air defenses in Chechnya #AzerbaijanAirlines pic.twitter.com/typOJzc6c8
— Air Data News (@airwayaviation) December 26, 2024
The jet’s crew decided to fly west, crossing the Caspian Sea to the Kazakh coast, where they attempted an emergency landing in Aktau, but the aircraft crashed minutes before reaching the runway.
Of the 67 occupants, 38 died, but some survivors walked away from the wreckage of the plane.
ADS-B jamming and shrapnel holes in the aircraft
Shortly after the accident, Rosaviatsia, the Russian civil aviation agency, stated that the Azerbaijan jet had been hit by a bird strike and that the weather in the Grozny region prevented it from landing.
However, some signs raised suspicions that something was happening in Chechnya. In addition to the drone attack, the ADS-B signals were jammed, making it difficult to read the aircraft’s data.
The aircraft’s behavior in its final moments suggests that the pilots struggled to keep it aloft, maneuvering to increase altitude and then diving to avoid a stall.
Videos recorded by passengers showed that the oxygen masks had been deployed and that a section of the left flap extender was damaged.
Embraer’s E-Jets family of regional jets has delivered more than 1,800 aircraft in just over 20 years of service.
Only two fatal accidents had occurred before the Azerbaijan Airlines plane, one caused by human error in 2010 in China and another by intentional action in Namibia in 2013.
The audio and flight data recorders from the Embraer plane were recovered by Kazakh authorities.
