The reason for the Tu-134 crash was found on the ground

The reason for the Tu-134 crash was found on the ground

Published: 8 July, 2011, 03:34

­Investigators became interested in the technical equipment at Besovets Airport, where 47 people died in a plane crash in July.  

During the course of the investigation, the commission determined that a mistake made by the crew was not the only factor that led to the tragedy. Pilots went to land the plane while relying on deficient airfield equipment. Prior to departure to Petrozavodsk, aircraft commander Aleksandr Fedotov was informed of a sudden deterioration in weather conditions in Petrozavodsk. However, the aircraft was allowed to takeoff, because the weather conditions were consistent with the allowable limit.   

“When the airplane passed through the first drive, it reported to ground control,” a source close to the investigation told Izvestia. “The dispatcher warned that the cloud height was lower than usual, and recommended changing course to another airfield. But the commander responded that he would continue to land. The airplane went through the first drive at an exceedingly high altitude and therefore went into a sharp descent. As a result, the crew failed to keep up with the vertical speed.”   

Investigators determined that the dispatcher noticed the airplane had diverted its course when it was already at a height of 15 meters instead of 60 meters, and at the distance of 1 kilometer away from the airfield. He recommended going for another loop before landing. The pilot jerked on the control wheel, the airplane tipped and brushing against treetops. Had the dispatcher informed him a minute earlier, the catastrophe could have been avoided.

“The dispatcher is not at fault!”, the president of the Russian Trade Union of Air Dispatchers, Sergey Kovalev, told Izvestia. “The Besovets Airport does not have a landing locator. Once there had been one. Instead, now there is a dispatcher’s locator – which is a screen displaying a moving flashing dot. The dispatcher only sees the direction of the flight, but cannot recognize a minor deviation from the course at a distance of 2 kilometer, or a dangerous decrease in altitude.”

Pilots are also complaining about outdated equipment.

“I am very familiar with the Besovets airfield,” Honored Pilot of Russia Leonid Scherbak told Izvestia. “Its only landing system is the OSP blind landing equipment. In all Russian airports it is used only as a spare. The OSP at Besovets has an error margin of 10-12 degrees. All pilots who land there in poor weather conditions always miss the airfield on the first try.”   

The Besovets Airport has had been shut down several times due to non-compliance with safety regulations. The most recent attempt to close it was made by the Northwestern Transportation Prosecutor’s Office in February. Several times, the airport even filed for bankruptcy and changed owners. In 2009, the government of the republic, having paid the previous owner’s debt of 47 million rubles, reopened the airport and became its owner.

“In course of the Prosecutor Office’s investigation, it was discovered that the airport did not have an aviation safety license,” a senior assistant to the prosecutor general of the Republic of Karelia, Tatiana Kordyukova, told Izvestia.

Neither did the airport have search-and-rescue and emergency response certification. The airport’s operations were found by the prosecutors to be “threatening to the life and health of citizens.” However, local authorities did not allow for the airport to be shut down. The first thing that the head of Karelia, Andrey Nelidov, said after the catastrophe was: “The airport’s technical equipment could not have been the cause of the accident.”

But pilots have a different opinion.

“If the airport had a landing locator, the catastrophe would have been averted,” said Sergey Kovalev. “RosAviation officials have argued that it is necessary to install an advanced landing system. But it is too expensive.”

The scandalous purchase of lighting navigation aids should have a special mention. Izvestia learned that in 2008, had opened a bid for the reconstruction of equipment at the airport in Karelia with a starting price of 53.6 million rubles. Initially, the Aviaspetsmontazh assembly and production firm won the bid. Its offer was 4 million rubles less, and included an extended warranty of 10 months. But on the same day it was suddenly discovered that the Aerotekhstroy company had actually won the bid. The bid organizer explained the initial information as a technical error. As a result, equipment was purchased for twice the original price – 139 million rubles.

http://www.bne.eu/storyf2774/MOSCOW_BLOG_Duma_approves_bill_to_lower_election_threshold

The state Duma passed this week in its first of three readings a bill that will reduce the election threshold needed to get into parliament from the current 7% to 5%, the approval of which says a lot about the Dmitry Medvedev-Vladimir Putin duo's plans for politics.

The bill was submitted to the Russian parliament's lower house by President Dmitry Medvedev. First and foremost, it shows the Kremlin is getting ready to loosen its hold on political power and civil society. In effect, it has conceded the fact that the people are tired and want more say over how the country is run. The Kremlin is also preparing to cede more power to genuine opposition groups. This strongly suggests that in future elections the Kremlin will be satisfied with a simple majority.

But not in the parliamentary elections set for December – the new bill won't come into effect until the following Duma elections. This means the Kremlin (ie. Prime Minister Putin) intends to go for a constitutional majority in the upcoming elections. But we knew that already thanks to the PM's move to set up a new alliance in an effort to revitalize the party of power's appeal to the electorate, as it becomes increasingly obvious that United Russia is bankrupt as a political force.

This bill also strongly suggests that Medvedev will stay on as president. This bill could only pass the Duma with Putin's approval, as the PM is fully in control of the parliament. Thus, the decision to pass this bill vindicates bne's belief that Putin intends to introduce more political freedom and gradually ease Russia towards something that looks more like a parliamentary democracy – but to do this slowly.

Both Putin and Medvedev have said explicitly that they want to avoid the mistake that Gorbachev made: he introduced political freedoms first, then tried to push through economic reforms, which led to the collapse of the system. Putin wants to do the economic reforms first and once he has build a stable and prosperous society, only then will he introduce the political freedoms.

This is one of the reasons he is pushing for increased home ownership so hard, as people who own property don't make good rebels. On July 6, he called on Sberbank to reduce interest rates to 8% and these two pieces of news are linked to the same goal.

Too far off

The news that Medvedev has ordered the bar on entry to the Russian parliament to be lowered is a major signal of the duo's future plans for politics in Russia, but this event has passed off with almost no comment. Easing control over politics (albeit in a very limited fashion) doesn't fit with the authoritarian stereotype that Putin's Russia has been branded with.

Political freedoms are coming and there is an increasing amount of noise that suggests as soon as the presidential elections in March are passed, we will see several new big reforms that will attempt to pick up the pace of change significantly.

But all said and done what is so disappointing about this news is that it will only apply to the 2015 elections. That means the opposition will be left in the wildness for another four years.

It's a mistake, because the population is becoming increasingly disillusioned. The middle aged are already drawing parallels with the Brezhnev era, the middle class are frustrated with their political impotence and the young are leaving, complaining that the tight control the state has over the system means that social mobility has been destroyed. If you are not born into the privileged elite, it is extremely difficult to enter for anyone of modest origins.

Putin is betting that if he can repeat his trick of producing fast growth and material gain (incomes increase 14-fold while he was president), then this will be enough to satisfy the voters. But as people become wealthier, they also become increasingly political, or at least demand more say in the political process. If they don't get it, they will eventually revolt. Russia is already prosperous – the time to ease control over the political system is now.