Interfax News Agency
Russia & CIS Military Newswire
July 26, 2006 Wednesday 2:10 PM MSK
MOSCOW July 26
The crash of an Airbus A320 passenger jet belonging to the Armavia airline near Sochi on May 3 happened due to the fault of the crew, Transportation Minister and head of an ad hoc government commission investigating the crash Igor Levitin said at a press conference in Moscow on Wednesday.
"The human factor played its role in difficult weather conditions," Levitin said.
Tatyana Anodina, the head of the Interstate Aviation Committee, a CIS organization investigating air incidents, told journalists that "the plane was landing on autopilot and strictly following the glide slope in a landing configuration, when it received a report from air traffic control that the cloud base was lowering. The plane stopped descending at a speed of around 340 meters, and started a right climbing turn.
While performing this turn, the captain switched the autopilot off and made the plane to descend."
"These actions by the captain were not properly controlled by the second pilot, and the crew's following actions were uncoordinated and inadequate to roll the plane out," Anodina said.
As for suggestions that the crash could have been caused by a mechanical fault, the commission's conclusion reads, "There were no malfunctions in the aircraft's engines and systems, and the plane normally responded to both the autopilot's commands and the crew's actions. There was enough fuel on board to safely complete the flight."
The A320 crash near Sochi at 2:13 a.m. Moscow time on May 3 (2213 GMT on May 2) killed 105 passengers and eight crewmembers.
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