SAWT BEIRUT INTERNATIONAL

| 18 September 2024, Wednesday |

Ukraine helicopter was flying low in foggy weather before crash

In horrible weather, the interior minister was among the fourteen people killed when a helicopter crashed in a suburb of Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine, on Thursday, according to prosecutors. The chopper was operating at a low altitude.

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy referred to the helicopter crash on January 18 as a “terrible tragedy” and then demanded an investigation. The chopper fell in fog close to a nursery.

Interior Minister Denys Monastyrskyi, 42, a prominent member of Zelenskiy’s team in fighting Russia’s invasion, and his first deputy were among the dead.

The helicopter had been flying to a location near the frontline. The Prosecutor General’s office accused five emergency services officials of violating flight safety rules.

“According to the investigation, the officials committed flagrant violations of the rules of traffic safety and operating air transport, which caused the death of people,” the statement said.

They were also investigating the head of the department for flight safety at the emergency services for negligence.

The prosecutors did not name the emergency services officials.

The prosecutors said that officials had used the helicopter that was on duty to respond to potential emergencies in Kyiv and nearby and that it had no permits for other types of flights.

The crew commander was not informed of the weather along the flight route, and in particular over Brovary, an eastern suburb of Kyiv where the aircraft crashed. The crew also had no appropriate permits to fly in difficult weather, the prosecutors said.

Due to the difficult weather conditions, the helicopter crew was forced to fly at an extremely low altitude, even lower than the height of the buildings along the route, the prosecutors said.

The crew commander saw an obstacle and began to perform a circling manoeuvre, but he abruptly climbed, lost his orientation and crashed due to lack of necessary skills, they said.

The day of the crash was reconstructed minute by minute during the pre-trial investigation, including the decoding of the black boxes, they added.

    Source:
  • Reuters